People Before Profit blog

A “field of dreams” takes root in West Oakland

Wed, 29 Oct 2014 12:19:00 +0000

OAKLAND, Calif. - A vision took its first steps toward reality Oct. 27, as area elected officials and community leaders gathered in West Oakland to announce plans for an urban farm - and ultimately other small businesses and affordable housing units - all to be built, operated and cooperatively owned by formerly incarcerated people and others with severe employment challenges.

The enterprise's founders say they aim not just to start another re-entry program, but to create real cooperatively-owned, money-making businesses. They plan to start with an urban farm, producing greens and other vegetables through aquaponics and other organic methods and selling to local customers.

"We know this looks like nothing, it's been like this for three decades," Elaine Brown, the project's CEO, said as she looked out over the bedraggled vacant lot at 7th and Campbell Streets. "This is our place and we need to find the ways to make something happen. So we decided we would build a wonderful field of dreams."

Oakland and the World Enterprises, Inc., which has acquired the nearly one-acre lot, was founded by Brown, a longtime community activist, together with Alameda County Supervisor Keith Carson, who has long worked to help formerly incarcerated people overcome the serious problems they face, including barriers to employment.

Carson stressed that the project's mission goes far beyond "just growing fruits and vegetables," to "processing, selling, creating a work ethic, creating an opportunity for people to reconnect with their families and community, and become productive people in the community."

Among advisory board members: attorneys, a judge, a leader in urban farming, a formerly incarcerated activist, bankers, tech and sustainable development developers, realtors, a former Oakland City Councilmember, a Grammy-winning musician - to name a few.

Their goal is that once it's operational, the project will be financially self-sustaining. To get things going, they are putting resources together through private investments, philanthropic contributions and government funding.

Several speakers cited the area's rich history as a lively, largely African American community with successful businesses and a flourishing arts scene.

"As we stand on 7th St., said area City Councilmember Lynette Gibson McElhaney, "this was a thriving enterprise zone where black migrants from the south came and made their way in a segregated Oakland, creating businesses that worked."

McElhaney cited "decisions made in governmental houses" that resulted in the breaking up of the neighborhood, including erecting above-ground rapid transit tracks along 7th St. and building a huge Post Office. Large numbers of area residents were displaced in the process.

Construction of a freeway also divided the neighborhood and separated it from the city's downtown area.

Oakland Mayor Jean Quan recalled visiting West Oakland in the mid-1960s, when as a teenager she tutored neighborhood children. There she met Brown, then a Black Panther Party activist. When they learned that the new Post Office wasn't hiring area residents, Quan said, they helped tutor the children's parents so they could pass the Postal Service exam.

"Today with that vibrant community, with the Lincoln Theater and Esther's Orbit Room (a leading jazz venue) gone, I see this as part of rebuilding that heart and soul, and staking a cultural ground here, to make sure we don't forget our history," she said.

Board member Jerry Elster, now healing justice coordinator with the American Friends Service Committee and earlier incarcerated for over two decades, emphasized the project's role in achieving "true public safety - public housing, food, and job opportunities," with participants "becoming an owner, being invested in this."

After the urban farm is up and running, further plans include a fitness center, a tech business, a juice bar, athletic shoe and clothing manufacturing companies. A housing development is also planned for mixed income families, including those with low and very low incomes - all to be cooperatively owned.

Photo: Oakland and the World, Inc. board members gather with Elaine Brown (center), Oakland City Councilmember Lynette McElhaney (left) and Mayor Jean Quan (right). Marilyn Bechtel/PW

Rare rhino death as poaching worsens

Tue, 28 Oct 2014 16:29:00 +0000

The extremely rare northern white rhino - a subspecies of white rhino - may soon disappear. One of the last males, a 34 year-old rhino named Suni, died from natural causes on Oct. 17, at a nature reserve in Kenya, leaving just six northern white rhinos (only one of them male) remaining worldwide. Its close cousin, the southern white rhino, is also severely threatened. The low numbers are themselves largely a product of the relentless rhino poaching that occurs across Africa, and which has driven the animals as a whole to the brink of extinction. And the problem is getting worse.

Back in 2009, Suni was one of eight of its species at the Kenyan Ol Pejeta Conservancy as part of a last-resort effort to save its kind. To date, these rhinos have not fared well in captivity. But after all, experts point out, it's not as though they're exactly doing too well in the wild: according to some conservationists, a free-roaming rhino is killed for its horn every nine hours.

"It's a shame the [northern white rhino] subspecies got to that point," said Matthew Lewis, the World Wildlife Fund's senior program officer for African species conservation. Corralling surviving rhinos in that type of nature reserve represents "the worst-case scenario in trying to bring back a subspecies. Its story is a fantastic lesson on what not to do, and how we need to avoid getting to this point with other rhinos."

So what to do? The answer, most would say, is to continue to support efforts to stop poaching, which is the primary cause of the decline of rhinos, as well as elephants and other animals. "That we've lost the subspecies is a statement of just how bad off animals are across Africa," said Stuart Pimm, a conservation ecologist at North Carolina's Duke University. "It's a measure of the fact that rhinos are being massively poached and in trouble wherever they are. It also means we're losing this distinctive, important animal within the savanna ecosystem. It's not just another charismatic animal; it's also a species that has a very clear ecological role, and we need to be very worried that we lost that."

Large demonstrations took place Oct. 4 in 136 different cities, with activists calling for an end to rhino and elephant poaching, and seeking to draw greater attention to the issue in the eyes of the public. "There's a lot of talk, but we need to see more action," said Simon Jones, founder of nonprofit group Helping Rhinos. "We need more rangers on the ground and we need more campaigns in countries where ivory and rhino horns are sold."

Among those actions was a march that took place that day in Johannesburg, South Africa. One of the organizers, Dex Kotze, remarked, "We have to do this for future generations. The youth today are making a statement globally, in 136 cities, that it's their heritage that is being killed. South Africa, home to the world's largest rhino populations, has seen at least 700 killed so far this year. We are also here protesting against the political leaders of the world, who do not have the guts and political will to make appropriate changes in their laws."

