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Blowing bubbles has become a symbol of what happened at the G20 Protests in Toronto…

Hundreds of protesters expected to blow bubbles at Toronto rally
www.digitaljournal.com/article/294791
“Digital Journal reported on Friday that a woman was arrested shortly after she began to blow bubbles at two police officers. One of officers threatened to arrest of her if any of the bubbles hit him because it was an act of assault. The officer has been dubbed: Officer Bubbles.”
…
“During the G20, the police acted in a way that directly contradicts how we believe a lawful society should behave. Many protesters and innocent bystanders were unjustly arrested and detained for up to 36 hours, some without even the right to have access to a lawyer or a phone call.”

Part of the story I’m working on involves a character (I changed his name to Colin) who works for a “Green Marketing” company. He soon learns his employers are not so eco-friendly and mostly interested in the other kind of green, money.

Tonight I am researching “carbon credits” and found this story.

The great carbon credit con: Why are we paying the Third World to poison its environment?
www.dailymail.co.uk/home/moslive/article-1188937/The-great-carbon-credit-eco-companies-causing-pollution.html

In the fields around this giant chemicals factory in Gujarat, the barren soil smells of paint stripper and the water from the well makes you gag. So why has it been given tens of millions of pounds of taxpayer-funded UN ‘green reward points’, which are traded hungrily on the financial markets at huge profit?
…
Companies that cut their emissions gain credits. If, on the other hand, they exceed their quotas, they have to acquire credits. The credits are traded on markets such as the ECX and have become such an established part of the financial world that trading involves Europe’s biggest banks, including RBS and Barclays. Until the global slowdown, carbon was one of the most profitable ‘commodities’, nearly doubling in value between 2007 and 2008.

The main points from a document I like very very much:

Principles of Spiritual Activism
www.agnt.org/snvSpiritActive.htm

1. Love those with whom we are in conflict. This is a real challenge for most of us.

2. We are all spiritual beings. See the image of God in everyone.

3. We are all connected and part of the web of life.

4. We can pray. Prayer is powerful and effective and should precede all actions.

5. We are conscious beings and are part of a collective universal consciousness. As such, our positive thoughts and intentions can have a beneficial impact on all life forms.

6. Shift our motivation for action from anger to love.

7. Be aware of any negative thinking on our part. Be alert for fearful or angry images which arise in our consciousness. We have a choice. We can let negative thoughts rule us and our behavior or we can replace these thoughts with more positive images.

9. To promote peace, we need to become peaceful ourselves. Meditating can help us develop peace and learn to live more in a state of love.

10. Develop a non-attachment to outcome. Buddhists believe this is the path out of suffering.

11. Let go of the need to be right and in control. Be open to all possibilities.

12. When involved in a dispute, focus on the issues rather than attacking the opposition.

13. We should not isolate ourselves from the pain and suffering of the world. As we let the pain in, we become transformed, compassionate and motivated to action.

14. God created life and we are intelligent beings capable of creative genius. We can co-create, with God, a better future.

15. Peaceful, non-violent direct action is an appropriate way to demonstrate our protest to harmful, unjust laws or practices.

16. We are all One with God, each other and all life. In this oneness, may we love one another and be of service.

Two things I’ve learned in Canada are:

A perogy is a potato based food stuffed with cheese or other tasty fillings.

Proroguing Parliament is when a Prime Minister closes Parliamentary sessions for a period, often to avoid facing up to scandal or just to get a nice long vacation (which this time was met with giant waves of protest in rallies today all across the country!)

One estimate said over 7000 people attended in Toronto! I took photos, including these:

During “economic downturns” many choose to invest in (and or hoard) gold.

Why is gold so valuable anyway? Is it just for its jewelry value or is there something more to it?

Does it matter?

Free investment advice for those with money right now: invest in SEEDS, LAND, and/or GREENHOUSES!

Yesterday, I worked a 14 hour shift handing out ballots and at the end of the day, counting votes in the British Columbia provincial election.

Though “democracy” and party politics have their limitations, the experience left me feeling quite thankful that I live in this part of the world in this time in history.

Have some perspective! We are lucky.

