Shout Out to SOUTH END PRESS 30 April 2007

I’ve posted a few times on George Monbiot’s fantastic book, “Heat,” and I will be doing so with more regularity. Indeed, I’m illegally excerpting from his book, in fact. Always makes me a bit nervous, but I hope publishers understand that in so doing I help, maybe a tiny, tiny bit, to boost sales. Happy I was, to get a quick note from South End Press, the U.S. publisher of “Heat” asking for a link which I’ve dutifully added.

Checking out South End Press’ website I discovered that they’ve published an INCREDIBLE range of books on not only ecology and green issues, but race relations, labor issues, gender issues, media studies, political science, feminism, globalization, and much more. The company’s slogan is classic: READ. WRITE. REVOLT.

SOUTH END PRESS. Check the site. Load up your cart. Get to reading. Only lurnin’ is going to save us, folks. Scratch that - only applied learning will save us.

Song ‘O the Day is from Dinah Washington. Track = “I Could Write a Book” (such a nice tie in, isn’t it? i’m telling you, dear reader, you should collect these tracks i pull out into a compilation. . .sure to impress your friends with your hip eclectic sounds)

George Monbiot’s “Heat” Excerpt #12 28 April 2007

Well, Miranda July hasn’t called yet (but she will), so I still have some time to spare writing this blog instead of miraculous screenplays. Fortunate for you, dear and loyal reader! The recent Mayor Bloomberg announcement got me thinking again about George Monbiot’s seminal book on global heating, “HEAT” (Click the HEAT link and you’ll be taken to the site you SHOULD be using instead of Amazon–Alonovo. Check it out and you’ll see why.). I’ll admit that part of me was happy to hear Bloomberg’s plan as it at least represents some progress. Yet, it simply isn’t enough. We must not be satisfied with token gains as we are very, very much running out of time to make the necessary changes.

Monbiot makes a number of interesting points in his book. I’m going to throw a few of them down for y’all. Starting with this excerpt from Page 41 which gets to the heart of why people like Bloomberg are making such tepid efforts:

In September 2005, I attended a conference in London at which Sir David was speaking. He told it that a ‘reasonable’ target for stabilizing carbon dioxide in the atmosphere was 550 parts per million. This happens to be the target set by the British government. It would be ‘politically unrealistic’, he said, to demand anything lower. Simon Retallack from the Institute for Public Policy Research stood up and reminded Sir David that as chief scientist his duty is not to represent political reality, but to represent scientific reality. Retallack’s own work shows that at 550 parts per million the chances of preventing more than 2 degrees of global warming are just 10-20 percent. Sir David replied that if he recommended a lower limit, he would lose credibility with the government.

I think many people feel like him: that if they adopted the position determined by science rather than the position determined by politics, no one would take them seriously.

Monbiot nails it on the head here. Even many touted eco-organizations, like the Sierra Club, endorse weak proposals, for fear of losing credibility. Myopic as these people are, they don’t realize that the HAVE lost credibility - but it’s their future credibility, when we need it most, that they’ve lost.

Song o’ the Day = Big Audio Dynamite doing “Situation No Win”. Been a while since you’ve rocked the B.A.D., no? This track has the eco-perfect lyrics, “rush for the change of atmosphere” in there somewhere if I recall correctly.

What? You’re denying that you were a B.A.D. fan? Pffft. You never got into “No. 10 Upping St.”? Seriously? Oh, I get it. You consider yourself a ‘real’ Clash fan and therefore look down your mile-long nose at this effort. Fair enough. I do the same thing with post-Joy Division disco-queens, New Order. Understood. We can agree to disagree.

Technorati Tags: george-monbiot, miranda-july, big-audio-dynamite, sierra-club, sir-david, alonovo

Tod Brilliant Has a Secret Crush on Miranda July 25 April 2007

Okay. Once in a while I leave all this doom-and-gloom climate catastrophe crap behind and just post about something amazing. Like the time I posted about hip-hop masters, Grand Buffet. Or about my new stories+photos PolaFiction website (I really could dedicate a whole ten gazillion website to Polaroids). Or that one post about my fantasy meeting at a Turkish bath with Dick Cheney and Al Jolson (seriously, paw through the site, you’ll find it.)

This day, I submit to you that I may well have found the first and only PERFECT WEBSITE. Miranda July made it. She also made that one really great, really funny movie with the goldfish scene that was so perfectly beautiful that I still stare off into space when I think about it. What was it called? I can’t remember. No, I can. It IS called “Me and You and Everyone We Know.”

Seriously, the website - it’s flippin’ genius.

CLICK HERE AND FIND OUT FOR YOURSELF.

