Chlorophyll

Ted Trainer is at the University of New South Wales, Australia, where he writes on culture and ecology. His latest piece is called "We can't go on living this way" (y en español) in which he makes discusses his idea of The Simpler Way.

So, not only is my web hosting company, Dreamhost, employee-owned -- they're also green! Not as in Green Party (though you never know!), but as in carbon-neutral. Well, they're buying carbon credit, not running off solar power, but how many places do even that much?

After more than five years, Ingrid remains a prisoner of the FARC in Colombia. Here's an AP story on how she's frequently chained by the neck, because she has tried to escape five times. (Note how the article carefully avoids naming the Green Party of Colombia.) This news comes from a Colombian police officer who successfully escaped, at the price of 17 days wandering in the jungle before being rescued. Here's a story of his account from a Colombian paper. President Uribe is reportedly very upset at Ingrid's treatment, and has vowed to rescue her militarily. Many people are convinced this will result in the death of many prisoners... largely because that's what happened last time they tried a military rescue. The Colombia Support Network has a letter you can send to your Senator to try to pressure Uribe to negotiate.

For Immediate Release May 29th, 2007

Today, the Wisconsin Green Party joined a growing chorus of local Democrats and state newspapers in calling for Joe Wineke to resign from his position as chair of the Democratic Party of Wisconsin. Wineke is a registered lobbyist for the AT&T corporation, and has been lobbying on AT&T’s behalf for a bill that would enable them to gain control of Wisconsin's cable TV services.

Thanks to Green Jenni for pointing to this, a very unnerving Presidential Directive (is there another kind?). It basically lays out what steps the government would take in the event of another event on the scale of 9/11. On the surface, it all sounds quite reasonable. But I have no doubt that this administration would twist its own words, and I wouldn't put it past them to suspend elections in 2008 if something bad did happen. The directive never mentions elections, though the whole thing is supposedly meant to maintain Constitutional governance. It does, however, mention that it is meant to conform to Constitutional language on... wait for it... succession to the Presidency.

What this means is that if another disaster were to strike, part six of the directive would go into effect:

(6) The President shall lead the activities of the Federal Government for ensuring constitutional government.

It's altogether possible that Bush could suspend elections. However, the Constitution mandates that he must leave office after two terms of four years each. If he did so without elections being held, Cheney would automatically become President. At that point, the Republic would fall, and a wave of unvarnished tyranny would wash over the planet.

"The Democrats didn't fight for their own true election results in 2000 or in 2004, so why should we expect them to impeach an illegitimate Administration that has violated the U.S. Constitution and international law, lied to the American people, and sent our young men and women into harm's way?

In fact, the Democrats have just now made themselves complicit in impeachable crimes of the Bush Administration. On March 17, my birthday, at the antiwar protest at the Pentagon, I declared that by voting to fund George Bush's wars, the Democrats had become explicitly complicit in war crimes, torture, crimes against humanity, and crimes against peace."

Cindy Sheehan

I have endured a lot of smear and hatred since Casey was killed and especially since I became the so-called “Face” of the American anti-war movement. Especially since I renounced any tie I have remaining with the Democratic Party, I have been further trashed on such “liberal blogs” as the Democratic Underground. Being called an “attention whore” and being told “good riddance” are some of the more milder rebukes.

May 26, 2007
Dublin, Ireland

Dear Democratic Congress,

Hello, my name is Cindy Sheehan and my son Casey Sheehan was killed on April 04, 2004 in Sadr City, Baghdad, Iraq. He was killed when the Republicans still were in control of Congress. Naively, I set off on my tireless campaign calling on Congress to rescind George's authority to wage his war of terror while asking him "for what noble cause" did Casey and thousands of other have to die. Now, with Democrats in control of Congress, I have lost my optimistic naiveté and have become cynically pessimistic as I see you all caving into as one Daily Kos poster called: "Mr. 28%."

This is National Bike to Work Week. I'm doing my part, and biking to all three of my jobs this week. Of course, I do that as much as possible anyway, so that's not much of a change. And there may be some of you who don't live in towns that are as bike-friendly as Madison. Still, though -- give it a try. I can actually get my jobs faster on my bike than on the bus. Of course, rain makes me think twice, and I'm not hardcore enough to bike when the temperature is below freezing, but even so, even riding half the year makes a big difference.