photo by Anita Sarkeesian (Flickr CC)

Protests movements often have trouble gaining the sympathies of the masses of people whom they actually represent.

Corporate media, bragging politicians, the well-funded propaganda of big business and a pervading desire of most people to maintain the status quo (or at least not rock the boat) usually win out over principals of fairness, equality and even the self-interest of the masses themselves.

My inner conservative (read: cynic) thinks that the middle classes as well as the ‘relatively comfortable poor’ will usually choose not to risk what security and wages they have, preferring to go it on their own and stay with the system. Solidarity – both ideological and in terms of real political action – be damned.

But take away enough people’s expectations, crush their dreams (American or European) and to my inner cynic’s surprise, they will rise up, commit in enough numbers and flex their political will so that it is felt throughout all levels of political culture – all the way to the corridors of money and power.

Occupy Wall Street, Occupy London, the Indignados of Spain and Portugal, protests in Greece, Israel and at the upcoming G20 meeting in France are no longer simply being represented as the actions of a few radical trouble makers. The ‘99%’ mantra is ringing true.

Soren Ambrose of anti-poverty group ActionAid is quoted in a report by France 24:

Because of the scale of the financial crisis, ordinary people are being affected. There are many more unemployed people, and people who have lost their homes. It is a different scene now, it is much more political.

A so-called ‘Robin Hood Tax’ finally makes sense to the previously complacent middle classes, meaning common folk are finally recognizing that their political and economic systems effectively allow the rich to steal from the non rich. Even a piece in the Spectator has quoted British PM David Cameron’s acknowledgement that a Robin Hood Tax has ‘wide support’, though the author still makes the dubious claim that ‘The Tories, not the anti-capitalists, are making all the political capital’ from the Occupy London Protests.

You wish.

This kind of desperation by the right wing press reminds me of an issue of the Economist last year which attempted to brand Cameron’s government as some kind of radical punk movement within European politics, when they are in fact the same old conservatives, updated with a sunny disposition and some lip-service to the Green movement. Reference The Smiths and The Clash as much as you want, Tories – you are not revolutionary, you are counter revolutionary.

photo by wheelzwheeler (Flickr CC)

But I’m glad the conservative press is desperate. I am glad there will be a referendum in Greece (even if it will just be used to pass the political blame onto the people rather than the government). I’m glad the mainstream media is covering Occupy protests in New York, Oakland, London and Calgary. I am hopeful that Middle America will realize that Michael Moore is on its side and that Fox News is not.

A Robin Hood Tax, environmental legislation, financial regulation, fair and equal pay, getting money out of politics and putting the rights of people above those of corporations are all things for you, the 99% of humanity. Keep realizing this.

photo courtesy of Animal Defenders International

In May we ran a couple of posts on how Britons overwhelmingly support a ban on circus animals, yet the UK’s Conservative-led government was against any such ban.

The Tory-Lib Dem coalition government, led by Prime Minister David Cameron (an avid hunter) instead proposed a licensing scheme for circuses.

However, members of British parliament, including key Conservatives, have stood up to pressure from the Prime Minister and voted to ban wild animals in UK circuses.

Though the motion voted on does not in itself enact a ban, but rather directs the government to do so, it is being hailed as a victory and a firm show of public and parliamentary support for the ban, which is expected to follow.

Well I have a message for the whips and for the Prime Minister of our country – and I didn’t pick a fight with the Prime Minister – I may just be a little council house lad from a very poor background but that background gave me a backbone. It gives me a thick skin and I’m not going to be cowed by the whips of the Prime Minister on an issue I feel passionately about and have conviction about.

–Mark Pritchard, MP

Way to break ranks, Mr. Pritchard!

