Case: Ecuador: Can a Little Country Take on Big Oil?

These goonies sure won't be doing anything to stop Ecuador's suffering.

Chevron is infallible.  You did know that, right?

It is if you’re on the side of McCain fundraiser Wayne Berman, who
serves as one of Chevron’s top supporters in its ongoing lawsuit
for polluting Ecuador rainforests and the health of 30,000 residents
with 19 billion gallons of toxic wastewater, and 16.8 billion gallons of crude. Cancer and physical deformities were reported.

Otherwise, it’s never been that simple.  But Chevron and its supporters
would like to think that it has been, saying they won’t “let little countries screw around with big companies like [us]”, according to one anonymous lobbyist in Newsweek.

Never mind that the mogul declined to tell shareholders about the entire
pollution issue until the court (unofficially) ruled this spring they owed between $8 and 16 billion.

Oh, and Ecuador can kiss its trade preferences goodbye, according to Newsweek, unless its government throws the case out.  The article received confirmation of this request from a spokesman for U.S. Trade Rep. Susan Schwab.

As if we needed any more evidence that Big Government is just as guilty
as Big Business.  Or any more evidence that McCain’s presidency will be a facsimile of Bush’s.

But, claims the article, there’s a ‘wild card’ in this equation.

Attorney Steven Donziger is aiding in D.C. efforts against Chevron.
Donziger happens to be a Harvard law school buddy of Obama’s,
and in 2006 met with the Senator to show him photos of Chevron’s
Ecuadorean damage, including pits and runoffs.
According to Donziger, Obama was “offended by” a large
multinational corporation “trying to get [this] country to cry uncle”
by “subvert[ing] the rule of law”.

Obama then vetted the case with VT Sen. Patrick Leahy,
a human rights vet, in Feb. 2006 writing then-U.S. Trade Rep. Rob Portman
to fight for the Ecuadoreans’ right to their case–without Big Oil’s intervention.

Chevron–and McCain’s ties–will learn they can’t manipulate their way out of trouble.

Meanwhile, Ecuadorean–and  American–citizens will learn that this case’s wild card could be one lucky draw.

Join the ongoing Technorati discussions.

McCain Not Committed to stated Grand Canyon Protections

McCain ain't Teddy...at least not anymore.

The Washington Independent has one of the most in-depth issue analysis articles I’ve seen
in a good while.This one pertains to an apparent
faux-environmentalism that McCain proposed.

McCain has, according the article, repeatedly acknowledged that his top political role model remains none other than Teddy Roosevelt. In a recent New York Times interview, McCain was apparently quoted as saying that
“Theodore Roosevelt was my hero and is to this day […]
He was responsible for the National Parks system, the crown jewels of America. They are $6-billion under-funded, they’re under enormous strain.”

Additionally, while counting himself as a “conservative Republican”, he does view himself “to a large degree in the Theodore Roosevelt mold”.

The article delineates that McCain did advocate previously for the Grand Canyon:

‘Early in his Congressional career, McCain pushed through legislation
restricting aircraft flights in the Grand Canyon to keep the natural quiet.
In what he calls one of his proudest achievements, McCain
joined the late Arizona Democratic Rep. Morris K. Udall to set aside
1.4 million acres of Arizona desert as wilderness’.

However….

This has conveniently gone down the tubes in favor of uranium mining.
Apparently, two defense lobbyists close to McCain are responsible for

preventing any cleanup of an abandoned mine in the area.
How surprising.

The abandoned, "Orphan" mine.

Keep in mind that this site is a Superfund one. You got it,

that means that all the nuke waste is going guess where, besides

the Republicans’ heads? Eventually into the Colorado River.

‘McCain’s Senate office and also his campaign staff did not return
several phone calls and emails with a list of questions about
uranium mining near the park and the clean up of the Orphan Mine.
McCain’s silence on the issue is regarded as a disappointment to
many who cite him as a defender of the environment in general,
and the Grand Canyon in particular’.

Additionally, the Grand Canyon Watersheds Protection Act (GCWPA) is
relying on McCain’s support in order to be passed. This bill
protects 1 million acres of USFS/Bureau of Land Management area
from mining, as it includes several of the country’s largest uranium
deposits.

“The bill is not going anywhere without McCain’s support,” says Roger
Clark, air and water director for The Grand Canyon Trust, a
Flagstaff, Ariz.,-based environmental group.   (Clark has repeatedly
tried to meet with McCain to discuss GCWPA, but has,
according to the Independent, been rejected each time).

This is precisely why we need someone in the White House who is going to stand up for the environment.

Both the Sierra Club and the League of Conservation Voters have already endorsed Obama, and for good reason:

• Obama’s plan will decrease CO2 emissions 80% by 2050, using both cap-and-trade and carbon sequestration techniques. The cap-and-trade system will feature 100% auctioning of pollution credits.

Obama’s website says that “100 percent auction ensures that all polluters pay for every ton of emissions they release, rather than giving these emission rights away to coal and oil companies”.

• 2030 will see a 50% reduction in energy requirements.