Oh, yeah . . . you should buy the book. I’m going to.And whatever you do, don’t tell my wife that I now officially have a totally top-secret crush on Miranda July. My secret is safe with you guys, right? No, no. . .Andi never reads this site. She only reads the other one. So shhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!

(Confession: I really only posted this because I’m hoping that Miranda is the type of person who obsessively checks the links to her website (help me out, click her site already!), notices this, reads it, clicks to the Polafiction site, reads the lame stories there, is drunk enough to think they’re decent, then contacts me to work with her on dozens of world-shattering screenplays. This scenario, unlikely as it seems, will quite likely play out very much as described. You wait and see. What, you’re calling me delusional? Fuck you. Wait and see.)

Technorati Tags: miranda-july, polafiction, polaroid, dick-cheney, turkish-bath

G Cycle: Sounds Like a Very Sexy Motorcycle But It Isn’t 24 April 2007

Oh now you have to check out this site. Essentially, it tells you where you can recycle/dispose of electronic/tech waste of most any type in your local area. Yeah, it would be good if we tried to stop shipping our Macs and Dells to Africa for disposal, don’t you think? If we’re going to send Apples to Africa, they should be the eating kind, not the more-heavily-laced-with-heavy-metals-than-other-computers kind!

G Cycle is a great, great site. Useful, informative, and fun. Watch the commercials (”Hey dude, did you know that every day we dump 356,000 cellphones into landfills? That’s no good!”) while you’re there. Trust me, you’ll bookmark this one.G CYCLE WEBSITE

Song o’ the Day is the amazing Mark Eitzel’s grandiose “Are You the Trash?”

Let’s Talk About Water, Baby! Let’s Talk About You and Pee! 22 April 2007

How far do we really go to conserve energy? Or water? For example, it’s more or less mandated in the U.S. that we have to use low-flow toilets, but can’t we do better? I know it’s a bit indelicate to ask, but: Must you really flush every time you pee?

The answer is a resounding NO. My wife and I can tell you from much experience that flushing after every second or third trip is more than sufficient. Provided that one has a healthy diet and drinks plenty of water, one’s urine has virtually no color, nor odor. Wasting three gallons for every trip to the loo is incredibly wasteful, no?

Some math: The average U.S. citizen pees about six times per day. Flushing each time at a national average of 3 gallons/flush (not everyone is on the low-flow program) = 18 gallons of water used. Halving the amount of flushes = 9 gallons saved daily or 3200 gallons saved annually. Multiply by, say, a million participating “Flush Savers” and one has three billion gallons of water - enough water to fill Lake Michigan sixty times. Okay, not that much water. In fact, in the U.S., we use precisely that amount each day showering. Still, every drop counts.

So, next time you pee check the toilet. Is it clear and odor-free? No? Change your diet. Back off the processed foods and red meat. Yes? Don’t flush. Just walk away and wash your hands of the wastefulness of flushing four ounces of water with three gallons.

SAY IT LOUD! I DON’T FLUSH AND I’M PROUD!

Today’s song is by Canada’s all-time greatest band, Chixdiggit (seriously, can you even THINK of another Canadian band? And don’t say Bryan Adams or Barenaked Ladies) Their version of Duke Ellington’s “Toilet Seat’s Coming Down” is a thing of pure beauty.

(EDIT: It appears Sheryl Crow is joining the bathroom revolution. The singer/songwriter tells us to go lightly with toilet paper:

I propose a limitation be put on how many sqares of toilet paper can be used in any one sitting. Now, I don’t want to rob any law-abiding American of his or her God-given rights, but I think we are an industrious enough people that we can make it work with only one square per restroom visit, except, of course, on those pesky occasions where 2 to 3 could be required.
Read her blog to learn more about this and other interesting ‘green’ ideas. Poor girl is going to get ’shredded’ by many for these notions. My hat is off to her…why in the world she ever dated Lance Armstrong is beyond me)

Technorati Tags: poo. pee, sheryl-crow, chixdiggit, lance-armstrong

Bloomberg Set to Announce Weak Reduction Scheme 19 April 2007

From itsgettinghotinhere.org:
On Sunday, April 22nd, New York City’s mayor, Michael Bloomberg will announce PlaNYC 2030 - one of the more advanced 25-year climate action plans put forth to date. After six months of work, the NYC team put together a plan that will reduce the city’s total emissions 30 percent by 2030. Earlier this week, Bloomberg’s office released a study that shows that NYC contributes 1% of the nation’s greenhouse gases.

The team at itsgettinghotinhere.org urge you to write Bloomberg and other city mayor’s to support this progressive initiative. The mayor is set to announce the comprehensive plan on Sunday at 1:00 PM.

PROGRESSIVE INITIATIVE? What?