For more on the story, including video of an impassioned speech by Conservative MP Mark Pritchard, read the following article in the Independent, the UK newspaper that has been instrumental in bolstering the campaign for banning circus animals:

Victory in the campaign to ban circus animals

Additional resources:

www.navs.org.uk

www.ad-international.org

www.YouTube.com/AnimalDefenders

www.CafePress.com/AnimalDefenders

Don't be fooled. Photo by Simon Li (Manic Street Preacher on Flickr CC)

When I was a kid “Supercuts” was just a place to get a bowl haircut for $5, but across the pond in 2010′s Britain it means something completely different: “austerity” and Big Society –  a.k.a. big tuition fees to keep the riffraff out of higher education, cementing the dominant number of old school ties in the House of Commons lockers.

Check out this DIY short film by Carbon Diaries author Saci Lloyd featuring the UK’s dynamic duo. Is Clegg having a crisis of faith or a twinge of regret due to selling out the Lib Dem agenda? Watch and see…

NICK AND DAVE ON THE BACKSTAIRS

carbondiaries.com

lead image by Financial Times photos (Flickr CC)

photo by thewritingzone (Flickr Creative Commons)

The ‘greenest government ever’ is at it again.

The UK’s coalition government headed by Prime Minister David Cameron and Deputy PM Nick Clegg has been cutting a lot of green programs and departments in the name of efficiency and belt-tightening.

Now they are shelving one of their own environmental plans to regulate coal and gas power plants, a measure they claimed could be implemented upon taking office.

From a report in the Guardian:

Introducing a so-called “environmental performance standard” (EPS) for power companies would have restricted greenhouse gas emissions from coal and gas plants and encouraged companies wishing to build to use more efficient technology.

While in opposition, both Cameron and Clegg campaigned for an EPS and included it in their coalition deal.

From an article in the Telegraph:

Both Lib Dem and Conservative MPs voted for the introduction of such a measure just a few months ago, and if they U-turn on this and fail to put this measure into their new energy law, how can they claim to be the greenest government ever?

–Joss Garman, Greenpeace energy campaigner

David Cameron and Chris Huhne, photo by DECCgovuk (Flickr Creative Commons)

Former UK Energy and Climate Change Secretary Ed Miliband thinks the new coalition government’s energy policies are a ‘huge disappointment’ to industry and to the country.

Well, he would say that, wouldn’t he? He’s in the shadow cabinet and that’s sort of their job. Yet it seems Miliband is indeed more pro-active in terms of helping green industry than his replacement, current Energy and Climate Change Secretary Chris Huhne.

From BBC News:

On a range of issues such as wind power, renewable heat and the green investment bank the government was going “backwards not forwards” compared to the Labour administration, Mr Miliband claimed.

Besides all the big cuts they are making, the coalition government is throwing its green eggs into three baskets: cutting energy use and investing in electricity and carbon markets.

The Telegraph’s environment editor Geoffrey Lean is not convinced. He details the almost across the board cuts the Tory-Lib Dem coalition has made, though fairly acknowledges their commitment to combat climate change (how can they do both?) as well as their plans to help households become more energy efficient. The government has also confirmed that it is renewing the commitment to subsidize biogas.

Across Whitehall the Business Secretary,Vince Cable, has axed a key body dealing with electronic waste. And Caroline Spelman, the Environment Secretary, has withdrawn funding from the Sustainable Development Commission, scrapped the Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution (thus showing what she thinks of ministers’ two sources of independent, non-political scrutiny and advice) and abolished the Commission for Rural Communities, which tackled deprivation in the countryside. The savings were minuscule.

Read Geoffrey Lean’s entire piece in the Telegraph:

David Cameron runs the greenest government ever? Tell it to the birds

photo by APTOPIX (sam_churchill; Flickr Creative Commons)

First it was actor Kevin Costner and his oil separation machines, now it’s Hollywood heavyweight James Cameron – director of Avatar, Titanic and the Terminator and Alien film series – who has offered to join in the quest for solutions to the Deepwater oil well leak in the Gulf of Mexico.

Cameron, an avid submariner, owns a considerable amount of deep-sea equipment and has become a bit of an expert in deep-sea filming and technology by virtue of his work on Titanic, The Abyss and several documentary films.