This will allow growth in the hybrid and green-building markets

(keep in mind that the hybrid market alone leaped 50 percent in 2007

from 2006, with the U.S. accounting for 75 percent more sales than its next-largest competitor, Japan)

• A 10-year, $150-billion energy investment will aid in new research fields and patents, plus an estimated 5 million new jobs

• $10 billion a year will go into a VC fund for clean energy, encouraging market innovation

Read the entire list of environmental leaders who support Obama–then pose your ideas for Change.

Cancer, anyone?

I’ve received word of peculiar happenings near Portland, where an aunt of mine owns a farm.
Apparently a coal-mining company moved in next door and employs practices
that release several types of carcinogens into the air. She is suffering from dizziness and nausea as a result,
as are many people within her community.

Know what they’re thinking? You guessed it.
Prime ground for a class-action lawsuit.
Of course, this company denies that its practices are affecting anyone’s health.
More on this soon…

A Day of Action.

Today I received an urgent petition from enviro-law nonprofit EarthJustice. No, wait, today I found out I’d received it. It had been thrown underneath a pile for several days, deemed ‘spam’ by my mother.

That’s ok. I quickly explained to her why it wasn’t. There’s a little something called the Clean Air Act which found its way to the EPA in 2003, which apparently did NOT define carbon dioxide as a pollutant. The EPA did its best to assure the public that it therefore didn’t have authority to regulate greenhouse gases.

That went great.

Actually, it allowed 12 states and 13 enviro groups in 2007 to sue the agency and allow it to claim responsibility, with the Supreme Court voting 5-4. The Court encouraged the EPA to act in accordance with the act’s mandate to ‘protect the public from air pollution’ (“Supreme Court Ruling Adds Twist to Clean Air Debate”, 1).

Fun stuff. Great to know the EPA’s on our side, isn’t it? Public health? What’s that?

I don’t know, but that piece of paper asking me to petition them sure looks like spam.

Sources

• “Supreme Court Ruling Adds Twist to Clean Air Debate”. Earthworks: Making Progress and Facing Problems. May 2008: 4.

…Because not all environmentalists are with Greenpeace–you did know that, right? …Oh, dear.

Here’s a little test for you to try. It accomplishes two things:
1) pisses people off, and
2) measures your apparent ranking within the ideological scale
as proportional to the level of response you receive.

Here’s how it works: At an event at which you’ll be meeting new people,

skillfully work the subject of AR or environmentalism into the conversation
(most of the time, you won’t even have to–
it’ll just automatically come up in one form or another.
Typically this form is criticism..).
If someone rails against you, spouting the usual accompanied by a suspicious eyebrow raise,
“..but aren’t you with PETA/Greenpeace?” or “but global warming is a hoax! Just look at An Inconvenient Truth!“

Your response:First, recognize the antagonist’s mistakes (besides that of irking you):
assuming you’re an extremist, and that global warming is synonymous with ALL environmental topics and concerns.

Second, respond calmly; this will throw them off guard as they EXPECT you to prove yourself
vulnerable by wigging out on them.
DON’T get emotional–this is the first sign that they have you where
they want you.

Continue on pragmatically, presenting the issues in a common-sense and economical light.
That way, the antagonist will see that–GASP–not all environmentalists are crazies affiliated with Greenpeace!
IMAGINE!

Do this and you’ve done your job.;)

Proud to be a hippie snob/spoiled urbanite trend-hopper.

The sustainable market boom is not without a prominent psychology: the result of understanding the issues behind non-sustainable products, and a subsequent backlash against them.  As Caring Consumers, we communicate ethically with our dollars; the amount of money put forth to the markets we support identifies each’s prominence within our psyche.

I consider myself a Caring Consumer.  But just what, indeed, is one?  The ethical considerations put forth  often consists of the Big Three: as chocolatebar.com puts it, “Species, Habitat and Humanity”.  You don’t have to be an extremist to comprehend and desire change for more sustainable products within these areas.

So, why is it that normal Caring Consumers are sometimes faced with arrogant backlash, even from friends and/or family members?  One answer is that people like to think they’re intelligent in their own buying decisions, and a well-thought, market-supported view=threatening.  In their world, we’re touting ourselves by deeming our buying decisions as ‘ethical’, rendering theirs ‘unethical’.  This is not the case.

Naturally, it doesn’t help that to most people, supporting anything environmental or animal-rights oriented automatically guarantees ‘hippie’ or ‘tree-hugger’ status.  Now we are officially ‘hippie snobs’.

Overall, many people see ethical market trends as an loaded excuse for condemnation.  This lens guarantees our status as worse than hippie snobs–we’ve now been downgraded to a bunch of spoiled urbanite trend-hoppers starving for our next Starbucks Macchiato–and our next ‘unethical’ victim.

The need for distinction is clear within this argument: our employment of ethical buying decisions indicates that we place greater prominence on these issues within this sphere.  Meanwhile, the lack of emphasis on ethics present in others’ buying decisions does not render them as UNethical–at most, uncommitted.

How to prevent this misunderstanding?  Sometimes, it’s best to agree to disagree.  At best. it’s a learning experience just to see how quick people are to argue and try to back you into a corner.  (Unfortunately for them, my Italian heritage guarantees an adamant response should any of this occur;)).  Translation: I’ll talk–but if pushed, will give a speech.