Environment

EFF to Represent Yes Men in Court Battle Over Chamber of Commerce Action | Electronic Freedom Foundation
Davis Wright Tremaine LLP Also Joins in Free Speech Fight

The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) and Davis Wright Tremaine, LLP, will defend the Yes Men and other activists in a lawsuit filed against them by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce over political criticism of the Chamber's stance on climate change legislation.

In mid-October, the activists staged a "press conference" in which the Chamber of Commerce ostensibly reversed its position and promised to stop lobbying against strong climate change legislation -- a stance that has caused numerous Chamber members to leave the organization. As has been widely reported, before the press conference was even completed, a Chamber of Commerce representative rushed into the room and revealed that the Chamber's position on climate change legislation had not in fact changed.

"The action was a brilliant piece of political theater, but it had a serious purpose: calling attention to the Chamber's political activities," said EFF Senior Staff Attorney Corynne McSherry. "This is core political speech, protected by the First Amendment. We're very pleased that Davis Wright Tremaine -- with its long, successful history of protecting free speech rights of Americans -- has joined us in helping these activists battle a transparent attempt at censorship."

"U.S. courts have recognized that political parody lies at the heart of the First Amendment," said Davis Wright Tremaine LLP partner Bruce Johnson. "Even if the party parodied refuses to giggle--or even panics and sues--free speech will ultimately triumph. We look forward to a prompt dismissal of this case and a reaffirmation of the rights of all Americans to poke fun at the pompous and powerful." Read more.

Maine says NO to Nestle again!
By Jamilla El-Shafei, Organizer | Save Our Water | Kennebunkport, ME

Once again, Maine voters said NO to Nestle! Activists in the communities which surround the Branch Brook Aquifer, located in the southern part of the state handily defeated a water extraction ordinance on a referendum vote in the town of Wells. The ordinance, written under the direction of the Nestle Corporate lawyers, would have opened the door to large scale bottled water extractors. The vote was 3,194 against large scale extraction and 1,420 for, a 69.2% margin!!! This was a stunning defeat for the corporation who was ousted from McCloud, California and in Shapleigh and Newfield, Maine. This was convincing testimony that a grassroots campaign cannot be replaced by slick marketing and Greenwashing.

This was a classic David and Goliath battle. Activists were armed with photocopies to educate citizens about the dangers of corporate control of their groundwater resources but Nestle waged an unprecedented advertising blitz. They spent hundreds of thousands of advertising dollars to influence the vote in the small seaside community. However, their campaign backfired, as the townspeople were overwhelmed and annoyed by the barrage of ads and the appearance that Nestle was trying to "buy their vote."

Still, it was not enough that Nestle was pouring money like water into the campaign to play "spin the bottle," to convince people that they are good environmental stewards. Their PR firm resorted to employing many dirty tricks such as printing the WRONG POLLING HOURS on not just one advertising piece which they mailed to every household, but two! A mistake they said! but twice?! It is a tired old election trick the opposition employees when they are loosing.

Home to a worldwide summit on climate change in early December, Denmark is setting a global example in creating clean power, storing it, and using it responsibly. Their reliance on wind power to produce electricity without contributing to global warming is well known, but now they're looking to drive the point home with electric cars. To do this, they've partnered with social entrepreneur Shai Agassi and his company Better Place.

PBS’ NOW investigates how the Danish government and Better Place are working together to put electric cars into the hands of as many Danish families as possible. The idea is still having trouble getting out of the garage here in America, but Denmark be an inspiration.

Will so much green enthusiasm bring about a "Copenhagen Protocol"? This show is part of a series on social entrepreneurs at work that PBS’ NOW calls "Enterprising Ideas."

By Dave Lindorff

It would be easy to read too much into the few statewide races that were decided last night, but I think it’s fair to say that the results in New Jersey and Virginia, where Republican gubernatorial candidates won--in New Jersey’s case knocking off a well-funded Democratic incumbent--that the results were a blow to the Barack Obama/Rahm Emanuel strategy of playing to the right, of avoiding confrontation in Congress and of ignoring the progressive voters whose enthusiasm and effort back in the 2008 campaign put Obama in office.

BYD says that its new E6 electric car due out before the end of the year will do 250 miles (400km) on a single charge. READ MORE AT BBC.

By Dave Lindorff

The Nuclear Regulator Commission will be holding hearings tomorrow and Wednesday in Hawaii on an application by the US Army for a permit to have depleted uranium at its Pohakuloa Training Area, a vast stretch of flat land in what’s called the “saddle” between the sacred mountains of Mauna Loa and Mauna Kea on Hawaii’s Big Island, and at the Schofield Barracks on the island of Oahu. In fact, what the Army is asking for is a permit to leave in place the DU left over from years of test firing of M101 mortar “spotting rounds,” that each contained close to half a pound of depleted uranium (DU). The Army, which originally denied that any DU weapons had been used at either location, now says that as many as 2000 rounds of M101 DU mortars might have been fired at Pohakuloa alone.

But that’s only a small part of the story.

The Labor Network for Sustainability needs you
-- And you need it.

Are you in the labor movement? Are you concerned about a sustainable future? Climate change? Economic justice? If so, you should know about the Labor Network for Sustainability.

The LNFS was launched in October, 2009 by labor activists who are concerned about a more just and sustainable world.

