Photos from the Feria Internacional del Agua in Cochabamba, Bolivia, celebrating the 10th anniversary of the people's victory over Bechtel in the corporation's attempt to privatize the city's water.
Photos were taken by Ruth Caplan, coordinator of the Alliance's Defending Water for Life campaign; you can read more of her experiences and observations at Cochabamba Rising.
Mourning over the loss of life on the Deepwater Horizon has turned to outrage as the oil comes ashore on the Gulf coast, fouling marshes and closing fisheries. With the long-term impact of the spill still unknown, how can anger over lax regulation and cavalier attitudes toward the value of human life, ecosystems and safety be channeled into constructive work on solid environmental demands?
Laird and Robin Monahan have posted several pictures of the last few days of their trip on their website. Last week they stayed with Alliance for Democracy co-chair Nancy Price and her husband Don in Davis, California, where Nancy interviewed them for Davis community television, and Gavin Dahl wrote about the walk for Raw Story.
As they follow Route 50, more or less, they're planning a walk around the State Capitol in Sacramento, and possibly a media event in Carson City, Nevada. In Nevada, they're planning to pass through Fallon, Austin, Eureka, and Ely--if you can host them for an evening or two, have media contacts, or would like them to speak to a group in the area, please contact Riley Gardam at riley-gardam@uiowa.edu.
In response to the BP oil spill disaster in the Gulf of Mexico, Chelsea Green Publishing and biologist/toxicologist/“fisherma’am” Riki Ott are making Not One Drop, her book about the Exxon Valdez spill in Alaska, available for free download indefinitely on Scribd.com.
In exchange, Ott, who went to the Gulf Coast earlier this month to work with communities and fisherfolk, and her publisher, are asking that those who download the book donate at least $1 to Global Green USA, a nonprofit supporting those affected by the spill. The books is also in print. Why not visit your local independent bookstore and buy a copy for your public library?
It was so brief that Katie Couric moved on to the turtles, but on May 18, Kelly Cobiella and a CBS news team were turned back from filming along a Louisiana beach and threatened with arrest by a Coast Guard patrol saying they were following BP's orders.
Video here.
From Chesapeake Climate Action Network's blog. Posted on May 20
Despite the Gulf disaster, no one from BP has been arrested and sent to jail. Despite safety violations at coal mines, no one from Massey Energy has been handcuffed. But today I write to inform you that one of America's best global warming activists is probably facing several months of jail. He's been convicted by a D.C. jury, and now he awaits sentencing on July 6th. Why? Because he peacefully dropped two banners on Capitol Hill that said: "GREEN JOBS NOW" and "GET TO WORK."
I’m not joking. Ted Glick of the Chesapeake Climate Action Network was convicted by a jury May 13th of peacefully dropping the banners inside the U.S. Senate Hart Office Building last September. The D.C. U.S. Attorney's office clearly has decided to make an "example" of Ted because of his previous two — count 'em, two — convictions related to peaceful acts of climate civil disobedience. Can you believe it? You can see a three-minute video of Ted’s September "crime" below. He's the guy towards the end (approximately 2:20 in) simply lowering the banners.
Now Ted is facing up to three years in jail. Based on the judge’s comments last week, it really does appear that he will be incarcerated for at least a month or two.
What can you do? Help spread the word about this fight to keep a morally innocent staff member out of jail during this time of great global crisis.
Another well-named and commonsense idea to keep private wealth and public investment where they will do the most good for the greatest number.AfD Co-chair Nancy Price is hosting Laird and Robin Monahan in Davis today at the Farmer's Market--here's an advance. Read more about their walk at their website.
by Nancy Price. Published May 19 by the Davis (CA) Enterprise
A pair of brothers who are walking across America to protest what they call 'the legal fiction that corporations are persons with constitutional rights' will be in Davis on Wednesday.
Robin Monahan, 67, and his brother Laird, 69, will be at the Farmers' Market beginning at 4:30 p.m. They left San Francisco on Saturday and will set off for Sacramento on Thursday morning.
