Reclaim the Commons - resistance is growing!

BioJustice 2007 Convergence!

Fri, 16 Feb 2007 00:00:00 +0000

BioJustice 2007 SCHEDULE OF EVENTS (click here)

BioJustice 2007 is a week long celebration of sustainable food and alternatives to corporate healthcare. It is being mobilized by a wide coalition of public interest groups, activists, farmers, scientists, and concerned citizens, working together in response to the biotechnology industry's international convention scheduled for the new Boston Convention and Exhibition Center during May 6-9, 2007.

Rising Tide Spring 2007 Climate Action Tour!

Wed, 14 Feb 2007 00:38:22 +0000

The Rising Tide Spring 2007 Climate Action Tour is Coming to Your Region - Host Us in Your Town!

This spring, Rising Tide will bring the global struggle for climate justice to the belly of the beast, connecting the dots between the overarching crisis of climate change and the grassroots struggles of communities resisting the fossil fuel industry’s assault on their land and culture.

Through partnering with local environmental and climate justice organizations in each region, we seek to amplify the voices of those most affected by climate change and the fossil fuel industry, boosting support for these revolutions on the local level and creating a culture of solidarity across lines of race, class and gender.

Dissent! Anti-G8 USA West & East Coasts Infotour

Tue, 13 Feb 2007 00:55:29 +0000

Dissent G8! USA INFOTOUR Schedule at Indymedia.US

ABOUT Dissent! G8 Infotour

Once a year the leaders of the 8 richest nations meet behind closed doors in secret with no publicized agenda or published minutes, to discuss the fate of the world. They’ve been making empty promises for decades about improving the environment, poverty in Africa, and lots more, but the fact is that the G8 is not the solution to these ills, it is the problem! We are preparing in Germany for large scale protests against the G8 meeting this June 6-8, 2007, and plan to come tell you about what is going on here. We have done over 200 presentations in 25+ countries since November 2005, and are now coming to your town!

Converge against Nuclear Weapons Testing and War, March 27 - April 1 at the Nevada Test Site!

Sun, 14 Jan 2007 12:01:03 +0000

Nevada Desert Experience is an interfaith nonprofit that has campaigned for an end to nuclear weapons testing since 1982. Do you share our concerns about the threats of nuclear weapons-related violence looming large in 2007? From the Bush Administration's threats of war on Iran, to political fallout from the North Korean nuclear test, to the Divine Strake chemical detonation at the Nevada Test Site, to the new Complex 2030 plan to spend $150 billion on new nuclear weapons, this is a crucial time for collective action.

In response to the urgent threats of nuclear war and nuclear terrorism, we are calling members of concerned groups to gather in the desert near the Nevada Test Site. We will be speaking out against nuclear proliferation at home and abroad and building momentum for nuclear abolition, which includes transforming the Test Site into a facility that serves human and environmental needs.

Firestone Under Fire

Fri, 29 Dec 2006 01:11:08 +0000

Published on Thursday, December 28, 2006 by the McLatchy Newspapers

Firestone Catches Heat for its Treatment of Liberian Workers
by Shashank Bengali

HARBEL, Liberia — The wake-up call comes each morning before 4:30. In the dark, 6,000 weary men follow the faint beams of flashlights to their assigned spaces on a massive farm of rubber trees.

Moses Kollie, 51, carries an estimated 150 pounds of latex on his shoulder at the Firestone rubber plantation in Harbel, Liberia. Kollie says he supports his wife and nine children on $80 a month.

How YOU Can Help the Desert Rock Blockade

Fri, 22 Dec 2006 19:47:39 +0000

Friday, December 22nd update - While no arrests were made yesterday, the Navajo Nation HAS been harassing the protesters and threatening elders with arrest during an all day-and-night stand off.

The Navajo Nation President's office has been giving out a lot of misinformation, pretending that they're actually HELPING the protesters (President Joe Shirley told us a few hours ago that they were helping with wood hauling, which is not true at all). The police are not allowing press to the site and there is no independent monitoring of the situation.