Organizers there debuted a list of objectives, which included the demand for a global ban on the trade in ivory and rhino horns, stricter penalties for poachers who are caught, and better, more coordinated international cooperation in stopping what has arguably developed into a flourishing underground criminal industry.

Photo: Poaching protest in Johannesburg, South Africa. Black Focal Lens blog (GNU General Public License)

A rational response to the Ebola epidemic

Mon, 27 Oct 2014 15:43:00 +0000

The panic surrounding the 2014 Ebola epidemic is more infectious than the virus itself. This is the time for forward-thinking activists to take a deep breath and start countering the opportunists who are using this epidemic to further fuel their fear machine.

Ebola is a deadly virus that demands a forceful and thoughtful response. For several decades, global health authorities have documented and responded to Ebola virus epidemics in central Africa, primarily in the Democratic Republic of Congo. These epidemics have been rural in nature and have claimed relatively few victims. Over the decades, physicians have come to understand much about how the Ebola virus spreads from person to person and how it affects its victims.

The main difference between this epidemic and others is that this epidemic struck primarily urban areas in three West African countries: Guinea, Liberia, and Sierra Leone. The more densely populated urban areas have resulted in faster transmission and more deaths. As of Oct. 25, there have been 10,141 confirmed cases of Ebola and 4,922 deaths.

Ebola is difficult to spread. It is only possible to catch Ebola from another person who is currently showing symptoms; these are primarily fever, severe headache, muscle pain, weakness, diarrhea, vomiting, abdominal pain, and unexplained bruising or bleeding. The virus only spreads when body fluids from someone who is showing symptoms - blood, feces, urine, semen, saliva, breast milk, vomit, and sweat - come into contact with another person's mouth, nose, eyes, broken skin, or sexual organs. Ebola is not airborne, but can be spread through droplets (for example, when someone who is showing symptoms coughs or sneezes on another person). Ebola has an incubation period that lasts from two to 21 days; this means that after a person is exposed and if she does not develop symptoms within 21 days, then there is no chance that the person has Ebola.

The events at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital in Dallas triggered intense scrutiny of the mistakes that had led to Thomas Eric Duncan's initial hospital discharge and eventual infection of two nurses, Nina Pham and Amber Vinson. It became clear to public health authorities that without serious effort, U.S. hospitals were not adequately prepared to safely handle patients with Ebola. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have significantly modified their response for possible Ebola cases. When New York City's first Ebola case emerged, Bellevue Hospital followed the strict new protocols developed with the lessons learned from what happened in Texas.

While there is no question that serious missteps occurred at Texas Health Presbyterian, the overall response to Ebola has been driven much more by politics and fear than by rational public health considerations. All the elements of a best-selling news cycle can be found in this situation: racism against Africans, xenophobia, distrust of science and medicine, an opportunity to attack the Obama administration, gruesome details, and moving human-interest angles. As a result, the instinct of some politicians to transform this situation into possible electoral points has been the primary driver of our response. Fundamentally, the fact remains that Ebola presents a negligible risk for the average person living in the United States. Diseases such as heart disease, diabetes, injuries from motor vehicle accidents, depression, and influenza remain much more serious, and much more pressing, health care priorities. Minor precautions such frequent hand washing can even further decrease the vanishingly small risk any one individual has of contracting Ebola. Other measures, such as receiving a yearly influenza vaccine, will reduce people's risk of contracting a more prevalent disease that can be deadly and reduce the burden on our hospitals by reducing preventable trips to the ER.

One of the questions most politicized by the conservative fear machine has been the mandatory 21-day quarantine of individuals who are not sick. When New Jersey Governor Chris Christie ordered Kaci Hickox, an epidemiologist who recently returned from Sierra Leone, to remain quarantined in a tent outside Newark's University Hospital despite the fact that her blood tests were negative for Ebola, significant issues of distress and due process came to the fore. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention do not recommend quarantine of exposed individuals who are not showing symptoms, only that they stay home from work and check their temperatures twice per day. Mandatory quarantine of people who are not sick places a major strain on health systems that are already stressed and may dissuade health care workers from caring for patients with Ebola in West Africa and at home.

While Ebola is not anywhere close to a crisis in the United States, it is a major crisis in Guinea, Liberia, and Sierra Leone. Many health care workers in these countries have become infected and died while treating others affected by Ebola; this has created a near-collapse of those nations' health care systems. Even while Ebola continues to spread, other diseases such as malaria, diarrheal diseases, injuries from accidents, and childbirth complications remain. Even prior to Ebola, these countries' health care systems were hard pressed to meet their nations' demand. Now, with hospitals and clinics overrun with Ebola patients, and many fewer trained professionals available, many more people are dying of other illnesses that previously would have been successfully treated. People who die of these other conditions are not counted in the Ebola statistics, but they are also victims of the Ebola outbreak. These three countries desperately need the international community to help them rebuild, equip, and staff their health care systems. Major investment in infrastructure, mobilization of medical volunteers, and donation of supplies is needed to ensure that the Ebola epidemic can be brought to heel. The world will only be safe from international spread if the epidemic can be controlled in West Africa. Once the epidemic is contained, then these countries will need significant help in training a new health care workforce to replace the hundreds of professionals who died during the epidemic.

Emphasizing the minute risk that Ebola poses to the U.S. population does not negate the need to ensure that our health care system is prepared to handle Ebola cases if they do appear in our emergency rooms. This must be done in a way that protects emergency and hospital workers. As their counterparts in West Africa, U.S. hospital workers do come into close and frequent contact with patients' bodily fluids. Hospital workers need access to adequate personal protective equipment and adequate training on how to safely use it. This training is difficult to provide because it is time consuming and requires workers to role-play use of the equipment numerous times until each one can use it without making any mistakes. Many states are designating specific hospitals to provide Ebola care and intensively training the workers who would be providing care to Ebola patients. These states are also developing specific protocols on how to transfer patients to these Ebola-designated hospitals. Labor unions representing hospital workers have been at the forefront of making sure that their members receive the equipment and training they need to ensure that hospitals can provide the best and safest care to all patients.