They call this apocalyptic times and fear the end of the world. But let’s compare our lot with folks in medieval Europe. Most land belonged to the nobility and the church. Peasants, who comprised the vast majority of the population, were forced to live off small strips of land, and a bad harvest or harsh taxes could leave thousands on the verge of starvation, with little hope. Bands of outlaws — poachers, thieves, vagrants, murderers, rapists — were common. Life was nasty, brutish, and short. — Stewart Ross, Bandits and Outlaws

Images of the day… Alex Grey painting Obama!

Behind the scenes, the conservative Canadian Federal government is making deals with the United States to sell off Canada and most Canadians are unaware of it.

Though I have largely moved away from talking politics, this one is important to be aware of.

Deep Integration and Water
http://www.canadians.org/DI/issues/guide/water.html
“It is nearly inevitable that bulk water exports from Canada … will take place, given the political circumstances, within the next two to five years,” said Paul Michael Wihbey, president and founder of Global Water and Energy Strategy Team, during a September 2006 Business Forum in Banff, Alberta.

A Probe Research national survey released in July 2006 found that 74 per cent of Canadians are opposed to selling our water like a commodity to the U.S., but ongoing regulatory and policy harmonization between our two countries is leading us down that path.

In Canada we are starting to have more security measures, albeit not to the extremes that appear in the United States in a time of media induced homeland paranoia.

Where I live we rely on the ferries to get to the mainland, so the news item below is of local concern.

BC Ferries to Screen Passengers
http://www.cbc.ca/canada/british-columbia/
story/2007/04/04/bc-ferries.html
Tougher security measures will start to take effect at BC Ferries terminals next year — including random screening of passengers and vehicles, says a senior company official.

BC Ferries Clarifies Security Plans
in The Vancouver Sun
April 4, 2004
B.C. Ferries is not planning to put in a complete screening system, including full searches of all vehicles and passengers. But he said that’s always an option in the event that a terrorist action takes place.

Here is part of why I love Jon Stewart and would love to talk media with him someday. He obviously knows a thing or two :)

Jon Stewart: Journalist or Comedian?
http://www.yesmagazine.org/article.asp?ID=1591
Nearly one in four adults aged 18 to 29 get their election news from watching “The Daily Show” or NBC’s “Saturday Night Live.” Young people who watched “The Daily Show” scored higher on a campaign knowledge test than network news viewers and newspaper readers. All late-night comedy viewers scored higher than network viewers. “Daily Show” viewers scored higher than both.

“Literally no one upheld the honor better of what remains of the media than did this ‘fake news’ comedian. He is our leader. How pathetic is that?”
Eric Alterman for The Nation

According to this report, the US Government has outsourced the job of reviewing whether a chemical causes birth defects to someone that works for the same company that makes and sells the chemical…

Chemical Industry Consultant Runs Federal Reproductive Health Agency
http://ewg.org/issues/bisphenola/20070228/index.php
The Center for the Evaluation of Risks to Human Reproduction (CERHR) — an agency under the auspices of the National Institutes of Health — is actually run by Sciences International (SI) of Alexandria, Va. EWG found that Sciences International has collaborated with Dow Chemical Co., a major manufacturer of a widely used industrial chemical the agency will evaluate next week, and has also worked for the tobacco giant R.J. Reynolds.
…
BPA is a heavily used industrial chemical that is integral to the production of hard plastics and is found in the liners of metal food cans and in hard plastic containers. More than 200 animal studies show that BPA is toxic at very low doses, while the Centers for Disease Control has found BPA in 95 percent of people tested at levels that raise health concerns.

Campaign finance reform is starting to happen at the local and state levels in America in some areas.

Kudos to the reformers who are working hard on this issue!

Jim Hightower: Clean Money
http://www.jimhightower.com//node/6045
For money reform that works – look not to Washington, but to states and cities, which are passing laws that provide public financing of their elections. This gives candidates an option that frees them from always going around rattling a tin cup for donations. The “Clean Elections” option is changing politics.

Maine, for example, has had four election cycles under its public financing system, and the astonishing result is that Mainers now have a state legislature in which 83 percent of its members have been elected with clean money. Nancy Smith, a small dairy farmer, is one of those house members, as is Deborah Simpson, a single mom who was a waitress. Neither could have run without the possibility of public funding. As Nancy says, “Clean campaigns allow those who work to run for office, and they create ‘citizen legislatures’ that bring very different perspectives and a different energy to government.”