Based on my conversations with some of those on the ground, it appears that police dismantled the camp site and dispersed the protesters' personal belongings along the road. They wouldn't let elders use the bathroom or eat or allow any wood hauling. They even threatened arrest if they left the site to use the bathroom and are refusing to let them use port-a-potties that they paid for (there are no convenient places to go to the bathroom). A local family was even told that they cannot return to their own land where they live and that their land belongs to BHP (a big coal company).

Days of Resistance to the War - March 19 and 20th, 2007

Fri, 15 Dec 2006 18:31:33 +0000

Call to Action: Days of Resistance to the War - March 19 and 20th, 2007

Days of Resistance to the War: March 19 and 20th, 2007

This call to action comes from a number of different organizations and individuals involved in the anti-war movement. Our organizing experiences have left us feeling disappointed in ourselves and in the movement as a whole. Organizing against the war in Iraq has led us to believe that marching and chanting has not made enough of an impact nor done enough to end the brutal realities of the occupation. This has got to change.

On March 19 and 20th 2007, we call for worldwide days of resistance to the imperialist, racist and senseless war in Iraq. We propose occupations, acts of civil disobedience, and direct action. We propose that these acts of resistance be directed towards governments, military recruitment centers, corporations, and other institutions that perpetuate American empire and war.

SUPPORT NEEDED: Dine' Establish Blockade Near Proposed Power Plant Site

Thu, 14 Dec 2006 16:58:01 +0000

Lucy A. Willie, right, stands at the proposed Desert Rock Power Plant site outside of Burnham on Wednesday where she and several friends and family stayed overnight to stop a contractor for Desert Rock Energy Company from doing preliminary work.

Burnham, Sanostee & Nenanezah Elders and citizens are braving the cold to protect the land from the encroaching Diné Power Authority (DPA) and Sithe Global LLC at the proposed Desert Rock site. Navajo residents confronted the Diné Power Authority/Sithe Global on Tuesday afternoon after learning of water drilling that had been occurring without the knowledge and notification of local residents.

Iceland: Summer of International Dissent Against Heavy Industry - Gathering Starts 6 July 2007

Tue, 12 Dec 2006 20:59:19 +0000

The campaign to defend Europe's vastest remaining wilderness continues. After the direct action camps in Iceland in the summers of 2005 and 2006 against the Karahnjukar dam and ALCOA's aluminium smelter, the Saving Iceland campaign moves on to bring industrialisation of Iceland to a halt. A new camp in Iceland will commence on July 6th 2007 (location to be announced later).

SUMMER OF INTERNATIONAL DISSENT AGAINST HEAVY INDUSTRY - GATHERING STARTS 6 JULY 2007
http://www.savingiceland.org/

The campaign to defend Europe's vastest remaining wilderness continues.

Early info on the 2007 G8 Summit

Sat, 09 Dec 2006 21:05:59 +0000

The exact dates for the G8 Heiligendamm summit will be June 6-8, 2007.

The 2007 G8 summit mobilisation is starting to take shape. The following is a very rough and certainly not set-in-stone overview of what the days of resistance will most likely look like:

Convergence Centre - Hamburg

From 26th May 2007 onwards there will be a convergence center open in Hamburg. The convergence center will be located in the autonomous social center "Rote Flora". The idea behind this convergence center is to offer a possibility for activists from other parts of Germany and especially for activists from abroad to gather already some days before the actual summit, to have a place to arrive in Germany and to prepare actions or get the latest information.

Call to Action: May Day 2007 National Mobilization to Support Immigrant Workers!

Sat, 09 Dec 2006 06:57:04 +0000

From the National Immigrant Solidarity Network

We are calling:

A national day of multi-ethnic community, youth, peace and justice movement in solidarity with immigrant workers and support immigrant rights!