So what is to be done? Knee-jerk and politically driven programs such as mandatory quarantines and border closures serve only to strengthen fear-driven politics without increasing public safety. Conservatives will work hard to strengthen racist and xenophobic narratives and to score political points against Democrats prior to the upcoming election. Progressives must counter Ebola hysteria by pushing policies that are based on public health science. It is only by demanding a level-headed response that we can ensure that critical humanitarian aid arrives in West Africa, that our health care system is ready to handle Ebola, and that we continue to increase access and quality in our health care system.

Photo: Centers for Disease Control disease detective Rupa with Guinean colleagues, at the river border between Guinea and Sierra Leone (via CDC).

Minnesota wolves hounded as hunting licenses increase

Fri, 24 Oct 2014 15:33:00 +0000

After announcing on Jul. 24 the onset of the wolf hunting and trapping season, the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources (DNR) announced it would issue 500 more licenses than last year, and increase the number of wolves that could be killed by nearly 14 percent. At a time when wolves throughout the U.S. are endangered, and only just starting to make a comeback in some states, these actions have fueled a climate of concern and outrage amongst animal rights activists and environmentalists, for some important reasons.

The state DNR has overall made 3,800 licenses available for 2014, and will allow up to 250 wolves to be killed (an uptick from last year's 220), before the season's closure. The basis for the increase is the DNR's apparent estimate that the Minnesota gray wolf population is "stable, with no significant change from the 2013 estimate." This can be seen as something of a logical fallacy, as what occurs amongst the wolf population in one state has a ripple effect on that of another. In fact, the Wisconsin DNR issued a report in April this year, noting that there was a 19 percent decrease in that state's wolf population in 2013 - notably, after hunting permits in that state were doubled during the fall of that year, but also likely affected by hunting in neighboring states as well.

Maureen Hackett, a founder of Howling for Wolves, a conservational wolf advocacy group, said that the bottom line is "people need to know that no matter what they say, the [Minnesota] DNR clearly doesn't have the best interest of wolves in mind, to be having another season, with more wolves killed, so quickly after they were on the endangered species list. The DNR has no idea what kind of mortality [rate] wolves are seeing for poaching and vehicles, or other problems - so they really don't know how many wolves are out there."

Though some argue that the expansion of wolves into other U.S. states is a sign that they are no longer endangered, Hackett suggested that conclusion is not quite logical, either. She remarked that shooting or trapping individual wolves "disrupts the pack's social order" and causes the individual members to disperse. It's probable that this is a key component in their wandering into long-uninhabited territory. And those stray wolves are not faring well. In August 2013, the first wolf in 150 years was found in Kentucky, and then promptly shot and killed by a hunter, who had mistaken it for a coyote.

A common argument made by wolf-hunting supporters is that the animals prey heavily upon white-tailed deer, negatively affecting the population, but this is largely untrue. In fact, deer are overpopulated, and this itself is at least partly a byproduct of wild wolf depletion, and is furthermore causing ecological problems. Some animal welfare advocates were up in arms after an 11 year-old Michigan hunter killed an albino deer this month while on a hunting trip with his father. But the truth is, aside from that animal's unique color, the incident was inconsequential; deer across the U.S. are still growing in troubling numbers despite hunting.

According to Nature World News, a recent study conducted by researchers at Cornell University found that the rise in deer populations is contributing to long-term deforestation, as the animals' grazing habits are preventing trees and other plants from maturing. Anurag Agrawal, Cornell professor of ecology and evolutionary biology who was one of the authors of the study, said, "Deer are slowing down forest succession or natural establishment. In fact, the deer are preventing forests from establishing." This is because deer prefer to eat the seeds of native woody plants (trees and shrubbery), and do so in vast numbers while rejecting those found in invasive plants (mostly weeds).

Native Americans, meanwhile, have also spoken out against the wolf killing, as Peter David, biologist with the Great Lakes Indian Fish and Wildlife Commission (GLIFWC) pointed out. "Tribes feel strongly that wolves provide real benefits, both ecologically and spiritually," he said. "The state's actions have greatly diminished those benefits. The tribes have great concerns about what is happening to the wolf."

James Zorn, executive administrator of GLIFWC, concluded, "We understand wolves to be educators, teaching us about hunting and working together in extended family units. We oppose wolf hunts. Wolves exemplify perseverance, guardianship, intelligence, and wisdom."

Photo: AP

At state park, fight is on to stop mountaintop removal

Tue, 21 Oct 2014 15:45:00 +0000

The Kanawha Forest Coalition, a group composed of local residents and environmental organizations, is desperately fighting a mountaintop removal project just outside of Kanawha State Forest, a state park in Loudendale, West Virginia. The coalition held the first of three educational lunchtime discussions Oct. 20 at the Kanawha County Public Library, giving the public an opportunity to learn about the dangers posed by this ecologically devastating practice. Meanwhile, this latest mountaintop removal operation comes at a time when a new peer-reviewed study has strongly linked its effects to lung cancer.

The operation in West Virginia is being conducted by coal and petcoke production company Keystone Industries, LLC, who in May obtained a permit from the state's Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) allowing them to mine just 418 acres east of Kanawha State Forest. Mining has been taking place since June, even though the detrimental effects it causes to the environment and people's health are well-documented. And given the added sensitivity of a state park and the wildlife it contains, the Forest Coalition believed it was time to get the word out to the general public, particularly in an attempt to generate grassroots support for a local movement against mountaintop removal.

The issue is of both ecological and economic import, Coalition member Doug Wood remarked: "If we're that close [to Kanawha State Forest], there are certain things that can happen that will damage the potential for tourism out there - blasting noise, for one thing; dust another thing. There's potential damage to the water resources that flow through the forest also, and to the fish and wildlife." He said the group hoped that Keystone's permit would be rescinded, allowing the land they are tampering with to be purchased by a conservation organization. The best likely bet to have the permit withdrawn would be to effectively point out the negative health effects the project could create. But any push to have the state DEP disallow the company from continuing would require a political effort, he added. "It would take a lot of the public getting involved, telling their elected representatives and Gov. Tomblin to look this over very closely."