A thirty percent reduction over twenty years is not even close to what is needed to stem the tide. Yes, do write Bloomberg! And tell him that we’re all absolutely screwed if we can’t hit a 80-90% reduction by 2030. Even with a 90% reduction by 2030, we very well may NOT keep the global temperature increase under 2 degrees Celsius. I’ve yet to see a global heating reduction scenario that calls for such a soft reduction. This is beyond pathetic. Bloomberg had better not get any good press for this bullshit. In fact, if people hail him an eco-hero or visionary, we’ll likely see other leaders adopt this same position, one that will commit the United States to a reduction that is only ONE-THIRD of what is necessary.

This is slippery-slope stuff here, folks. I wish the eco-community wouldn’t be satisfied with ’small advances’ like this. This is the absolutely perfect example of a pyrrhic victory–”a victory with a devastating cost to the victor.”

Even the usually grand Eco-Chick.com gave a positive spin to this announcement. Oh, that’s because itsgettinghotinhere is a Summer Rayne Oakes venture. Damn it all, but she should, and usually seems to, know better!

AAAAAGH! (I say this in my best Charlie Brown voice so you can really, really sense my frustration) WAKE UP PEOPLE!!!

PLEASE contact Bloomberg. Tell him he needs to STEP IT UP (even these guys need to accelerate their timetable but they’re on the right track) a whole lot!
Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg
City Hall
New York, NY 10007
PHONE 311 (or 212-NEW-YORK outside NYC)

FAX (212) 788-2460

E-MAIL:
http://www.nyc.gov/html/mail/html/mayor.html

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I have no idea what this song has to do with this post, but I’m making it Song O’ the Day, regardless. If you love “The Cougar”, you’ll feel what I’m feeling. Push PLAY and rock the hell on (softly, mind you):

Technorati Tags: bloomberg, mayor-bloomber, climate-change, planyc-2030, global-warming

Not Just the Bees. We’ve Killed Kermit, too.

After reading my post about how Darth Vader is zapping bumblebees with mobile phone rays, my friend Larry alerted me to THIS ARTICLE which talks about the mysterious decline of amphibian populations. Now, we all know that frogs and lizards are very sensitive to changes in their habitat and when this habitat is disturbed, their numbers fall precipitously. However, this article is discussing amphibians living IN A PROTECTED RAINFOREST PRESERVE. From the Guardian Unlimited article:

“Conservationists working in a lowland forest reserve at La Selva in Costa Rica used biological records dating from 1970 to show that species of frogs, toads, lizards, snakes and salamanders have plummeted on average 75% in the past 35 years.

The new findings suggest an unknown ecological effect is behind at least some of the sudden losses and have prompted scientists to call for urgent studies in other protected forest areas.

The study revealed sharp declines among two species of salamander, whose numbers fell on average 14.52% every year between 1970 and 2005. Frog species slumped too, with numbers of the mimicking rain frog falling 13.49%, the common tink frog 6.69%, and the strawberry poison frog 1.18% a year. Lizards suffered similar falls, with one species, the striped litter skink, down 10.03% each year, and orange-tailed geckos declining by 8.05% every year.

The researchers also analysed weather records for the region, which revealed a rise of more than 1C in temperature over the 35-year period and a doubling of the number of wet days.”

Could it be that amphibians, too, are sensitive to all the mobile phone machinations and endless barrage of radio and microwave transmissions? I don’t know the answer, but it makes me miserable thinking about what we’ve done.

Quintron the Amazing Spellcaster has written a paean to the lovely frog. It’s called FROGS-CLUB and I’m sure you’ll love it. It’s the Song O’ the Day here at todbrilliant.com

Technorati Tags: kermit, darth-vader, quintron, bees

Mobile Phones Killing Bees? 17 April 2007

Ever heard of “Colony Collapse Disorder”? Neither had I. At least not until I read this article in The Independent. The disorder affects bee populations and it refers to the unexplained phenomenon (cue X-Files theme) that occurs when the denizens of a bee hive suddenly disappear. Remember the mysterious dissapearance of the Anasazi? Of entire Mayan cities? Huge populations simply vanished, leaving their homes to never return. Now, it could be that space aliens are responsible, zapping both ancient humans and modern bees, but there now exists a new theory to help explain why bee populations have declined by as much as 80% - one which posits that mobile phone use is responsible, at least in part, for the huge drop in honeybee populations. While a portion of the decline can be attributed to pesticides and mites (namely the Varroa Vampire mite), it seems that cell phone signals are screwing with the wee bees’ built-in navigation systems. From the article:

They (scientists) are putting forward the theory that radiation given off by mobile phones and other hi-tech gadgets is a possible answer to one of the more bizarre mysteries ever to happen in the natural world - the abrupt disappearance of the bees that pollinate crops. Late last week, some bee-keepers claimed that the phenomenon - which started in the US, then spread to continental Europe - was beginning to hit Britain as well.

