Saturday, April 23, 2011

"Hold Both Parties to High Standards": Van Jones, Obama’s Ex-Green Jobs Czar





More than 10,000 people converged in Washington, D.C., this past week to mobilize around the issue of climate change at the Power Shift 2011 conference. Van Jones, a longtime environmental advocate and former green jobs adviser in the Obama White House, gave the keynote address. "We pull out of the ground death, and we burn it in our engines. And we burn death in our power plants, without ceremony," Jones said. "And then we act shocked when, having pulled death out of the ground and burned it — we act shocked when we get death from our skies in the form of global warming and death on our oceans in the form of oil spills and death in our children’s lungs in the form of asthma and cancer." [includes rush transcript]


"Hold Both Parties to High Standards": Van Jones, Obama’s Ex-Green Jobs Czar

Wednesday, April 20, 2011

"A Sea in Flames": Ecologist Carl Safina on First Anniversary of Deepwater Horizon Oil Rig Blowout




Today marks the one-year anniversary of the worst maritime oil spill in U.S. history. Last year on April 20, the Deepwater Horizon rig, leased by oil giant BP, exploded in the Gulf of Mexico, killing 11 workers and releasing nearly 200 million gallons of oil, tens of millions of gallons of natural gas and 1.8 million gallons of other chemicals. A year later, how much has changed? “[Another spill] could happen again tomorrow. And if it did, the response would be as bad,” says Carl Safina, author of the new book, A Sea in Flames. Safina reviews BP, Halliburton and TransOcean’s role in the disaster and reflects on how little the government has done to prepare for another offshore drilling accident. [includes rush transcript]


"A Sea in Flames": Ecologist Carl Safina on First Anniversary of Deepwater Horizon Oil Rig Blowout

Friday, March 11, 2011

Dumki Jacoba & A Carnival of Revolution

originally one of the very first posts at "whats up," launched on 311/11, the day of THE GREAT TOHOKU EARTHQUAKE & TSUNAMI AND  BEGINNING OF THE ONGOING FUKUSHIMA NUCLEAR CATASTROPHE.  whats up then became "whats up nuclear blog"


Wojciech Jacob Jankowski


Dumki Jacoba
 via Google translate - -

"Dumki" emerged in 1994 - 99th Then lived in the woods and mountains, away from the noise, crowds, politics itpodobnych attractions. Generally used to be that I could not sleep until they have shed intrusive thoughts down on paper. Most of these tales to keep printed by various newspapers: The Tri-City "Election", "Mac Pariadka," "Vegetarian World", "kayasa Ochi", "Green Brigade". In 1999 Warsaw Publishing Agency "Here," released them as a book. In 2005, Anarchist Initiative Beskidzka styrała paperback resume. And now opened Tezeuszkowa, ecumenical, virtual space.

With hindsight and experience some of these texts seem to me to be naive, wind, and sometimes "haunted". But yes at times earlier, even as you type. And sometimes, years later, the most "haunted" pieces are revived and embarrassing to me as a specific, life science, absolutely, "impersonally."

Being honest with oneself is bad art. Or perhaps the purpose of this journey? I'm glad I did not threw into the furnace of the "failed", bad stories. Because that's what happens sometimes they inspire, not only me, I guess.

Some time ago the phone rang. The guy thanked him, bought the book "accidentally" in a bookstore. I abandoned the thought of suicide. Thanks. On a larger prize, I could not count. Howgh!

... And I am carrying you
winter rose
I know the tricks of time
take it - for the moment
We will not ...
/ Andrzej Sulima-Suryn /


PROLOGUE
Red rocks, mossy paths, streams, rivers, streams. Increasingly rare, rachitic vegetation. The traveler looked around. He sat down.

Musin, Moon Mountain, from a distance looked inconspicuous. Now, when he rested in the middle of the road to the summit, he saw a powerful, autonomous world. Mountain and sky. In the distance, sharp, snow-capped peaks. Somewhere out there - hen! - Ribbon highway. With all the hustle and bustle of civilized - fragile ribbon.

He smiled. It was a strength. And this power was in it. He saw that human problems are only a delusion. Play it cool. The age-old, wonderful music...
> more Dumki Jacoba: polish original | english translation
alternat url polish | english translation



A Carnival of Revolution - "Jacob's Retreat"


A Carnival of Revolution: Central Europe 1989, Padraic Kenney

- at Princeton University Press:
"This is the first history of the revolutions that toppled communism in Europe to look behind the scenes at the grassroots movements that made those revolutions happen. It looks for answers not in the salons of power brokers and famed intellectuals, not in decrepit economies--but in the whirlwind of activity that stirred so crucially, unstoppably, on the street. Melding his experience in Solidarity-era Poland with the sensibility of a historian, Padraic Kenney takes us into the hearts and minds of those revolutionaries across much of Central Europe who have since faded namelessly back into everyday life. This is a riveting story of musicians, artists, and guerrilla theater collectives subverting traditions and state power; a story of youthful social movements emerging in the 1980s in Poland, East Germany, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, and parts of Yugoslavia and the Soviet Union."


"Jacob's Retreat"
- from A carnival of revolution: Central Europe 1989,
via Google books




photos from the period (images are not from the book) -







Jocob in the place I got to know him

Sonoma Mountain Zen Center, Feb. 26 2011

"Teraz, wczoraj, sto, tysiąc czy więcej lat temu - tak to właśnie wygląda. Nauczyciel i uczniowie. SMZC, zimowe sesshin, foto - Barbara."

Now, yesterday, a hundred thousand or more years ago - that's how it looks. Teacher and students. SMZC, winter sesshin)









more Dumki Jacoba: polish original | english translation
alternat url polish | english translation


see also - whats more: The Old Ways