Mountaintop removal is a notoriously messy and destructive fossil fuel mining method, which involves blowing off mountain peaks to access the coal within; the resultant debris then falls into bodies of water and valleys below. The practice has decimated large parts of the Appalachian landscape, caused health epidemics for local communities, and taken jobs away from people (the work is mostly done by huge machines, with only a handful of workers required to operate them). Now, a study by researchers from West Virginia University's Mary Babb Cancer Center found conclusively that the coal dust-laced particulate matter circulated into the air from this mining is directly linked to a decades-long spate of lung cancer.

In its introduction the study stated, "Epidemiological studies suggest that living near mountain coal mining activities is one of the contributing factors for high lung cancer incidence." The University of Indiana's Dr. Michael Hendryx, who had published earlier studies on the correlation, said, "This study shows that dust collected from mountaintop removal communities promotes lung cancer. Previous studies have shown this," and furthermore showed that it's "not due to smoking. But with this study we now have solid evidence that dust collected from residential areas near mountaintop removal sites causes cancerous changes to human lung cells."

Environmentalists say that the Obama administration needs to step in on this issue, curbing the spread of this harmful dust in the same way that the EPA has done with CO2 and mercury emissions. Non-profit environmental group Appalachian Voices explained that mountaintop removal, or 'surface coal mining,' "has been going on in Appalachia for a long time. The regulations have been modified a few times, the markets have had their ups and downs, and some of the names of the coal companies are different than they used to be. Aside from that, not much has changed. In 2009, there was a great deal of excitement about conversations with Obama administration officials," and people hoped the EPA would be "eager to hear from communities and make some real changes. Yet, five years later, mountaintop removal is still happening in Appalachia."

Thom Kay, a member of the organization, said, "The coal industry and its allies in Congress have always been eager to dismiss claims that air and water pollution caused by mountaintop removal has any link to the high rates of lung cancer, cardiovascular disease, and birth defects. Will this new study get them to finally change their tune? I'm almost certain that it won't. It will be up to those of us who care about the health of Appalachian communities to raise our voices and simply drown them out."

Photo: A demonstrator sits atop a giant tripod sign outside the EPA headquarters in Washington, D.C., in an effort to draw attention to the administration's apparent lack of action on mountaintop removal. Pablo Martinez Monsivais/AP

Climate change requires a new abolition movement

Mon, 20 Oct 2014 15:30:00 +0000

With the elections a few weeks ahead and the People's Climate March in New York a few weeks in the rear view mirror, I'm reminded of a meeting in the Bronx that I attended and spoke at this summer. I wasn't the featured speaker by any means; a representative of 350.org was and made a very compelling speech about the science and consequences of atmospheric warming if present trends continue - "business as usual" as they say in the climate change community.

But when questions and comments were solicited from the audience, I took the opportunity to make some remarks.

Which I would like to share with People's World readers because what I said has some relevance, in my opinion (although you can judge), to the ongoing conversation on climate change.

It went something like this (full disclosure: I have taken considerable liberties in recreating my remarks):

I have two comments: one seemingly radical, the other seemingly pedestrian.

First the seemingly radical: Roughly a century and a half ago, our nation fought a Civil War. At the end of this bloody inter-sectional conflict, property ownership in human beings - forcibly uprooted from Africa, transported across the Atlantic in unspeakable conditions, and thrown against their will and in violation of their humanity into a relentlessly exploitative, violent, degrading, and racist labor system - was abolished.

Most of the nation cheered this historic event that liquidated the slave-owner class and its mode of production, unshackled three and a half million human beings (who were also major actors in their own liberation) from the chains of slavery, and gave the nation a new burst of freedom.

Admittedly, that freedom, despite enormous courage, sacrifice, and struggle, never fully materialized in the war's aftermath. In fact, a decade later and then for long into the next century, new forms of servitude - not slavery, but inhumane, violent, racist, and deeply exploitative nonetheless - shaped the political economy and freedom prospects in the former Confederate states. It also turned the South into a drag on the democratic and progressive development of the whole country at the time, and to this very day.

That, however, doesn't take away from the historic significance of the fact that millions, black and white, came to the conclusion - not for the same reasons (they varied depending on one's social status, circumstances, and sensibilities) nor at the same time (many white people came to abolitionist positions in the course of the war, including, and to his credit, President Lincoln) - that ownership of human beings by other human beings had to be abolished.

In other words, slave property that had once been sanctioned by the court, the pulpit, seats of higher learning, custom, and, above all, force, became illegitimate, outmoded, and dispensable in the eyes of a sizable section of the American people, beginning with the slaves and freed black people and their white allies in the North.

Now fast forward to the present. Notwithstanding obvious political, economic, and ethical/moral differences, shouldn't we use the precedent of that first abolition and the inspiration of the anti-slavery movement to build a modern-day majority movement to abolish another form of property that shackles the country in a different, but perilous way - private ownership of energy resources?

Can we afford to allow the profit motive - the lifeblood and life force of privately owned energy corporations (and other corporations for that matter) - rather than human values and planetary sustainability - to dictate national energy policy and development at a time when our atmosphere is approaching dangerous tipping points that when reached will have catastrophic consequences?

Can we any longer permit the energy corporate elite - the Koch brothers and others - to bankroll the campaign to deny the science of climate change, corrupt the election process with their money, and fiercely resist any, even the most modest, measures to cut down on carbon emissions released into the atmosphere?

Can humankind meet the challenge to slow down, halt, and reverse the buildup of emissions in the atmosphere without abolishing a form of private property that is committed to a policy and practice of "business as usual" as far as energy exploitation and development is concerned?

Isn't it naïve, perhaps even suicidal, to think that energy corporations who are addicted to the extraction of fossil-based fuels underneath the earth's crust and the immense profits and wealth therefrom will act as responsible stewards of our planet?