Video: Clean Elections, Changing the Face of America
http://www.publicampaign.org/video
More competition, a more diverse candidate pool, more time spent with regular voters, freedom from conflicts of interest—these are among the accomplishments of Arizona and Maine’s revolutionary Clean Elections laws as shown in the video “Clean Elections: Changing the Face of America.”

In my view, the above organization is worth supporting as it has the potential to accomplish an amazing amount of good in America.

To rule is to serve.
– Chinese Proverb

I live in a small community near Vancouver, British Columbia called the Sunshine Coast. One must take a ferry to get here, because although it’s on the mainland, the mountains are so steep that so far, there are no connecting roads.

If I were in charge, we’d be permaculturing that land instead…

I am about to travel to the USA for the first time in several years, so I checked up on the latest rules & regulations. You can now only carry on liquids in 3 oz. or smaller containers and they must be in a certain sized plastic bag for inspection. I am hoping they’ll allow me to bring on some hand lotion as it’s a long flight!

These rules are silly and paranoid, especially the one below.

Permitted and Prohibited Items
http://www.tsa.gov/travelers/airtravel/prohibited/permitted-prohibited-items.shtm
Snow globes regardless of size or amount of liquid inside, even with documentation, are prohibited in your carry-on. Please ship these items or pack them in your checked baggage.

The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (aka the CBC) is a beloved Canadian institution that is under threat.

Friends of Canadian Broadcasting
http://www.friends.ca/files/html/FCB06nov24-np.html
This past Monday, after strong encouragement from FRIENDS and engaged citizens like you, the House of Commons Standing Committee on Canadian Heritage appeared to agree that the CBC has lost its way and voted unanimously to “undertake a full investigation of the role for a public broadcaster in the 21st century”.

We have discovered that Stephen Harper has a secret agenda for the CBC, and is preparing to change it beyond recognition, perhaps even shut it down, if he thinks he can get away with it politically. That’s why he is waiting for a majority government to implement his hidden agenda.

Harper’s CBC views draw fire (2004)
http://www.friends.ca/News/Friends_News/archives/articles05200401.asp
Mr. Harper told an audience in Winnipeg on Tuesday that the CBC’s main television station and its Radio Two classical music service should be commercialized.

“I’ve suggested that government subsidies in support of CBC’s services should be to those things that are not . . . do not have commercial alternatives,” Mr. Harper said, according to a transcript of his comments. “And I think when you look at things like main English-language television and probably to a lesser degree Radio Two, you could look there at putting those on a commercial basis.”

I’ve been involved with a project that is highly “anti” something and while I agree that what’s being complained about is criminal, I have decided to put FAR less focus on negative activism and FAR more focus on activism that seeks to provide hope & positive solutions, especially activism that involves art, theatre, music, and humour.

Buckminster Fuller quotes:

You never change things by fighting the existing reality. To change something, build a new model that makes the existing model obsolete.

Don’t oppose forces, use them.

Here’s an article from a self-identified conservative Christian about the war in Iraq.

What would Jesus do indeed….

Christianity and the War
http://www.lewrockwell.com/vance/vance81.html
If there is any war in history that is contrary to the whole spirit of the New Testament it is this one. All adherents of Christianity, of any creed or denomination, should be opposed to this war. So why aren’t they? Much of the blame must be laid at the feet of the pastors, preachers, and priests who have failed to discern the truth and educate their congregations. We need ministers who are as concerned about killing on the battlefield as they are about killing in the womb.

But not only is this war against Christian “just war” principles and contrary to the whole spirit of the New Testament, fighting this war is in opposition to the practice of the early church. Not only did the early Christians, following the example of the Lord himself, refuse to advance their ideals by political or coercive means, they condemned war in the abstract and did not participate in the state’s wars. Lactantius describes Christians as “those who are ignorant of wars, who preserve concord with all, who are friends even to their enemies, who love all men as brothers, who know how to curb anger and soften with quiet moderation every madness of the mind.”

The US Government is working on drafting changes to the Endangered Species Act, many of which are actually designed to help business make more money (this is not about creating jobs here, ok?) and will weaken animal protections.

