Happy Carl Sagan Day / A message from beyond

Carl Sagan would have been 77 today.  Happy birthday, Carl...and thank you.

Critical message from GASLAND director Josh Fox

Save the Delaware River from Fracking

Dear friends-

We've come a long way in the fight against fracking. The flaming faucets in GASLAND has been seen by upwards of 40 million people in 20 countries.  A recent study shows that 4 out of 5 Americans say that they are concerned about the effect of fracking on drinking water.  

But our most crucial stand is less than two weeks away.  

On November 21st the Delaware River Basin Commission (DRBC) will vote to approve a plan that will allow for 20,000 or more fracked gas wells in the Delaware River Basin.  We need you to come out and protest the vote in huge numbers.

Because this moment is so important, I made a new video, my first video addressing fracking since GASLAND.

SAVE THE DELAWARE from JFOX on Vimeo.

The crucial decision to frack or not to frack the Delaware is in the hands of President Obama and the Governors of Delaware and New York.  We need you to take charge and push them to do the right thing.

I have travelled all over this world, in over 30 states in the USA, to Africa, to Europe, Asia and Australia and one thing is clear:  Fracking is not only one of the most destructive forms of extreme energy development, creating water contamination, horrific and hazardous air pollution and a health crisis, it is a world wide scourge that pushes us farther away from the renewable energy future that we need.

Now the fight comes back to my home, the Delaware River Basin, where it started for me.  But this fight isn't about me.  It's about the drinking water for 16 million people that the Delaware River provides.

If enough of us get out there, we can save the Delaware River and we can win a huge battle in the fight against fracking nationwide and worldwide.  We can inspire the nation and the world to rid ourselves of this dirty form of energy.  

THE CRUCIAL VOTE:

The Delaware River Basin Commission is an interstate body with five voting members, the Governors of New York, Pennsylvania, Delaware and New Jersey and the Obama Administration as represented by the Army Corps of Engineers.  Three out of five votes will either pass or reject the plan to frack the Delaware River.  

It seems clear that the Governors of New Jersey and Pennsylvania will vote to allow fracking on a huge scale in the River Basin, which is why we need all three remaining votes in order to prevail.

Like the massive actions these past few months against Tar Sands development and the Keystone XL pipeline, this decision will be a "watershed" moment for President Obama and a must win for us fighting against extreme energy development.

Not only is the Delaware River the source of drinking water for 16 million people (or 5% of Americans), it is a designated Wild and Scenic river, a tourist destination for 5.4 million people a year and a national treasure.  The proposed plan to frack the Delaware would forever industrialize and contaminate this precious and currently pristine watershed.  We can work together now to protect our water.  

We are asking you to do two things:

1) Make calls.  2) Come join us in an amazing protest effort on November 21st.

MAKE CALLS RIGHT NOW:

Call the Army Corps of Engineers to urge them to vote no fracking in the Delaware River Basin.  Tell them you will hold President Obama accountable for the vote and make it clear that you know that it is his decision.  703 697 4672 Leave a message for Jo Ellen Darcy, Obama's rep on the DRBC

Call Governor Jack Markell of Delaware.  Delaware has been sitting on the fence on fracking.  We need them clearly and unequivocally voting no.  Tell him to vote no fracking on the upcoming DRBC vote.

302-577-3210

Call Governor Andrew Cuomo of New York.  Tell him to oppose fracking in the Delaware River Basin watershed, just as he has in the New York city and Syracuse watersheds.  518-474-8390 

PROTEST on NOVEMBER 21st in Trenton, N.J.

When: November 21, 8 am

Where: Patriots Theater at the War Memorial, 1 Memorial Drive Trenton, N.J.

Coming from another location?  Bus sign up HERE.

Sign up for email updates HERE.

Delaware Riverkeeper Network will host a training session in lawful, peaceful, first amendment activity on November 2oth in New York City and Trenton. 

NYC, Sign up HERE.

Trenton, Sign up HERE.

Questions:  savethedelawareriver@gmail.com and/or continue to check back.