In an era in which climate change and a warming atmosphere threaten humanity and the other multitude of life forms, hasn't private ownership and development of our energy resources become illegitimate, outmoded, and irrational too?

Thus, the abolition of a class of property ownership isn't so radical as it may seem. It has a historical precedent in our nation's momentous abolition of slave property. It rests on science, common sense, and existential necessity. As in the case of the abolition of slavery, human rights - not abstract, but real, urgent, life-sustaining - trump property rights.

Now to my seemingly pedestrian comment: This fall millions of Americans will go to the polls where they will decide whether the Republican Party - a party that is dominated by the right wing and climate change deniers - will retain control of the House and regain control of the Senate.

Shouldn't this be on the agenda of the climate change movement too?

It's hard not to be excited by the new wave of initiatives and forms of struggle - marches, civil disobedience, disinvestment campaigns, and disruptive actions - that are energizing the climate change struggle. It is also encouraging to see political/legislative actions at the local and state level to reduce our carbon footprint.

And I welcome the growing understanding that capitalism's systemic imperative to grow and accumulate capital/profits without limit is incompatible with planetary sustainability. And more and more see that capitalism runs counter to a new emerging global ethos that embraces cooperation not competition, mutuality and reciprocity not hyper-individualism, equality not dominance, sharing and a sense of limits not unrestrained acquisitiveness and consumerism, and a respect, even awe, for the beauty and interconnectedness of life.

But I also strongly feel - pedestrian as it may seem to some - that taking control of Congress out of the hands of the right-wing Republican gang is absolutely necessary too in this struggle to save our planet.

This anti-democratic, obstructionist faction in Congress isn't the only obstacle to progressive and radical measures to mitigate the climate change crisis. But it is the immediate obstacle, and its defeat will create more favorable conditions for progressive and left thinking people and organizations to press a climate change agenda on the national level, including inroads into the property rights and power of the energy industrial complex.

Such a turn of relations of power and policy at this level is essential. What other level of government, after all, has - and any fundamental solution to the climate change crisis requires this - the financial and material resources, planning potential, and intellectual wherewithal to meet this challenge?

State and local legislative actions are necessary for sure. The same can be said of direct actions at the choke points along the energy production, supply, and distribution lines.

But by themselves they aren't enough. They complement and reinforce rather than substitute for efforts to change the balance of power in the national government and, in turn, energy policy on a broad scale.

Thus the climate change movement can't yield this terrain of struggle to the Darth Vaders of the Republican right nor to the capitalist class a whole. Defeating the right at the ballot box in a few weeks and then in 2016 at the national (and state) level can alter the political dynamics of the climate change struggle in a positive way. How much will depend on, among other things, the sweep of the victory and the breadth, depth, reach, unity, flexibility, maturity, and, not least, staying power of the people's movement.

Back in 1860, the election of Abraham Lincoln as president didn't the sound the death knell of slavery; in fact, abolition wasn't Lincoln's intention at the time of his election. But his victory broke the grip of the slaveholding class on the federal government, thereby setting into motion a political dynamic that swept Lincoln and all parties into the conflict, created new ground on which the abolitionist movement could campaign for abolition, and catapulted in the course of the war the eradication of the system of slavery to the top of the country's agenda.

Can't we reasonably think that breaking the hold of the Republican right on the main branches of the federal government in current circumstances would also open up new windows of opportunity to tackle climate change (as well as other deep-going social crises) on a scale and with the urgency that justice, morality, and science demand?

All of which makes me think that the struggle (and it will be a struggle) to defeat the right at the federal and other levels of government isn't pedestrian, after all. Rather it is an integral part of a bigger and effective climate change strategy that will prevent disaster and mitigate the worst of a warming atmosphere and planet.

Well, that's an expanded version of what I said at that Bronx meeting. People there told me it was good food for thought, and action. What do you think?

Photo: The Lincoln Memorial, Washington. Gage Skidmore CC 2.0

On climate train, green architect talks blueprints for future

Tue, 14 Oct 2014 15:51:00 +0000

On Sept. 18, days ahead of the 400,000-strong People's Climate March, the People's Climate Train was a hub of activity in its own right. Of primary import during the trip were environmental workshops, in which experts from all walks of life - yet part of the same struggle - talked about solutions to climate change and environmental degradation. Among those speakers was Pete Gang, who explained that a very important form of activism lay not just in building a stronger movement, but building in general.

Gang, who is an architect, explained, "It was humbling for me to realize that the area of human enterprise that has the largest effect on the environment is buildings. Here in the U.S., buildings account for 40 percent of anthropogenic greenhouse gases," which is to say, those directly caused by human activity. That statistic comes from data collected by the U.S. Air and Energy Administration.

A big leverage point

Gang has taught what is called 'green building' for the last 15 years, and in 2001 co-founded the Redwood Empire chapter of the U.S. Green Building Council, a nonprofit confederation that promotes sustainability in the design and operation of buildings. What is green building? According to Gang, it's about "acknowledging that our influence" on greenhouse gas emissions through buildings also "offers us a big leverage point," in that people can drastically alter that 40 percent by changing how these structures are made and used.

"Climate change," said Gang, "is something I've been talking about for years, and I see it as being right at the heart of architecture." Over time, he noted, "Green building has emerged from the fringe and the sidelines into the mainstream. At this point, the general public seems to have an understanding to some degree of the importance of environmentally conscious building." But it's still not enough, and in fact, he stressed, there could be real solutions to global warming waiting to be found in the field of architecture. "Building in a way to drastically reduce climate impact would not be that difficult if it had more support. And this is an issue that can even overcome partisan divide," he added, hinting at the drastically different opinions the Democratic and Republican parties have on the environment.

A large part of the solution involves upgrading to renewable energy to power buildings, and to modify them to eat up less power. For example, he said, "In commercial buildings, 50 percent of energy is used to heat space and water."