From Andrew C. Revkin’s Dot Earth blog in the New York Times:

I did six subsequent deep-ocean expeditions, spent nine months at sea and participated in 55 deep submarine dives. I’ve owned and operated my own submarines and pretty much know everybody in the deep-ocean world outside of the oil business. We are right at the cutting edge on this.

­–James Cameron

Cameron has assembled a team of independent experts, who met Tuesday for a brainstorming session regarding the spill. BP subsequently rejected Cameron’s offer of help.

The Canadian director was quoted referring to BP as ‘morons’ for how they were handling the oil well leak in the Gulf, but claims his statements were taken out of context.

by Graham Land

Additional resources:

Guardian – James Cameron: Can the king of the world save us all?

The Atlantic – Titanic Errors

Nick Clegg and David Cameron; photo from The Prime Minister's Office (source: Flickr Creative Commons)

The Tory/Lib Dem coalition government has already announced agreements concerning its environmental policies. These include building a smart grid and initiating a high-speed rail network, scrapping plans to build a third runway at Heathrow Airport, and moving ahead with feed-in tariff systems.

The Conservatives and Liberal Democrats still disagree on the nuclear power issue, with the Conservatives in favor of the construction of new plants and the Lib Dems remaining against.

From an article in the Guardian:

Both parties are committed to pursuing a global deal to cut greenhouse gas emissions. But their differing enthusiasm for Europe, particularly the Eurosceptic MPs to the right of the Conservative party (not least Hague), may cause rifts over whether to back European negotiating positions.

Read more about the coalition’s environmental policies in this article in The Ecologist.

by Graham Land

James Cameron at a press conference to stop Belo Monte Dam; photo from International Rivers (source: Flickr Creative Commons)

Plans for the construction of a massive hydroelectric dam in the Brazilian Amazon have experienced some recent setbacks in the form of back and forth legal action as well as controversy over indigenous rights and environmental issues. As of Friday, however, bids for construction contracts are again set to move forward on the previously planned date of April 20th.

The Belo Monte dam project, set to be located on the Amazon’s Xingu River, will be the world’s third largest hydroelectric plant of its kind. It is part of a Brazilian government initiative to fuel economic expansion and recovery while mitigating greenhouse gas emissions.

An article in the New York Times states that Brazil uses hydroelectric power for over 80% of its energy needs. The US Energy Information Administration, puts the amount at 36% – a far smaller, but still a significant share.

Critics claim the Belo Monte project will force native Amazonian tribes from their homelands and result in environmental damage to one of the world’s most important ecosystems.

To build Belo Monte, builders would have to excavate two huge channels larger than the Panama Canal to divert water from the main dam to the power plant. The reservoir would flood more than 160 square miles of forest while drying up a 60-mile stretch of the Xingu River, displacing more than 20,000 people, many from indigenous communities, according to non-governmental groups citing government figures.

–New York Times

Celebrities have leant their voices to the cause to stop the construction of the Belo Monte dam. Notably, Sting – a longtime proponent of the rights of the Brazilian Amazon’s indigenous peoples – and more recently, Avatar director James Cameron and actress Sigourney Weaver.

From an article in the Guardian:

Until last month Cameron had never been to the Brazilian Amazon, home to the world’s greatest tropical rainforest. Now, however, he has become the figurehead of an international campaign against Amazon destruction and specifically the multibillion-dollar Belo Monte hydroelectric dam project, which many of the Xingu region’s indigenous residents believe will wreak havoc in communities, flooding land in some places, drying up rivers in others and triggering an influx of workers, prostitution and disease.

Some Brazilian press articles have characterized Cameron’s criticism of the Brazilian government’s plans as ‘colonialist’, which is a bit ironic considering the nature of the hydroelectric project in relation to native Amazonians. Indeed, Cameron likens what is happening now in Brazil to the US government’s treatment of Native Americans in the 1800s – something that inspired him to make the film Avatar.

by Graham Land

Additional resources:

BBC News: Judge allows start of bids on controversial Brazil dam