The Monahans are walking the old Lincoln Highway to the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C., hoping to arrive by Election Day, Nov. 2. Their progress can be tracked online at http://lairdandrobin.org.
Local residents are invited to meet and talk with them Wednesday and sign the new 'Declaration of Independence from Corporate Rule.'
The Monahan brothers were motivated by a Jan. 21 U.S. Supreme Court decision against the Federal Election Commission in the Citizens United case. The 5-4 decision not only confirmed corporations as persons with constitutional rights, but also expanded corporate political free speech rights under the First Amendment to allow corporations to spend unlimited money in politics for or against candidates in local and national elections.
'The Supreme Court's decision,' Robin says, 'will allow corporations to become the greatest intimidators of our senators and representatives ever before witnessed in our country. We felt we had to do something beyond letter-writing or drafting and signing petitions. Our anger over this gutting of our political system called out to us for a physical sacrifice to stop it.'
The brothers are following the example of Doris Haddock, who, at age 89, began her walk across the country for campaign finance reform on Jan. 1, 1999. Fourteen months later, at age 90, she arrived in Washington, D.C.
Embraced as 'Granny D,' her walk created a groundswell of support for legislation to limit corporate money in politics. That led to Congress' approval of the bipartisan Campaign Reform Act of 2002 (McCain-Feingold) and more than 20 state campaign finance laws, now all struck down by the Supreme Court.
The Monahan brothers are sponsored by MovetoAmend, a consortium of more than 50 organizations promoting a constitutional amendment to abolish corporate personhood and corporate constitutional rights. You may sign the motion to amend at http://www.movetoamend.org.
AfD member Mary Francis is a key organizer for the Voices of Oklahoma radio project, which hopes to start up a community, not-for-profit FM station serving McClain, Garvin and southern Cleveland counties. After submitting their application to the FCC in 2007, Voices of Oklahoma recently learned it was approved, pending a 30 day period for competitors to appeal. But their attorney says their application is a strong one, and they're looking forward to receiving a construction permit, picking call letters, and getting on the air.
Voices of Oklahoma hopes to be working with the Prometheus Radio Project as their second full-power radio station "barnraising." The group also hopes to file applications for community radio stations in the towns of Cordell and Wynnewood.
Voices of Oklahoma's web magazine, www.voicesofok.org, features updates on station development, plus the kind of community-focus news the station hopes to be covering. Congratulations, Mary and all the people at Voices of Oklahoma!
First, Marjorie Cohn, past president of the National Lawyers Guild, sees Kagan as a step back from Justice Stephens on civil liberties and civil rights.
And legal commentator Marvin Ammori discusses Kagan's possible take on corporate access to the first amendment here; his suspicion is that she'd side with the majority if she were judging, rather than arguing, Citizens United.
Ammori draws some of his evidence from one of Kagan's law review articles, where she discusses Austin v. Michigan Chamber of Commerce. In that article, "Private Speech, Public Purpose," published long before Citizens United, Ammori sees her applying the same line of reasoning that the majority opinion did in the Citizens United case: a) most Supreme Court decisions have established a rule--in this case, that speech must not be restricted based on the relative status and power of the speaker in relation to others; b) that certain decisions contradict this rule, and thus, c) that those decisions should be overturned by a decision in the case at hand that conforms to the opinions set out in most preceding cases.
For Kagan, First National Bank v. Bellotti--which overturned restrictions on corporate spending in referendum campaigns, is the rule, while Austin, which prohibited corporations from using treasury money to support or oppose candidates in elections, is the exception. Her published thoughts on corporate access to free speech rights present corporate funding not as a mechanism for buying and selling candidates and dumbing down debate and policy analysis, but as part of the play of ideas, noting that "campaign finance laws ... easily can serve as incumbent-protection devices, insulating current officeholders from challenge and criticism."
If anyone has a real-life instance of more money leading to a more robust democracy, you're more than welcome--in fact, we beg you--to post it in the comments section. Comments from Maine and Arizona, states with public funding, are especially welcome. It's hard to recall anyone complaining that clean elections leads to stifling of challenge and criticism.