Managed by human stewardship

In an interview with Green Source DTW, Gary Olp, founder of Texas-based sustainable building group GGO Architects, said it is also important to ensure that building manmade structures doesn't harm ecosystems or disturb wildlife. It's an important thing to keep in mind, as that could further upset the balance that must be maintained, if there is to be hope for fighting climate change. "How and where we build may alter or affect the immediate environment," he remarked. "I learned from an Apache elder that man isn't by nature a destructive creature. Landscapes managed by human stewardship in pre-history times exhibited greater fish and game populations, healthier forests, and better water.

"But we also need to begin to address the full circle of individual responsibility. A diverse natural environment," which is increasingly threatened by large greenhouse gas emissions, "can't exist where there is nothing but concrete roads, sidewalks, and manicured landscapes with non-indigenous plants and rooftops. We need to rediscover a pedestrian way of life, and have communities that integrate our homes with the places we work, shop, and recreate; designing wild places that are integrated into the community fabric."

According to GGO Architects, "Public buildings should reflect a sense of purpose greater than commodity, something more than just satisfying a needed public service. It should be guiding a way to the future and representing a sound logical environmental stewardship, and elicit a personal sense of wellbeing and an awareness of the effort each of us has [to make] as an individual citizen of our communities."

Wooden skyscrapers, or "plyscrapers"

There is also the matter of resource depletion when it comes to the material used to make buildings. Michael C. Green, an architect based in Vancouver, British Columbia, said one effective and doable way to remedy this is with wooden skyscrapers, or as they have been nicknamed, plyscrapers. Green, who has talked about wood-based architecture for years, has just finished a new building for the University of Northern British Columbia, called the Wood Innovation and Design Center, where students will be able to learn about sustainable, wood-based architectural solutions.

This year, the U.S. Department of Agriculture declared it would invest $2 million in wood innovation efforts as a viable building alternative. Dept. Secretary Tom Vilsak, D-Iowa, said, "Wood may be one of the world's oldest building materials, but it is now also one of the most advanced. Building stronger markets for sustainable wood products helps reduce greenhouse gas emissions and puts rural America at the forefront of an emerging industry." Meanwhile, he added, the market created by wood-based architecture in the U.S. could "support more than one million direct jobs, many in rural America. As these markets expand, so will the economic opportunities."

"Wood is the most significant building material we use today that is grown by the sun," said Green. "When harvested responsibly, wood is arguably one of the best tools architects and engineers have for reducing emissions and storing carbon in our buildings."

But will that ever catch on as a large-scale, economically feasible, culturally accepted solution? When it comes to the current Republican-dominated, climate change-denying political environment, perhaps hopeful activists had better knock on wood.

Back on the climate train, however, Pete Gang, who is no stranger to these alternatives, emphasized, "It's not just about reforming building regulations and materials, or outfitting buildings with snappy new energy-efficient technology," though those are important goals to strive for. "We need that, but we also need to get everybody on board. And that's a tall order, because time is not on our side."

Photo: At a brief Amtrak stop, Pete Gang (bottom, second from left), joins the rest of the climate traingoers for a picture after the session on green architecture. Roberta Wood/PW

Occupy Alaska: Thousands of walrus stranded

Fri, 10 Oct 2014 16:55:00 +0000

The temporary exile of some 35,000 walrus on a shore near Point Lay, Alaska can be blamed entirely on climate change. Without a nearby source of sea ice on which to spend the winter, the mammals, which unlike seals cannot swim for extensive periods of time, have been forced to come ashore seeking refuge. There they remain, in record numbers, confused and stranded. It's just the latest price that wildlife is paying for the warming of the Arctic.

This has happened before. In fact, annually since 2007, walrus have been gathering en masse on Alaskan beaches in gradually increasing numbers. This new phenomenon is due to the dwindling sea ice, which has historically been important for female walrus to give birth, and for the animals to use as diving platforms to catch prey in more shallow areas of the ocean. However, ice has receded so far north that the water there is too shallow for walrus to dive to the bottom. This has left them stuck in the southerly region, where sea ice is now scarce. Scientists and conservationists are concerned over their new behavior, unsure as to whether it will negatively impact their wellbeing, and even fearing it could possibly render them endangered.

Scientists first spotted the herd on Sept. 25 while conducting an aerial survey of the area. Since then, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has requested that air traffic avoid coming near the mass of animals, who are already frightened and could be provoked into a stampede, which could crush and kill small calves.

Traditionally, walrus have moved in tandem with the ice during the season, following it into the Bering Sea as it receded northward, and ultimately ending up in the Chukchi Sea for the summer. That ice no longer exists. And that is disrupting their migratory patterns, according to Tony Fischbach, a wildlife biologist with the U.S. Geological Survey who's a member of an Alaskan Walrus Research Program. "Under historical conditions," said Fischbach, "there has always been sea ice over the Chukchi Sea over the summer. This is a real change that we see thousands and tens of thousands of animals coming to shore and resting together in these large haul-outs."

Experts consider these mass gatherings to be yet another wake-up call to the dangers of global warming. The congregation could also be seen as its very own form of protest against climate change - certainly, it's a mammals' Occupy movement, and it doesn't seem as though the walrus will be moving for a while. Margaret Williams, managing director of the World Wildlife Fund's Arctic program, said, "The massive concentration of walrus onshore - when they should be scattered broadly in ice-covered waters - is just one example of the impacts of climate change on the distribution of marine species in the Arctic."

Fischbach added, "This behavior raises a lot of questions about whether the walrus will run out of food in the surrounding area," due to the high number of walrus competing for sustenance there. "Occupying these areas concentrates tens of thousands of walrus in a smaller area that is already known to be less rich than their offshore foraging ground, and there is a concern that they could deplete the resources. It really appears that this is a new phenomenon for them. How they respond in the long term is an open question."

One could hope that the walrus get out of this tight spot by next year, when Royal Dutch Shell rears its ugly head and begins its Arctic drilling project - a plan that could put all of the Arctic in danger. The corporation submitted its new drilling plan to the U.S. Department of Interior on Aug. 28, and while a final decision has not yet been made, both scientists and environmentalists would consider it a disaster if Shell began tampering in the sensitive ecosystem. The consequences of an oil spill there would be unthinkable.