WE ARE ALL HUMANS! NO ONE IS ILLEGAL!

On May 1st 2006, we showed the world that our force, our strength and our voice cannot be silenced from this moment on! This is the birth of a new civil rights movement for the 21st century, and we will fight for our demands until we prevail.

Death by Dust: The frightening link between the 9-11 toxic cloud and cancer

Fri, 08 Dec 2006 18:39:40 +0000

Want more evidence of the government's criminal disregard for the healthy and safety of citizens? Consider: due directly to the lack of care shown for the lives of Ground Zero first responders by their leaders, more people will die from the toxic fallout at Ground Zero than were killed in the initial attacks.

A looming medical crisis could have been mitigated by swift, decisive action on the part of the EPA. But rather than declare lower Manhattan off limits until it performed a comprehensive evaluation of the hazards posed by airborne toxins emitted from the "pile" and provide appropriate protective gear to volunteers sifting through the debris, the White House pressured the EPA into declaring the air at Ground Zero safe.

And now that hundreds of Ground Zero first responders are dying from rare cancers, diminished lung capacity, and toxins in their blood, the same politicians have yet to respond to their plights and pleas for help. Apparently, there isn't adequate funding for monitoring, testing and treating the heroes politicians were all too happy to use for political gain.

Even the medical community has been in denial about the connection between their work after 9/11 and the rapid development of diseases that normally take significantly longer to appear. When these diseases appear in clusters, as they have in those who worked to clean up Ground Zero and those exposed to toxic clouds for months, it is time to drop the word 'coincidence' and take responsibility for caring for the men and women we lauded for their heroism and courage. We cannot let them become disposable heroes.

— 9/11 Truth Ed.

by Kristen Lombardi
November 28th, 2006
Village Voice

See also:

Believe 9-11 is causing cancer?
An open thread in Power Plays

Biofuels: "Green Energy" Panacea or Just the Latest Hype?

Fri, 08 Dec 2006 08:36:12 +0000

THE REAL SCOOP ON BIOFEULS

"Green Energy" Panacea or Just the Latest Hype?

by Brian Tokar, WW4 REPORT

You can hardly open up a major newspaper or national magazine these days without encountering the latest hype about biofuels, and how they're going to save oil, reduce pollution and prevent climate change. Bill Gates, Sun Microsystems' Vinod Khosla, and other major venture capitalists are investing millions in new biofuel production, whether in the form of ethanol, mainly derived from corn in the US today; or biodiesel, mainly from soybeans and canola seed. It's virtually a "modern day gold rush," as described by the New York Times, paraphrasing the chief executive of Cargill, one of the main benefactors of increased subsidies to agribusiness and tax credits to refiners for the purpose of encouraging biofuel production.

What is the Commons and Why Is It Important?

Thu, 07 Dec 2006 11:15:05 +0000

By digger
Published in The Confluence
Autumn 2006 - v.12, no.2
Reclaim the Commons Issue

These Comments are from participants in the Reclaim the Commons convergence in Chicago this April 9-11, 2006.

John Peck, Family Farm Defenders, Madison, Wisconsin:
"Most of our our life is based on Commons. We're talking about water, the air, our food. Many believe that food should be a human right; not a commodity. If the Commons are taken away from us and privatized, commodified and corporatized, our freedoms as a people are diminished, our communities are vulnerable. We lose local control and we are at the mercy of corporations."

In Defense of the Commons: A Brief History

Thu, 07 Dec 2006 11:06:56 +0000

By digger
Published in The Confluence
Autumn 2006 - v.12, no.2
Reclaim the Commons Issue

Hunter-gatherer societies' understanding of "ownership" was quite different from our modern conception. To primitive humans, no one owned the land, water, air, or sky; they belonged to whomever was using it at the time. With the rise of civilization came the rule of private property. However, even dominator societies such as the Roman Empire codified the Commons into their laws: land was set aside and water sources belonged to everyone (Res Communes).