Ammori's article is a bit technical, but certainly not incomprehensible. We will hopefully hear more from Kagan on the limits, or lack thereof, to corporate usurpation of personhood rights, and thanks to articles like this, we'll be listening a little more closely to her answers.
by Tom Wodetzki
As a public service for voters in the upcoming election, the non-partisan, non-profit organization Alliance for Democracy, with the assistance of the UC Institute of Governmental Studies, compiled the ballot recommendation chart below. We encourages you to publish it in your publication since it helps create better informed voters and increases voter participation. If you have questions or comments, please contact me at tw@mcn.org.
The chart below lists how 14 major non-profit organizations recommend citizens to vote in the upcoming primary election, June 8, 2010. The participants run the political spectrum from progressive, at the top of the list, to conservative, at the bottom. For the first time, all nine left/liberal orgs agree on all five propositions-- Yes, No, Yes, No, No-- while the conservative orgs do not agree.
This chart was compiled by Caspar's Jan Boyd with the assistance of the UC Institute of Governmental Studies and produced by the Mendocino Coast Alliance for Democracy. It is available and will be updated on the website www.ElectionInfo.org as additional ballot recommendations are submitted.
Note that the original chart incorrectly listed two recommendations by the CA LWV: they have no position on Question 14, recommend a Yes on 15, and a No on 16. You can read more from the League here. The corrected chart is below.
by Jan Edwards
April 25, 2010 marked the 10th Anniversary of the passing of the historic Point Arena Resolution on Corporate Personhood. In recognition, the Point Arena City Council proclaimed April 25th to be "Democracy Day" and voted to co-sponsor a celebration on Friday, April 23rd at the Arena Theater. There was a community potluck in the theater followed by a free showing of This Land is Your Land, a documentary about the effect of corporate power on the lives of average citizens with a special focus on corporate personhood. The movie was partially filmed in Point Arena and has several clips of the town and local folks commenting on corporate power. The audience cheered every time a familiar face or a clip showing the town flashed on the screen. Turnout was terrific and the evening was a lot of fun.
On Saturday, there was a forum at the Coast Community Library with a deeper discussion on the implications of the recent Supreme Court decision in Citizens United v FEC and of a proposed Amendment that will legally correct the Constitutional problem. Led by William Meyers with community activist and former Arcata City Councilman Dave Meserve working for the Campaign to Legalize Democracy, Dan Hamburg, director of Voice of the Environment and others including Jim Tarbell, Jan Edwards and many of the committee members who wrote the original resolution 10 years earlier.
In 2000, Point Arena became the first municipality to pass a resolution
rejecting the concept that corporations should be allowed to claim rights originally intended for human persons in the U.S. Constitution. The resolution was written and promoted by the Redwood Coast Chapter of the Alliance for Democracy. This action inspired Berkeley, Arcata, and then other cities and towns to pass resolutions of their own. Eventually, towns began to pass binding ordinances. In 2006, Humboldt County passed Measure T which revoked corporate rights in the county. Measure T was later overturned, but many small municipalities are currently using these ordinances to protect water, prevent toxic sludge dumping, prohibit factory hog farms and promote local democracy. Just this week Berkeley restated their opposition to corporate constitutional rights by passing a new resolution in reaction to the recent Supreme Court ruling that strengthened corporate rights.
In 1886, the Supreme Court recognized corporations as "persons" under the 14th Amendment, which had been passed to give equal protection and due process to people newly freed from slavery. Since that time, corporations have been handed almost all the rights of "natural (human) persons" including the First Amendment freedoms. In January of this year, the Supreme Court handed down a decision in Citizens United v Federal Elections Commission banning as unconstitutional Congress's restrictions on corporate campaign spending in elections. The trail of law supporting this ruling stems directly from the concept that corporations are persons with rights in the constitution.