If you want to help sign up for the mailing list below! I especially encourage Americans to get involved.

Save our Species Alliance
http://www.saveourspeciesalliance.org/cgi-bin/display.cgi?page=howyoucanhelp
The first step to making a difference in the debate over and future of the Endangered Species Act is to be informed. We encourage you to use all of the resources on this website to inform yourself about the ESA and how it impacts citizens. The next step is to speak out. Talk to your family, co-workers and neighbors. If you are concerned about the failure of the ESA to recover species and the negative impact it has on everyday citizens, then so should the people around you!

Use the materials below to aid you in your effort to get involved and to inform others about the importance of updating the ESA.

Television stations are airing “news” segments that have been produced by corporate entities more than ever. It’s tempting for stations to use these as they’re already pre-produced, which is good for tight timelines and budgets.

However, this is essentially about an attempt to disguise advertising as journalism. Unfortunately, many people believe that what they see on the news is what’s really happening.

Fake TV News: Widespread and Undisclosed
http://www.prwatch.org/fakenews/execsummary
Over a ten-month period, the Center for Media and Democracy (CMD) documented television newsrooms’ use of 36 video news releases (VNRs)—a small sample of the thousands produced each year. CMD identified 77 television stations, from those in the largest to the smallest markets, that aired these VNRs or related satellite media tours (SMTs) in 98 separate instances, without disclosure to viewers. Collectively, these 77 stations reach more than half of the U.S. population. The VNRs and SMTs whose broadcast CMD documented were produced by three broadcast PR firms for 49 different clients, including General Motors, Intel, Pfizer and Capital One. In each case, these 77 television stations actively disguised the sponsored content to make it appear to be their own reporting. In almost all cases, stations failed to balance the clients’ messages with independently-gathered footage or basic journalistic research. More than one-third of the time, stations aired the pre-packaged VNR in its entirety.

Medialink
http://content2.medialink.com/vnr.htm
Pioneered professionally by Medialink, the Video News Release (VNR), the television version of the printed press release, translates the printed word into the sound and pictures television newsrooms need. Produced in broadcast news style, VNRs relay the news of a product launch, medical discovery, corporate merger event, timely feature or breaking news to television news decision-makers. Every major television station in the world now uses VNRs regularly, and most are from Medialink. It’s a fact.

The most efficient notification and direct pathways ensure that your VNR advisory and full script reach news directors around the globe in the manner they prefer.

No Fake News
http://action.freepress.net/campaign/fakenews
Corporate propaganda has infiltrated local TV newscasts, with disguised product advertisements posing as genuine news reports. This represents a breach of the trust between broadcasters and their viewers.

Take action to stop fake news today. Demand that the Federal Communications Commission investigate, strengthen disclosure requirements and punish stations that air fake news.

Here’s a piece I like from a Canadian Vietnam War Veteran. He describes war from the perspective of someone who’s been there.

We must ask: What do we want for Canada?
http://www.rabble.ca/in_his_own_words.shtml?sh_itm=14f638b897b596285cd108d2a9aadefe&rXn=1&
Today I think about the young men and women in another war in a place not as green or wet as Vietnam, good kids whose lives are being wasted just as the lives of my generation were wasted in Southeast Asia, and I am dismayed that many countries continue to choose leaders that use war for personal political and financial advantage.

I am angered that after setting high standards at the end of World War II, the countries of the world, collectively, have not stood up for those standards and are tolerating the aggressive, pre- emptive warfare that is being pursued by the U.S. and its allies. Aggression is aggression, whether it is carried out against China, Ethiopia or Poland by the Japanese, Italians and Germans, or against Iraq now or a number of other countries the past fifty years by the U.S., the UK and whoever is willing to go along for the ride and a few rewards.

The history of Native land claims has been turbulent in Canada, but progress is happening.

Labrador’s 5,000 Inuit take charge of ‘our beautiful land’
http://www.cbc.ca/story/canada/national/2005/12/01/inuit-rule20051201.html
Toby Andersen, chief negotiator for the Labrador Inuit Association, said he is overwhelmed to see a long-held dream come true.

The Inuit are now able to make their own laws relating to cultural affairs, education and health.

