Green Notes Week of February 26, 2012

EARTH CIRCLE. . . On the first day of every month, people around the world stop everything for five minutes, joining with thousands of others to visualize peace and focus on new levels of kindness, understanding, and compassion necessary for collectively facing the challenges of the 21st century. New Dimensions invites peacemakers everywhere to join at 4:00pm Greenwich Mean Time, 10:00am in Lincoln and Omaha, 9:00am in District 3 where Mountain Time begins, Thursday, March 1, 2012, with the intention of deep healing for the Planet and all its people. Click here for more information about Earth Circle.

GREENS ARE GATHERING SIGNATURES . . . The Green Party is qualified for ballot status this election cycle in all of the four biggest states: New York, California, Florida, and Texas. At this time, 20 states have ballot status in November 2012. For brief information about current candidates for President, click here.
NGP is gathering signatures so voters here will also have the choice of voting for the Green Party presidential slate. In Lincoln, petitions are available at Meadowlark Coffee and Espresso, 1624 South Street. Registered Nebraska voters are invited to stop by for coffee, visit with Adam Hintz from 6:00am to 2:00pm daily, sign a petition, or pick up one to circulate. In Omaha, look for Charles Ostdiek at McFoster’s, 38th and Harney, to sign and pick up petitions.
You must be a registered voter to circulate the county specific petitions. Fill out a voter registration application online here. If you can help us identify a public place in CD 3 where petitions could be available, if you would like us to mail you petitions to circulate, or to participate in the ballot access process in any way, please let us know by e-mailing mjberry [at] inebraska [dot] com. Let’s take Our democracy back from Wall Street!

PLEASE HELP MCFOSTER’S, OUR OMAHA GREEN PARTY HOME . . . The restaurant’s closure would not only have a deep impact on the vegetarian and vegan communities in Omaha, but it has been the CD 2 home of Nebraska Green Party since 2000. An Omaha World Herald article reports “McFoster’s will stay in business until February 29th, when it will close if the owners don’t find a buyer.” Quoting Tom Foster, “Ideally, we could find an affluent Omahan that would like to buy it and keep it a natural foods restaurant. …We have a lot of loyal customers, a great building, a super location. I hate to give up on it.” Readers, please brainstorm about how to help Tom and Mary raise the money to stay in business at 38th and Farnam, where they have been for 18 years.

PAGE DOWN FOR KEYSTONE XL UPDATE.

Lincoln area: Congressional District 1

VIGIL AGAINST THE DEATH PENALTY . . . The Nebraska Supreme Court issued a stay of the scheduled March 6th execution on Thursday, February 23, 2012. “Supreme Court halts Ryan execution” provides details.
Every Monday, noon to 1:00pm, Nebraskans for abolition of the death penalty meet in front of the governor’s mansion when weather is good, 1425 H Street, Lincoln. When weather is bad, the vigil is inside the capitol, near the Information Desk. The lunch-hour presence reminds the governor of a constituency that does not want state killings. Weekly vigils have taken place year-round since July, 1991. All abolitionists are welcome to participate for a few minutes, or the hour. For more information about NADP, click here. “It is the deed that teaches, not the name we give it. Murder and capital punishment are not opposites that cancel one another, but similars that breed their kind.” –George Bernard Shaw

OCCUPY EDUCATION . . . Occupy Education, an initiative of Occupy Lincoln, is offering a free and open university with weekly talks/discussions through March 19, 2012. The teach-in workshops are Mondays, 7:00 to 8:00pm, at Indigo Bridge Books, 701 P Street.
The Monday Phil 99 Course, “A Philosophical Look at Law, Punishment, and Power,” consists of informal lectures, followed by an open discussion. “Part 2: Death is Different — A Discussion about Capital Punishment,” will be Monday, February 27th. The five-week seminar will be presented by Steve Swartzer, Lecturer of Philosophy and Assistant Director of the Center for the Teaching and Study of Applied Ethics at UN-L.
Tuesday Teach-In Workshops will be hosted by a different member of the Occupy Lincoln community, on a topic of their choosing, Tuesdays, 7:00 – 8:00pm, at Meadowlark Coffee and Espresso, 1624 South Street. February 28th, the topic is “Everything You Wanted to Know about the History of Birth Control, but were Afraid to Ask,” by Rose Holz, Associate Director of Women’s and Gender Studies, UN-L.
For more information, e-mail Hendrik van den Berg, hvan-den-berg1 [at] unl [dot] edu. Education is a Basic Human Right.