Websites for more information:
www.CaliforniaDemocracy.org (Click on Corporate Personhood for Point Arena Resolution and history of corporate personhood)
www.MovetoAmend.org (To read about the amendment and its sponsors.)
www.thislandthemovie.com (For information on the documentary This Land is Your Land.) To order a DVD of the movie, send $24.99 to: Lori Cheatle, Hard Working Movies, 10 Jay Street, Ste 902, Brooklyn, NY 11201, office: 1-646-383-5971. www.hardworkingmovies.com
On April 27, the mayor and City Council of Berkeley California voted unanimously to call for amending the U.S. and California constitutions to declare that corporations are not entitled to the rights of persons, that corporate money is not free speech, and to request that other communities take a similar stand. (You can read the resolution here.) The Peace and Justice Commission prepared this Democracy Resolution in anticipation that corporate spending in elections will increase due to the U.S. Supreme Court ruling against the Federal Elections Commission in the Citizens United case.
Seventeen people had written and 28 had signed a petition in favor of the Resolution. People held up signs at the meeting, including U.C. Berkeley student Stefanie Rawlings. Three people were allowed to speak in favor of the measure during public comment. Pancho Ramos-Stierle held an earth flag while stating, “The people of Berkeley have a tradition to support the values of the Earth Community. This is the Berkeley of the creative Charles Townes, of the courageous Mario Savio, of the wise and inspiring Joanna Macy. To abolish corporate personhood in this unique city is to exemplify a harmonious legacy for this planet.”
Peace and Justice Commissioner Phoebe Sorgen quoted President Obama who said of the Citizens United ruling, “I can’t think of anything more devastating to the public interest. The last thing we need to do is hand more influence to the lobbyists.”
She quoted John Kerry: “The Court has struck at the very heart of our democracy,” and Senate Judiciary Committee Chair Patrick Leahy: "...it will allow major corporations -- who should have law written to control their effect on America -- to instead control America." She even quoted a Republican, former Senator Warren Rudman: "Supreme Court opinion notwithstanding, corporations are not defined as people under the Constitution, and free speech can hardly be called free when only
the rich are heard." She paraphrased a new song by local storyteller Nancy Schimmel: “It isn’t a person if it doesn’t have a belly button.”
Council member Kriss Worthington explained that, though Berkeley took this stand in 2004, it is worth reiterating because of the Supreme Court ruling and because the Resolution also supports a related amendment introduced in Congress by Donna Edwards (D-MD) and cosponsored by Barbara Lee. H.J. RES 74 would permit Congress again to regulate corporate spending in elections.
Stefanie Rawlings proclaimed, "The to support people over profits serves as a ray of light in this mire of corporate control that so deeply affects every aspect of our lives. I hope other communities are inspired to join the call for sovereignty of the people!" The Resolution will be sent to state and federal representatives.
Bruce A. Dixon writes: What if BP, the principal corporate entity responsible for the monstrous oil well rupture a mile beneath Gulf of Mexico were a human being, a flesh and blood person instead of a faceless transnational corporation? It's a fair and simple question, and the answers tell us a lot more about the world we live in.When it suits their purposes, employees and mouthpieces of various transnational firms hasten to assure us that “corporations are people, too.” In a sense this is certainly true. Despite what some bible thumping fundamentalists will tell you, corporations were not ordained by the Almighty. Corporations are legal fictions. They are artificial shields under which we agree to allow a handful of extremely wealthy people to rule over the rest us, and plunder the planet and its people at will, just as centuries ago most of the humans who mattered agreed that kings, queens and nobly born, the “people of quality” had the god given right to ride roughshod over humanity.Read more...
Ultimately, people woke up, rose up, and revoked those privileges. How long will it be before we revoke the lawless privileges of corporations, before we limit their immunity, curtail their immortality, and rein in their immorality?
That’s the message which the Alliance’s Defending Water for Life campaign in Maine brought to the Feria Internacional del Aqua in Cochabamba, Bolivia, April 15-18. The message was in the form of an art show brought from Maine by Emily Posner, our Maine organizer, who arrived early to set up the show in the main entrance to the Complejo Fabril (labor center) where the Feria (fair) took place.