Back in 2011, when the walrus issue was first making headlines, Shell was quickly developing its Arctic drilling strategy. Rebecca Noblin, Alaska director of the Center for Biological Diversity, remarked, "It's a painful irony that on the same day" the Department of Interior said that no further research was needed on the impacts oil drilling would have on Arctic wildlife, "distressed walrus were seen hauling themselves onto shore because there's no ice where they need it. The Arctic is reeling from climate change."

Margaret Williams, the World Wildlife Fund's Arctic programs director, explained that Shell will encroach on vital walrus habitat if it moves forward with its plans, and that both ship traffic and oil spills present great risks to the animals. "It's an amazing place that's full of life, with a very rich food chain," she said. "If drilling goes forward, you have a huge potential mess."

The biggest threat presented by the gathering alone, however, is that of stampeding. Lori Polasek, a marine biologist at a research and wildlife rehab facility called the Alaska SeaLife Center, said that if there's a disturbance, "the calves get trampled. If the ice continues to wane, they'll continue to come on land and you potentially have more stampedes. Then it'll be a pickle where the population can't recover."

Photo: Ryan Kingsbery/U.S. Geological Survey

From trains to streets, Climate March moved people

Tue, 07 Oct 2014 16:24:00 +0000

From the Chicago climate train full of activists, to the People's Climate March itself, every person there seemed to feel passionately about a particular environmental issue. But all of them fully realized the scope of climate change as an overarching threat, and carried a message of resistance from Points A to B. The People's World joined the crowd of 400,000 to find out how people will get to Point C - making definitive change in the fight to protect the environment.

The journey from the Windy City's Union Station to Penn Station in Manhattan was an organized action in and of itself. People involved in the struggle took questions, shared stories, and held workshops. Among those who spoke was James Blakely, an activist from Boise, Idaho involved in LGBT organizing as well as climate organizing. He noted that he did not immediately feel included in the environmental struggle until he began to see it as one fight that involves everyone. "Several years ago," he said, "I got involved in the fight to stop the Keystone XL pipeline. I initially felt a disconnect from it, until I got the opportunity to go see the tarsands [processing site] in Fort McMurray, Alberta."

Blakely attended the Healing Walk there Jul. 27-29. The event was led by the First Nations people who are directly affected by tarsands operations, and it involved traversing local areas impacted by such activity - partly in protest, but also to call for healing of the land that has been ravaged by oil production. "I realized that Keystone XL is like an octopus that has tentacles in many places," said Blakely. People from all walks of life "gathered at this event for workshops and ceremonies. There was a great feeling of diversity, openness, and respect. Then we did a walk through the tarsands; we saw some of the giant processing equipment they use. We heard propane cannons in the distance. Giant scarecrows were set up to scare away wildlife. This used to be an important forest and traditional hunting ground for First Nations tribes. But no more. Now everything is poisoned. I saw this and I realized that this is a fight that involves everyone."

"This [climate march] is a big movement," said Valerie Love, an organizer from Berkeley, Calif. who works with the Center for Biological Diversity, and who, at the time, was optimistically predicting a turnout of 250,000 for the march - almost 50 percent lower than the impressive actual turnout. "We are telling leaders that we need more than talk; we need bold action to make a safe, healthy, and livable future for our children and grandchildren."

And the marchers took part in just that: bold action. People affected by natural disasters were there - signs reading "Remember Sandy?" and "Remember Katrina?" were thrusted upward in defiance. Another asked, "Mountaintops, glaciers, bayous - where have they all gone?" The march piqued the interest of several non-marchers, who seemed to slowly gravitate toward the throng from the sidelines. A sign held by 350 Seattle quoted President Obama: "We don't have time for a meeting of the Flat Earth Society." Perhaps the most poignant sign was one that simply read, "I'm marching for giving a sh*t."

Some people were present for very simple, though no less compelling, reasons. "I'm here today because of the destruction of our planet," said Nigel Sandering, a member of the World Wildlife Fund. "This march is great; it'll draw a lot of attention. What's disheartening, though, is that we're not actually marching to anything. They're not giving us the right to go to the UN," he said, in reference to a last-minute failure for Climate March organizers to secure route approval for marching to the UN building. "I wish we could circumvent the current route. It would be a lot bolder and more confrontational if we could. But I'll be surprised if things don't get confrontational at some point, anyway.

"An event like this builds support, and even though the deck is stacked against us in terms of where the power lies, it's gonna help if people go back home from this and do something within their local communities." He admitted, "We've fallen into a trap where there's limited control in the hands of the people, but events like this do have an effect. Systems can evolve, and we can help shift the balance of power. So things can change."

Meanwhile, the march had no shortage of star power. Leonardo DiCaprio, Mark Ruffalo, Edward Norton, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Kevin Bacon, Kiefer Sutherland, Evangelline Lily, and Susan Sarandon were among the actors present. Notable politicians participating included New York mayor Bill de Blasio, Al Gore, UN secretary general Ban Ki-moon, and 350.org's Bill McKibben.

Also present was Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt. In a brief statement to the People's World, he remarked, "I'm here for the same reason as the other several thousand people here - because climate change is real, and it's caused by human activity. And we need to work together to transform our energy system."

The impact felt from the march reverberated through communities for days afterward, including on the return train to Chicago. After such an immense fight for the preservation of the earth, it was tragically ironic, then, that on this trip back, the train passed a number of enormous piles of petcoke. These piles are near a refinery, owned by the capitalist Koch Brothers and located on the southeast side of the city of Chicago, and are quite literally making people sick. For travelers, many of whom were in the march, seeing this image suddenly made the whole struggle come full circle, and served as a harsh reminder that there's still much work to be done.

"This is Mother Earth!" one woman exclaimed from somewhere on the train. "This is the hand that feeds us. And we're slapping that hand away."