Gunner Palace is an eye-opening documentary about a group of American soldiers living and working in an old palace of Saddam’s in Iraq. It shows them playing guitar, using their laptops, swimming in the pool, raiding family homes in the middle of the night, and driving around getting shot at. It’s a side of the war they won’t be showing on CNN.

If you know someone thinking about enlisting, suggest they watch this first…

Gunner Palace
http://www.gunnerpalace.com
Meeting American soldiers over the summer, many expressed frustration that folks at home, accustomed to quick televised victories, had simply lost interest in the war and had changed the channel to the more entertaining reality of Survivor and American Idol. The War had become an event, something to be watched from a distance without consequence.

In the words of a soldier, “For y’all this is just a show, but we live in this movie.”

Part of the Bush Administration’s so-called “No Child Left Behind” act is a requirement for schools to provide lists of names & addresses of students to military recruiters. Here’s a link to the act and more information about what parents can do to opt their children out, as well as a story about a new ad campaign aimed at parents.

No Child Left Behind Act of 2001
http://www.ed.gov/policy/elsec/leg/esea02/index.html
(1) ACCESS TO STUDENT RECRUITING INFORMATION- Notwithstanding section 444(a)(5)(B) of the General Education Provisions Act and except as provided in paragraph (2), each local educational agency receiving assistance under this Act shall provide, on a request made by military recruiters or an institution of higher education, access to secondary school students names, addresses, and telephone listings.

Leave My Child Alone
http://www.leavemychildalone.org
The Pentagon has developed a database of 30 million 16-25-year-olds, including name, address, email addresses, cell phone numbers, ethnicity, social security numbers and areas of study. This database is updated daily and distributed monthly to the Armed Services for recruitment purposes. You may “opt out” of this list by sending in the form generated through Leave My Child Alone, and your child’s information will be moved to a “suppression file.” The Pentagon retains the information, but does not release it.

Uncle Sam Wants Your Parents … to let you enlist
http://slate.msn.com/id/2124786/
To me, the older guy looks like Mr. Middle America, with his denim jacket and his steely glint. He doesn’t seem too worried about the risk of bodily harm to his kid (never mind the moral underpinnings of the war). He’s far more interested in his son’s improved handshake etiquette. The Army will mold your boy into a stand-up guy with a manly bearing, the ad seems to say, and what could be more important than that?

It all comes together in the fascinating tag line: “Help them find their strength.” The Army has at last been repositioned as a finishing school. You’ve done the best you can, Mom and Dad, but it’s time let the service raise him right.

Every change made to our ecosystem affects every other thing within that system, including animals, plants, and humanity.

Banff food web shows sharp differences without wolves
http://calgary.cbc.ca/regional/servlet/View?filename=ca-wolves-elk20050802
Since wolves feed on elk, the number of herbivores jumped without the predators. Elk populations were 10 times as high in the low-wolf area compared to where many wolves roamed, the team found.
“Where there’s lot of elk, it’s like a lawnmower’s gone through and mowed everything down,” Hebblewhite said. “There’s no young aspen.”

Logging roads bad for caribou: outfitter
http://stjohns.cbc.ca/regional/servlet/View?filename=nf-outfitters-caribou-050802
Outfitters say the island’s caribou population is being disrupted by an increase in logging roads.
Wayne Holloway, an outfitter in Terra Nova, says there is evidence that new roads are going deeper into the forest and are destroying caribou habitat.

American Babies Born Polluted, Study Says
http://www.emagazine.com/view/?2745
“Of the 287 chemicals we detected in umbilical-cord blood, we know that 180 cause cancer in humans or animals, 217 are toxic to the brain and nervous system, and 208 cause birth defects or abnormal development in animal tests,” the report said.

“These 10 newborn babies … were born polluted,” said House Democrat Louise Slaughter of New York, who is leading the charge in Congress to hold chemical producers more accountable to higher standards. “If ever we had proof that our nation’s pollution laws aren’t working, it’s reading the list of industrial chemicals in the bodies of babies who have not yet lived outside the womb,” Slaughter added.

Good news from Ireland! Let’s hope the IRA keeps its word.

IRA says armed campaign is over
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/northern_ireland/4720863.stm
he IRA has formally ordered an end to its armed campaign and says it will pursue exclusively peaceful means.
In a long-awaited statement, the republican organisation said it would follow a democratic path ending more than 30 years of violence.