Reflecting the growing concern within organized labor and its allies not only with climate change but with an array of issues that threaten our long-term future, the LNFS will bring together activists from many different labor organizations to make labor a more effective force for sustainability. It will address the issues -- from water resources to food security, from economic justice to corporate accountability, from climate protection to renewable energy -- that will determine whether we have a just and sustainable future.

Conservationists fear the decision to allow Shell to drill for offshore oil in the Arctic will threaten polar bears and endangered animals. Photograph: Hans Strand/ Hans Strand/Corbis

U.S. gives Shell green light for offshore oil drilling in the Arctic
Conservationists say the decision by the Obama administration to allow drilling in the Beaufort Sea repeats Bush era mistakes
By Ed Pilkington | Guardian.UK

Conservation groups based in Alaska have accused the Obama administration of repeating the mistakes of George Bush after it gave the conditional go-ahead for Shell to begin drilling offshore for oil and natural gas in the environmentally sensitive Beaufort Sea.

The Minerals Management Service, part of the federal Interior Department, yesterday gave Shell the green light to begin exploratory wells off the north coast of Alaska in an Arctic area that is home to large numbers of endangered bowhead whales and polar bears, as well as walruses, ice seals and other species. The permission would run from July to October next year, though Shell has promised to suspend operations from its drill ship from late August when local Inuit people embark on subsistence hunting.

Environmentalists condemned the decision to allow drilling, saying it would generate industrial levels of noise in the water and pollute both the air and surrounding water. Rebecca Noblin, an Alaskan specialist with the conservation group the Centre for Biological Diversity, said: "We're disappointed to see the Obama administration taking decisions that will threaten the Arctic. It might as well have been the Bush administration." Read more.

By Dave Lindorff

How absurd is it that we have the government on the one hand pulling back from using a hollowed out mountain in Nevada to store nuclear waste because of a fear (legitimate I grant) that hundreds or thousands of years hence, some earthquake or other catastrophe could cause the stored waste to leak into the water table, while on the other hand we have this same government deliberately taking some of the most dangerous waste--the actual uranium from the used fuel rods--and putting it into bombs, shells and bullets to be splattered and burned all across the landscape?

And I should note that it's not just remote places like Iraq and Kuwait and Afghanistan that are being covered in super toxic and radioactive uranium dust--and I'm not just talking about the stuff that gets picked up in the wind and carried around the globe, or the stuff that gets inhaled by our troops and carried home internally, bad enough as that is.

By David Swanson

Pulling pranks on the U.S. Chamber of Commerce is just too easy. The Yes Men held a press conference this week pretending to speak for the chamber and fooled the journalists in the room, because "We are no longer going to promote the destruction of the earth's climate" is such a compelling position that it's very tempting to imagine that any human being could adopt it.

But Tom Donohue and his chamber take the opposite position and have for years. William Kovacs, a senior vice president at the chamber, told the LA Times he'd like to stage a "Scopes monkey trial of the 21st century" to deny, not evolution, but human-made climate change.

Yes Men, Activist Group, Teamed Up On Chamber Hoax
Zachary Roth | TPM Muckraker

Well, it looks like we were right.

The Chamber of Commerce hoax was perpetrated by the Yes Men, in tandem with a group of activists known as the Avaaz Action Factory.

Yes Man Andy Bichlbaum showed up at the 11am press conference that had earlier been announced by a "Chamber of Commerce" press release, and, impersonating a Chamber executive, declared:

We at the Chamber have tried to keep climate science from interfering with business. But without a stable climate, there will be no business.

At some point, reports Mother Jones, an actual Chamber spokesman showed up and yelled: "This is fraudulent!" Read more.

TAKE ACTION: http://stopthechamber.com

Announcement Of Chamber Shift On Global Warming Is Hoax
Zachary Roth | TPM Muckraker

A press release sent out under the banner of the Chamber of Commerce, announcing a major shift in the group's position on climate change, is a hoax.

J.P. Fielder, a spokesman for the Chamber, confirmed the hoax to TPMmuckraker. He said the Chamber was unaware of who was behind it.

The name Erica Avidus is listed as a contact on the press release. A recording at the number listed for Avidus says "this is Erica Avidus with the Chamber of Commerce." But Fielder said that no one by that name works there. Avidus is Latin for "greedy." Read more.

By Dave Lindorff

The horrors of the US Agent Orange defoliation campaign in Vietnam, about which I wrote on Oct. 15, could ultimately be dwarfed by the horrors caused by the depleted uranium weapons which the US began using in the 1991 Gulf War (300 tons), and which it has used much more extensively--and in more urban, populated areas--in the Iraq War and the now intensifying Afghanistan War.

Translated from original

Climate Organizations: “Trouble-maker legislation” scares demonstrators

New “trouble-maker legislation” is unnecessary and prevents people from using their democratic right to demonstrate, say climate organizations.

The government is playing double jeopardy when they on one hand donate 20 million Danish kroner to peaceful activists and on the other want to impose hard punishment on people who wish to speak up.

This is the opinion of the organization People’s Climate Action (PCA), founded in 2008 by the Danish Foreign Ministry in order to secure a peaceful and organized course with activists during the climate conference.

Today the Danish Minister of Justice, Brian Mikkelsen presents “trouble-maker legislation”, which will give the police more opportunities to make arrests and sentence demonstrators during the climate conference.