We were there with water activists from around the globe to celebrate the 10th anniversary of the people’s uprising in Cochabamba to take back their water from the private international consortium headed up by Bechtel Corporation. The story has been told around the world and featured in two documentaries: first in Thirst and more recently in FLOW.
We heard heart rending stories of the water crisis developing among indigenous communities in the high plains of Bolivia as glaciers are melting far faster than they are being replenished and where already one has disappeared entirely. We heard of the ecological disasters from large dams in the Philippines and from the reversal of river flows for irrigation in Brazil. We heard how the eucalyptus tree farms, an easy way to earn carbon credits, actually consume vast quantities of water and replace native trees. We learned about how 20-year contracts with local communities to maintain forests as a climate initiative, actually puts the community in financial jeopardy and threatens loss of their autonomy.
We heard from indigenous leaders in the Bolivian Andes about how water-intensive mining is threatening protected water basins, contaminating water supplies, drying up springs, and even so, how some water is being sold to Chile for mining.
On Saturday and Sunday, we understood why this really was a “feria” or fair. The large field adjacent to the labor center had blossomed with small tents showcasing the water cooperatives created by local neighborhoods in the poor, southern side of the city. Organizing is not just about throwing out the corporate thugs, but about taking local control. But as was made clear the day before, neighborhoods must work together to combat pollution and to ensure a sustainable source of water. How can the neighborhoods have a meaningful voice in establishing needed regulations to protect their water supplies?
As we turned our attention toward the upcoming People’s World Conference on Climate Change and the Rights of Mother Earth, we starting making the connection between climate justice and water justice. Just as water must not be commodified with the market setting the price, clean air should not be commodified through a reverse pricing where polluters buy carbon credits from native forest communities and tree farm entrepreneurs in the Global South. Clean air, once a commons, is now being given a price in a new market where speculation can run rampant.
Is this what we want? The conclusion of the Climate Change conference which followed was a resounding no. Instead, it was recognized that Mother Earth has intrinsic rights which must not be violated if we humans are to survive. In the working group on Mother Earth Rights in which I participated, alongside several hundred indigenous participants from Andean communities, a Declaration on the Rights of Mother Earth was prepared for presentation to the U.N. General Assembly for its consideration as a critical complement to the International Declaration on Human Rights. Here is the link to the declaration.
Now the organizing to get the declaration adopted by the United Nations must begin! The six local ordinances passed in NH and Maine all of which declare that nature has rights are an important start.
Preamble
We, the peoples and nations of Earth:
considering that we are all part of Mother Earth, an indivisible, living community of interrelated and interdependent beings with a common destiny;
gratefully acknowledging that Mother Earth is the source of life, nourishment and learning and provides everything we need to live well;
recognizing that the capitalist system and all forms of depredation, exploitation, abuse and contamination have caused great destruction, degradation and disruption of Mother Earth, putting life as we know it today at risk through phenomena such as climate change;
convinced that in an interdependent living community it is not possible to recognize the rights of only human beings without causing an imbalance within Mother Earth;
affirming that to guarantee human rights it is necessary to recognize and defend the rights of Mother Earth and all beings in her and that there are existing cultures, practices and laws that do so;
conscious of the urgency of taking decisive, collective action to transform structures and systems that cause climate change and other threats to Mother Earth;
proclaim this Universal Declaration of the Rights of Mother Earth, and call on the General Assembly of the United Nation to adopt it, as a common standard of achievement for all peoples and all nations of the world, and to the end that every individual and institution takes responsibility for promoting through teaching, education, and consciousness raising, respect for the rights recognized in this Declaration and ensure through prompt and progressive measures and mechanisms, national and international, their universal and effective recognition and observance among all peoples and States in the world.
Article 1. Mother Earth
(1) Mother Earth is a living being.
(2) Mother Earth is a unique, indivisible, self-regulating community of interrelated beings that sustains, contains and reproduces all beings.
(3) Each being is defined by its relationships as an integral part of Mother Earth.
(4) The inherent rights of Mother Earth are inalienable in that they arise from the same source as existence.