The observation about Americans below is from a travel article on a Korean website about visiting a small town in Missouri.

Is the American ethos of “self-reliance” overemphasized at the expense of community building & collective benefit?

Moving Through a ‘Gateway to the West’
http://english.ohmynews.com/ArticleView/article_view.asp?menu=A11100&no=232087&rel_no=3&back_url=
The reason America was called a land of opportunity is that, if someone were to fail here, he or she could move out and make a new life at a new place, as the origin of the nation shows. They didn’t need to fear failure, for they could sever their past relationships and renew life as independent individuals somewhere else, which is, I believe, the foundation of a frontier spirit. So far, so good. At some point in the course of American history, however, it helped produce an ideology that still governs the society individualism. This individualism ascribes causes of failure to individuals, not social structure, and teaches people to blame failure on nobody else but themselves and to move on. The ideology of “land of opportunity” has contributed to solidifying a belief that losers could always find a second chance somewhere else. Thus, solving problems and eliminating the societal causes of failure are often not an option. In other parts of the world, social tension is heightened by mass protest on the part of the underprivileged, reinforcing class struggle or being peacefully relieved by the more privileged agitating for the progressive social legislation. In my opinion one of the reasons this country does not have a meaningful progressive party is ironically related to the frontier spirit which sounds very progressive. The pressure coming up from the underprivileged disperses “Just go west.”

Here’s a tidbit on the effect that the Internet is having on how people get their news!

Democratic Media: A Do-it-Yourself Starter Kit
http://www.prwatch.org/node/3782
Running counter to this trend, there is a growing citizen journalism movement that is broadening the ranks of reporters and bringing in new voices that are more diverse and harder to tame than companies like Viacom or Disney. One of the most successful examples, South Korea’s OhMyNews, has played an important role in transforming the country’s traditionally conservative, corrupt political system. It has also become a commercial success and has grown to include an English-language international edition.

As the archbishop observed in his sermon, internet-powered citizen journalism has the potential to undermine some of the “near-monopolistic practices” and “control of the product” now found in the traditional media, but it has some problems of its own: “Unwelcome truth and necessary and prompt rebuttal are characteristic of the web-based media. So are paranoid fantasy, self-indulgent nonsense and dangerous bigotry. The atmosphere is close to that of unpoliced conversation – which tends to suggest that the very idea of an appropriate professionalism for journalists begins to dissolve.”

Today I went hiking in an area near my house that is slated to be logged soon. It was both gorgeous and totally depressing to imagine.

I seriously wonder if the people who direct and approve these projects have any concience whatsoever. Perhaps they don’t understand that what we do to the Earth, we ultimately do to ourselves. Perhaps they just don’t care about future generations or anyone but themselves.

Since we can’t fully escape from using environmentally destructive fossil fuels just yet, here’s an interesting concept on how individuals and organizations can attempt to balance that out ethically: pay an additional fee that will be applied towards climate change research!

Climatecare.org
http://www.climatecare.org
Climate Care Trust Limited sells CO2 reductions, and funds projects around the world to reduce greenhouse gas emissions to tackle climate change. The reductions made balance our clients’ emissions, making their activities climate neutral.

I’m not sure how effective this will be in practice, but it’s certainly better than doing nothing. It’s also good to see The Guardian using it on a business-wide scale.

Unfortunately, that won’t happen until enough people wake the *&#$ up and stop electing oil barons into office.

A former FBI man has come forward and admitted to being the anonymous source who told journalists about the Watergate scandal!

Though this is an interesting development, compared to Iran-Contra and Halliburton Watergate now seems old-timey and quaint as far as political scandals go!

Former FBI official claims to be ‘Deep Throat’
http://www.cbc.ca/story/world/national/2005/05/31/deepthroat-felt050531.html
W. Mark Felt, a former deputy associate director of the FBI has been identified as “Deep Throat,” according to an upcoming issue of Vanity Fair magazine.

Felt, who lives in Santa Rosa, Calif., has long been suspected of being the anonymous source used by the Washington Post to break the Watergate scandal, leading to former U.S. president Richard Nixon’s resignation in 1974.