AND just for a shot in the arm, here is a special statement from our friend, Bill McKibben:

"We're obviously deep in the trenches in Keystone XL pipeline fight, which has galvanized the whole country. But it's not just the pipe we're fighting, it's the carbon it carries. And that carbon--that extreme energy, the second round of fossil fuels now that the easy stuff is gone--doesn't just come from tarsands. It also comes from removing mountaintops for coal, and from drilling deep under the ocean--and, urgently, from fracking. We've simply got to somehow slow the rush to this new and dangerous technology, which promises to overwhelm the atmosphere with global warming gases. "

I've never had more resolve, I've never been more challenged and yet I've never felt more proud of us and our strength that I do right now.  I know we can win. Please join us and act quickly.

For more info go to www.savethedelawareriver.com.

Thank you,

Josh Fox

Director, GASLAND

Milanville, PA

P.S. Pass it on.

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Gasland 2 is in production.  Help us continue our work as the film comes to fruition!  Donate HERE.

Planting Change: Guerrilla Gardening & the Occupy Movement [update]

[via OccupyWallSt and our friends at Seismologik.com]


Guerrilla gardening is the occupation of ill-used land to support the communities and ecosystems to which that land rightfully belongs. As the Occupy movement "puts down roots" in public and private spaces across the world, guerilla gardening is essential to growing a sustainable movement free from dependence on corporate systems.


Over the coming months, One Pack Productions and Seismologik Media will showcase some of the amazing people who are creating actions which can inspire people to practice being the change they wish to see in the world. For more information on guerrilla gardening, check out guerrillagardening.org.

GUERRILLA GARDENING AT OWS from ONE PACK PRODUCTIONS on Vimeo.

Meet the Guerrilla Gardeners.

Students from Sterling College in Vermont came down to Occupy Wall Street and showed us how to plant and sow seeds anywhere where there is soil. In this short film, they demonstrate how easy it is to grow winter greens and beets right in the parks flower beds, and then speak earnestly and passionately about the importance of farming, and understanding where our food comes from. 

Occupy Together. Grow Together.


UPDATE : This story was picked up by 350.org - congrats to Seismologik! 

New TV Report: INSIDE OCCUPY WALL ST

Guest post by Danny Schechter 
[via OwsNews Service]


I am Danny Schechter, known as the News Dissector.  I am a blogger (NewsDissector.com), Filmmaker (PlundertheCrimeofOurTime.com) and fellow troublemaker.

I am a former producer for CNN and ABC News and even did a stint at CNBC.  But these networks are not open to independent perspectives, even from former employees and award-winning professional producers.  I had to go to Iran’s Press TV to find interest to make a short documentary about HOW Occupied Wall Street operates on the ground at Zuccotti Park.

Here’s my program that has already been on TV all over the world — but not in my own country.  What does that say about our media?  Most mainstream media, alas, serves the 1%, not the American people.

From Press TV : Occupy Wall Street had just celebrated its 30th day in the park. On Saturday, it inspired solidarity actions in 1000 cities and that is considered as an incredible achievement.

We have heard a lot about what they stand for but not how they organized to make this happen.  This occupation runs like a village with lots of participation from a diverse group of articulate people.

“Behind the scenes of occupy Wall Street is an organization that is pretty invisible. It is decentralized,  it’s bottom up and it’s organized into working committees,” editor of the Mediachannel.org, Danny Schechter says.

In this edition of the show we will take you behind the scenes of Occupy Wall Street to show you how it all works.

Guest post : Preparing in place (and speaking in other places)

by Guy McPherson 
[Guy McPherson is a professor emeritus at the University of Arizona and member of our trend research team. We have also included a link to an interview with Professor McPherson, courtesy of Eric Bouthillette and Everything is OK/Freethink Radio]
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There are various ways to ready oneself for the trip down the peak-oil curve, as well as for climate chaos. Most importantly, as I’ve indicated many times, is psychological readiness. If you are mentally prepared for a future radically different from the past you’ve known, you’re well on your way to thriving in the years ahead.

Also, as I’ve indicated many times, there are a couple general approaches one can pursue along the path of climate change and simultaneous collapses of the industrial economy and the living planet. You can hit the road, or you can mitigate in place. Either way, you’ll need to secure clean water and healthy food, maintain body temperature, and create and maintain a decent human community.