(5) Mother Earth and all beings are entitled to all the inherent rights recognized in this Declaration without distinction of any kind, such as may be made between organic and inorganic beings, species, origin, use to human beings, or any other status.
(6) Just as human beings have human rights, all other beings also have rights which are specific to their species or kind and appropriate for their role and function within the communities within which they exist.
(7) The rights of each being are limited by the rights of other beings and any conflict between their rights must be resolved in a way that maintains the integrity, balance and health of Mother Earth.
Article 2. Inherent Rights of Mother Earth
(1) Mother Earth and all beings of which she is composed have the following inherent rights:
(a) the right to life and to exist;
(b) the right to be respected;
(c) the right to continue their vital cycles and processes free from human disruptions;
(d) the right to maintain its identity and integrity as a distinct, self-regulating and interrelated being;
(e) the right to water as a source of life;
(f) the right to clean air;
(g) the right to integral health;
(h) the right to be free from contamination, pollution and toxic or radioactive waste;
(i) the right to not have its genetic structure modified or disrupted in a manner that threatens it integrity or vital and healthy functioning;
(j) the right to full and prompt restoration the violation of the rights recognized in this Declaration caused by human activities;
(2) Each being has the right to a place and to play its role in Mother Earth for her harmonious functioning.
(3) Every being has the right to wellbeing and to live free from torture or cruel treatment by human beings.
Article 3. Obligations of human beings to Mother Earth
(1) Every human being is responsible for respecting and living in harmony with Mother Earth.
(2) Human beings, all States, and all public and private institutions must:
(a) act in accordance with the rights and obligations recognized in this Declaration;
(b) recognize and promote the full implementation and enforcement of the rights and obligations recognized in this Declaration;
(c) promote and participate in learning, analysis, interpretation and communication about how to live in harmony with Mother Earth in accordance with this Declaration;
(d) ensure that the pursuit of human wellbeing contributes to the wellbeing of Mother Earth, now and in the future;
(e) establish and apply effective norms and laws for the defence, protection and conservation of the rights of Mother Earth;
(f) respect, protect, conserve and where necessary, restore the integrity, of the vital ecological cycles, processes and balances of Mother Earth;
(g) guarantee that the damages caused by human violations of the inherent rights recognized in this Declaration are rectified and that those responsible are held accountable for restoring the integrity and health of Mother Earth;
(h) empower human beings and institutions to defend the rights of Mother Earth and of all beings;
(i) establish precautionary and restrictive measures to prevent human activities from causing species extinction, the destruction of ecosystems or the disruption of ecological cycles;
(j) guarantee peace and eliminate nuclear, chemical and biological weapons;
(k) promote and support practices of respect for Mother Earth and all beings, in accordance with their own cultures, traditions and customs;
(l) promote economic systems that are in harmony with Mother Earth and in accordance with the rights recognized in this Declaration.
Article 4. Definitions
(1) The term “being” includes ecosystems, natural communities, species and all other natural entities which exist as part of Mother Earth.
(2) Nothing in this Declaration restricts the recognition of other inherent rights of all beings or specified beings.
In advance of next month's vote, California's Proposition 15, which would set up a public funding program for secretary of state elections, has been collecting media endorsements from the state's newspapers of record, including the Los Angeles Times (which reversed its earlier opposition to the idea), and the San Francisco Chronicle, which noted that "the beauty of Proposition 15 is that it targets an office that should be well insulated from fundraising dependence...Californians have seen what can go wrong when the secretary of state is not an honest broker."
These papers join the Los Angeles Daily News, the Bakersfield Californian, the Daily Breeze, the Long Beach Press Telegram, the San Jose Mercury News, and the Santa Rosa Press Democrat in support.
You can read a list of all supporters here.
The big water news in the Boston area is that the water's not fit to drink, thanks to a busted pipe in the MWRA works that bring drinking water from the Quabbin Reservoir to more than 700,000 households in the city and surrounding suburbs.