The theory is that radiation from mobile phones interferes with bees’ navigation systems, preventing the famously homeloving species from finding their way back to their hives. Improbable as it may seem, there is now evidence to back this up.

Now, y’all understand that bees are, like, totally responsible for, like, our FOOD, right? In fact, bees pollinate 30% of the U.S. food supply - a huge percentage. You can see why it’s important to figure out what’s happening to our bees. While we test our devices to ensure they don’t harm humans (jury is still out on mobile phones and people, however, especially children), we aren’t as concerned with what our technology does to our co-inhabitants. Case in point: All the whale beaching caused by U.S. military high-powered sonar — another example of our wireless tech interfering with non-human navigation/communication. Such myopia could very well be harmful to humans after all. Messing with the food supply is a very grave mistake. We humans are rather dependent on the mighty bumblebee.

So, what to do? What if we can prove without a doubt that our cellular tech is destroying bee populations? Do you think we’ll stop using cell phones? Or will we allow the bees to die off? Ah, I can hear some of you saying, “We’ll simply adjust the frequencies of our transmissions.” Easier said than done, mate. Seriously, which action will we, as a civilization, take? How you answer this sheds a whole lot of light on whether or not we’re going to extricate ourselves from the looming environmental disasters.

Song of the day time! Death by Chocolate gives us “The Is Bumble Bee”. You know it, right?

Technorati Tags: bees, mobile-phones, death-by-chocolate, colony-collapse-disorder, honeybees

Plan B Book Byte #2

Hot off the presses! A taste of the world’s most important book (no, not the ‘Good Book’), ‘Plan B 2.0: Rescuing a Planet Under Stress & a Civilization in Trouble’.

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PLAN B BUDGET FOR SAVING CIVILIZATION

http://www.earthpolicy.org/Books/Seg/PB2ch13_ss4.htm

Lester R. Brown

Mobilizing to save civilization means restructuring the economy, restoring the economy’s natural support systems, eradicating poverty, and stabilizing population. We have the technologies, economic instruments, and financial resources to do this. The United States has the resources to lead this effort. Jeffrey Sachs of Columbia University’s Earth Institute sums it up well: “The tragic irony of this moment is that the rich countries are so rich and the poor so poor that a few added tenths of one percent of GNP from the rich ones ramped up over the coming decades could do what was never before possible in human history: ensure that the basic needs of health and education are met for all impoverished children in this world. How many more tragedies will we suffer in this country before we wake up to our capacity to help make the world a safer and more prosperous place not only through military might, but through the gift of life itself?”

It is not possible to put a precise price tag on the changes needed to move our twenty-first century civilization off the overshoot-and-collapse path and onto a path that will sustain economic progress. What we can do, however, is provide some rough estimates of the scale of effort needed.

To fund the needed restructuring of the energy economy, we rely on shifting subsidies from fossil fuels to renewable sources of energy. For meeting our social goals, the additional external funding needed to achieve universal primary education in the more than 80 developing countries that require help is conservatively estimated by the World Bank at $12 billion per year. Funding for an adult literacy program based largely on volunteers will take an estimated additional $4 billion annually. Providing for the most basic health care in developing countries is estimated at $33 billion by the World Health Organization. The additional funding needed to provide reproductive health care and family planning services to all women in developing countries is less than $7 billion a year.

(more…)

DiCaprio’s Film Launches Website 16 April 2007

At last, a bit more info on Leo D’s new project, ‘The 11th Hour’. I’ve high hopes that this film can pick up where Gore’s film let down. . err. . . left off. In interviewing dozens of noted thinkers, the film seems to be ready to deliver on the “What can we do?” topic as well as well and truly get to the root causes of our current climate change predicament. Gore was nifty with the Power Point, but he left out pretty much every significant detail and refused to implicate his former paymasters. It’s almost time for another “why the hell do the Dems get all this ‘green’ credit when they continue to do so damned little” rant, but I’m going to table it . . . for now.

Here’s the link to the new site. Scant on info, but it looks like there is more to come. Oh, my main man Lester Brown was interviewed for the film, but he doesn’t show up on the bio list yet. Leo - are you reading this? I’m certain you ar, so will you do me a quick favor and get Les’ profile up? Thanks! We should grab dinner again at Papalote’s - I can’t believe those tofu burritos! Wearing that silver El Santo mask for anonymity was genius, man!

I’m dedicating today’s song to Leo. He seems to be the real deal.
Bonnie “Prince” Billy’s ‘The Lion Lair’

Technorati Tags: leonardo-dicaprio, 11th-hour, al-gore, lester-brown, papalote, tofu-burrito