I recommend a life of travel for most people, although I’ve taken a different route for personal reasons. Either way, an adventure-filled life awaits. On the road, you’ll need quick wits, good interpersonal skills, and astonishing amounts of creativity, compassion, and courage. Ditto for mitigating in place. In this post, I’ll address the primary concerns associated with mitigating in place, with a particular focus on me and the mud hut (my favorite subject and my favorite location, respectively).

If you’re staying put, I suggest you pay attention to the 3 Rs of the future. No, not the educational ones from years gone by. And it’s far too late for the three Rs targeting reduced consumption in a nation build on consumption, two of which we have ignored because there is no financial profit in reducing and reusing. Recycling — the only one of these three relevant actions fascist Amerika promotes — is like an apology after a punch in the face (credit Mike Sliwa). We punch the planet in the face with every cultural act, and then we apologize by sorting plastic and aluminum into separate bins.

The three Rs of interest in this post are relocalization, resilience, and redundancy. We’re headed for a severely constrained future with respect to transport of materials and humans. The days of the 12,000-mile supply chain are nearly behind us. Forget about cheap plastic crap from China, expensive watches from Switzerland, and decent hand tools from the Sears Roebuck catalog: We’re going to have to make do with what we’ve got in the very local area. Before the supply chain breaks, we should work toward building a resilient set of living arrangements steeped in redundancy. After the supply chain breaks, it’ll be a little late to start digging a well and learning how to grow food.

Here at the mud hut, we pay serious attention to multiple sources of water (two solar pumps, hand pump, rainwater harvesting from two rooftops, and the nearby river), food (wildcrafting, orchard, gardens, goats for milk and cheese, eggs from ducks and chickens, and in the future, hunting relatively large-bodied animals), body temperature (well-insulated, passive-solar house, multiple awnings, proper clothing, and abundant water and firewood), and human community (abundance in this category exceeds my patience to explain again, but search the archives for a few hints). I’ve no doubt we’re missing some things that will ease our lives in our post-carbon future. Some of these items will remain unknown, even to us, until it’s too late. I’m already missing a few things, even before the impending big crash leads to “lights out.” (As Dmitry Orlov uncharacteristically suggests, the day draws near. As “Tyler Durden” characteristically suggests, the day can be seen by a blind man.) And as I’ve mentioned a few hundred times, skyrocketing greenhouse gas emissions, along with wholesale destruction of the living planet, will seal our fate as a species unless we crash this luxury ship, and soon.

I know you’ve read this one before, but I’d love to have a solar ice-maker to cool our drinks and our bodies. But if the industrial economy reaches its overdue end within a few weeks, I won’t. And I suspect we’ll muddle through, until we don’t. I’d love to have more time to convince my human community to climb aboard the collapse train. But if the industrial economy reaches its overdue end within a few weeks, I won’t. And I suspect we’ll muddle through, until we don’t. I’d love to make a few more trips to discuss the dire nature of our predicaments with people who are aware and interested. But if the industrial economy reaches its overdue end within a few weeks, I won’t. And I suspect I’ll muddle through, although I’ll miss trips tentatively scheduled to Australia, New Zealand, Scotland, New England, and various places nearer the mud hut.

Closer to home, and closer to my heart, I’d love to have time for my parents — and the thousands of other winter immigrants descending on this area — to make the return trip to their northern homes. But if the industrial economy reaches its overdue end within a few weeks, or even within a few months, they won’t. And I have no idea how we’ll muddle through.

All things being equal, I’d rather have the solar ice-maker in a community fully on-board with collapse. All things being equal, I’d rather make a multitude of excursions to exotic places. All things being equal, I’d rather my parents experience collapse in their own home. But all things are not equal and, more than all these things, I’d rather have a planet marked by much more abundance and far fewer extinctions than we’re currently witnessing.

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Please find time to listen to Guy's interview from August, 12, 2011 here : http://www.mediafire.com/?b3d6ekwwh8drnw8

And be sure to visit Guy McPherson's blog at Nature Bats Last

Professor McPherson is a member of Ecological Society of America, Natural Areas Association, Society for Conservation Biology, and American Association of Professors. In addition he has lectured locally, regionally, nationally, and internationally.