Photo: A sign that perfectly demonstrated the all-inclusive nature of the People's Climate March. Heather Craig/Flickr/People's Climate.org

Climate march underscores the high stakes of using palm oil

Fri, 03 Oct 2014 15:35:00 +0000

NEW YORK - Most notable about the Sept. 21 People's Climate March in New York City was its emphasis on diversity - both in terms of participants and the issues they supported. With climate change itself being a multi-faceted problem, marchers made it clear that the issues that contribute to it are numerous. People's World spoke there with the Rainforest Action Network (RAN) to focus on one in particular: the excessive use and abuse of palm oil, and its many destructive implications.

Adrienne Fitch-Frankel, a national organizer with RAN and advocate for environmental and human rights, remarked, "Palm oil is one of the leading drivers of climate change. And all of a sudden, all of these big food companies," like PepsiCo, the Hershey Company, Hormel Foods Corporation, Kellogg Company, and Kraft Food Group, Inc., "are using it. So we're calling on them to be more responsible and protective of climates like the rainforest," which are torn apart and decimated to make way for large palm oil plantations. "Companies producing palm oil are just getting away with cutting away massive tracts of rainforest," she continued. "These companies need to reform their practices."

Fitch-Frankel said "all of a sudden" in reference to a disturbing fact: that palm oil imports to the U.S. have seen a 485 percent increase in the last decade. Naturally, rainforest depletion has increased in tandem with this uptick in palm oil plantations. Ninety percent of these areas exist in Indonesia and Malaysia, where in total, such plantations cover 16 million acres of land (an area roughly equal to the size of West Virginia, according to a palm oil fact sheet released by RAN). For Indonesia in particular, 98 percent of its forest may vanish by 2022, according to a statement by the UN's Environment Program (UNEP).

Like setting off a carbon bomb

So how is this rainforest destruction connected to climate change? Well, Fitch-Frankel explained, it has environmental consequences that go beyond how land alone is affected. When rainforests are destroyed, she said, "Carbon is released from the trees, which grow on layers of peat moss," or peatlands. "These peat moss swamps contain huge amounts of carbon themselves," - billions of tons, in fact - "which is then released into the atmosphere. So clearing a whole area of rainforest - it's like setting off a carbon bomb."

'Carbon bomb' is an apt way to describe it. According to Think Global Green, the world on average now loses a portion of rainforest the size of New York State each year, and the carbon thus released now accounts for about 17 percent of all global emissions that contribute to climate change. In particular, it releases more carbon in total than all cars, trucks, planes, trains, and ships - a sobering fact, given the damage that manmade vehicles have done just by themselves.

Rendering once-prosperous communities endangered

The unfortunate ripple effect of this decimation reaches into the ecosystems that depend upon it, rendering once-prosperous communities of wildlife suddenly endangered. Indonesia's rainforests contain 10 percent of the world's known plant life, 12 percent of mammals, and 17 percent of all known bird species. The animal that is most at risk right now is the orangutan, which struggles against the risk of extinction (in our lifetime!) in the rainforests of Borneo and Sumatra. The Sumatran orangutan's population dropped by 14 percent between 2004 and 2008, largely due to loss of habitat for the development of palm oil plantations. Meanwhile, those that wander accidentally onto the plantations are often shot and killed by workers, along with tigers and elephants.

Those workers, by the way, are no safer than the animals. In fact, they're often exploited and underpaid, and palm oil plantations are notorious for forced child labor, according to information from Oxfam, a community-based international confederation that fights poverty and injustice. Female workers in particular are exposed, sometimes while pregnant, to harmful spraying, fertilizing, and weeding on these plantations.

The Snack Food 20

RAN recently released the "Snack Food 20" - a list of popular snack companies whose products contain palm oil - making their complicity public for the first time. These include the aforementioned Pepsi, Hershey, Hormel, Kellogg, and Kraft products, as well as the following groups: Campbell Soup Company; ConAgra Foods, Inc.; Dunkin' Brands Group, Inc.; General Mills, Inc.; Groupo Bimbo; Hillshire Brands Company; H.J. Heinz Company; Krispy Kreme Doughnuts Corp.; Mars, Inc.; Mondelez International, Inc.; Nestlé S.A.; Nissin Foods Holdings Co., Ltd.; the J.M. Smucker Company; Toyo Suisan Kaisha, Ltd.; and Unilever.

Pepsi, easily being the most recognizable of these companies in the U.S., was the focal point of the Stroller Brigade - a protest led prior to the Climate March, formed by mothers and their families partnering with the Rainforest Action Network. The demonstration occurred on Sept. 9, during which concerned mothers called for PepsiCo CEO Indra Nooyi to have the company remove palm oil from its products. The event took place in Nooyi's hometown of Greenwich, Conn., and consisted of many tri-state area moms. They followed up the event by delivering over a quarter million petition signatures to Pepsi's global headquarters in White Plains, N.Y.

Mothers and activists Harriet Shugarman (Bergen County, N.J.), Debra Mahony (Fairfield County, Conn.), and Susan Rubin (Westchester County, N.Y.) - members of the Stroller Brigade - also sent an open letter to Nooyi, calling for immediate action. They remarked, "We are three mothers who live in the tri-state area. We are witnesses, firsthand and in our own communities, to the impacts of climate change. We are reaching out to you in regards to the historic leadership opportunity you face right now on the issue of climate change and palm oil. We are writing as fellow mothers, daughters, and working women. We speak for thousands of mothers around the country - neighbors, friends, relatives, as well as Rainforest Action Network members, who share our concerns that climate change is a direct threat to our children's future."

No better forum than a crowd of 400,000

Less than two weeks after these actions, the People's Climate March seemed to help continue RAN's campaign to expose the dangers of palm oil development, as well as the irresponsibility of corporations that continue to turn a blind eye to the threat. Certainly, there was no better forum for such a message than a crowd of 400,000 marching in solidarity through the Big Apple.

"We're calling on PepsiCo to make a change and create stronger policies," Fitch-Frankel concluded. After all, "if these companies can do that, it will have a massive impact on protecting the earth."

Photo: Appropriately wearing orangutan masks, Rainforest Action Network members take part in the People's Climate March to expose the danger posed by palm oil and rainforest destruction. RAN Facebook page