But Concord, Mass., is making waves, too--voters banned the sales of drinking water in plastic bottles during their final night of Town Meeting last week. The ban kicks in January 1, 2011. Concord is the second known town on the planet, after Bundanoon, in rural Australia, to ban the sale of bottled water.
The petitioner for the ban, Jean Hill, stressed the waste generated by single-serving plastic water bottles, and noted that more than 100 cities and three states have already taken action to curb spending on bottled water.
"Selling water in plastic bottles is the triumph of perceived need over real need," said Hill, 82.
Concord selectmen recommended no action be taken on the measure at Town Meeting, because they doubted they had any legal power to enact a ban, which prompted resident and voter Bob Lawson to reply "Why don't we just pass it and then you can find out?"
The motion did pass, and according to AfD North Bridge chapter member Mary White, Hill was beaming at the result. Still, the ban is getting some criticism.
The town's attorney has said the town may run afoul of the dormant commerce clause as possibly discriminating against interstate commerce, and the vote is likely to get thrown out by the Attorney General's office. A selectman has objected to the potential costs of defending the ban in court. The Boston Globe quoted Joe Doss, president of the International Bottled Water Association, a trade association that represents bottlers, suppliers, and distributors, as saying “We obviously don’t think highly of the vote in Concord. Any efforts to discourage consumers from drinking water, whether tap water or bottled water, is not in the best interests of consumers. Bottled water is a very healthy, safe, convenient product that consumers use to stay hydrated.’’
Even Nick Guroff, communications director for Corporate Accountability International, of "Think Outside the Bottle" fame, seemed a little awed by the decision, according to a quote in the Concord Journal. "A ban is a big move," said Guroff, adding that the organization he represents only advocates for governmental and organizational actions. "It's not something we'd advocate on a broad level," Guroff said of the ban. However, another spokesperson for the group saw the ban as part of the general trend toward drinking less bottled water.
p.s. If you're wondering--Concord has its own wells, and isn't on the "boil order."
Dr. Riki Ott, Alaskan marine toxicologist, salmon fisherma'am and author, on the BP Gulf oil spill and the energy industry's campaign to erode safety regulations and oversight.
Video from Maine videographer Martha Spiess: Thomas Linzey talks about CELDF (Community Environmental Legal Defense Fund) and how the Rights Based Ordinance movement has evolved and is growing. He discusses how local communities can challenge the regulatory doctrine at a grass roots level by passing rights based ordinance within their community and asserting inalienable rights to local self-governance, and the need to change the Constitution to "keep the good stuff and get rid of the bad stuff." Change will be led, says Linzey, by those who are most impacted by corporate rule. "They're running out of options. They can't turn to the regulatory system. They understand what it is."
AfD member Joe Seeman sends the following info:
On Wednesday, May 5th, and Thursday May 6th, Capital Region residents will be able to participate in two Town Hall forums in Saratoga Springs and Albany, hosted by MoveOn.org. Against the backdrop of a struggling economy and slow job growth, these events will bring together local citizens concerned about the influence of big corporations and lobbyists in Washington. Attendees will discuss what can be done to rein in the growing influence of big corporations and lobbyists in our democracy. Organizers plan a short panel of speakers, break out groups, and action plans.
Wed. May 5th 6:30pm: The Arts Center, 320 Broadway, Saratoga Springs
Please sign up to attend here or on Facebook.
Thurs. May 6th 7pm: FUUSA Channing Hall, 405 Washington Ave, Albany
Please sign up to attend here or on Facebook.
For more info, contact Dennis Karius (518) 456-5721 or Joe Seeman 583-4326
The speakers in Saratoga Town Hall will include:
B.K. Keramati on"Clean Money and Clean Elections"
Penny Hill on"Green Economy"
Kevin Eitzman on "Financial Deregulation and the Destruction of our Economy"
The speakers at the Albany Town Hall will include:
Nick Willson on "Corporations and Our Taxes"
Mark Schaffer on "Energy"
Aaron Mair on "Roll Back 20 years of Tax Shift"
Dennis Karius on"Media Democracy"
As true now as ever!
For ordering info see this page on our website!