CLIMATE CONVERSATIONS FORUM . . . There is no charge for a Climate Conversations Forum at Embassy Suites in Downtown/Old Market Omaha, 555 10th Street, Tuesday, February 28, 2012, from 11:30am to 4:00pm. The Forum will be hosted by The Keystone Center, as part of an effort to incorporate new voices and perspectives into the National Climate Assessment process. Short informational presentations will be followed by small-group discussions in a “World Café” format, intended to maximize thoughtful discussion and creative dialogue. A light lunch will be provided. Attendance is limited. Registration is required, here. Contact Caitlin Ellsworth, cellsworth [at] keystone [dot] org, or call 202.452.0108 with any questions.

NATIONAL STOP OCCUPY WALL STREET SUPPRESSION DAY . . . Tuesday, February 28, 2012, Occupy Lincoln and supporters will meet at Centennial Mall on K Street, 4:00pm, in solidarity with OWS. At 4:55, those gathered will walk through the Mall to L Street. Corporations are not people. Overturn Citizens United. Stop the Suppression of OWS.

LINCOLN PEACE VIGILS . . . Lincoln peace vigils continue at the Federal Building, 15th and O streets, every Wednesday from 5:00 to 6:00pm. Contact Mark at 402.499.6672 or e-mail mark [at] weddleton [dot] com for more information.

PEACEMAKING WORKSHOP XXVI . . . Nebraskans for Peace will present “Mind the Gap Between the 99 and 1%: Growing Inequity Between Rich and Poor,” on Sunday March 4, 2012, 1:30 to 5:30pm, at 1st United Methodist Church, 2723 North 50th Street, Lincoln. The Keynote Speaker will be Jim Hightower, nationally know commentator and former Texas elected official, at 1:30, presenting “America’s Leaders Are Small, But Americans Are Not: Turning Our Leaders’ Failure Into Our Inspiration.” A Workshop Series begins at 3:00. This event is free and open to the public. A free-will donation meal & conversation will follow at 5:30pm.

2012 WINTER LECTURE SERIES . . . Northern Africa from Morocco to Egypt is the topic of this year’s Winter Lecture Series at Lincoln’s Unitarian Church, 6300 A Street. Each two-hour session starts at 7:00pm. The first hour features a presentation, followed by refreshment break and a half hour of questions and dialogue. On the seventh and final evening, the series will end with a 6:00 dinner and a panel discussion at 7:00pm. The lectures are free and open to the public. On March 4, 2012, Raymond Maxwell, Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs, will present “Northern Africa and US Policy.”

OCCUPY LINCOLN . . . The Occupy Lincoln camp site is located on Centennial Mall north of the state capitol. The camp has been notified of a March 1, 2012 eviction date. Occupy Lincoln says it’s ‘not yet ready to end‘ and that the city’s eviction deadline is unrelated to renovation, calling the eviction “arbitrary and unrelated to actual renovation work.” Read Occupy Lincoln’s expertly crafted letter to the City, giving reasons for not leaving the mall on March 1st, here, and read Occupier Nick Svoboda’s February 26th Local View: “Occupiers need time and space” here.
There is a General Assembly every Sunday, 1:30-2:30pm, at Bennett Martin Library, 14th and N Streets, in the 4th floor auditorium; Wednesday, 6:30pm at Indigo Bridge Books; and Friday, 6:00 to 9:00pm. The Facebook page is here. The Twitter feed is @OccupyLincoln. For more information, e-mail occupylincoln [at] gmail [dot] com or phone 402.585.5865. Corporate Greed is Revolution’s Seed!

Omaha area: Congressional District 2

OMAHA PEACE VIGILS . . . Omaha peacemakers vigil every Wednesday, 4:30-5:30pm, at StratCom/UN-O, 6801 Pine Street, east of the Scott Technology Center on the UN-O campus. Free parking is available at the NE Corner of 67th Street and Pine in a student lot. For more information, phone Jerry Ebner, 402.502.5887. Every Saturday, 1:00-2:00pm, there is a Peace Vigil at 72nd and Dodge Streets. Park next to 72nd Street, in the pet store parking lot. Contact Steve Horn at 402.426.9068 for more information about Saturday vigils.

OMAHA PEOPLE’S FILM FESTIVAL . . . There is a People’s Film Festival every Wednesday evening, 7:00pm, at McFoster’s Natural Kind Cafe, 38th and Harney in Omaha. Wednesday, February 29, 2012, the film will be “Man with a Movie Camera,” an experimental 1929 silent documentary, with no story and no actors, presenting urban life in Odessa and other Soviet cities. A 9:14 minute video trailer is here. An informal discussion will follow the film. For more information, click here. The People’s Film Festival – Expanding Political Consciousness Since 2004.

GREEN TEAM ROUNDTABLE . . . The Green Omaha Coalition Green Business Council and WasteCap Nebraska will convene a Green Team Roundtable on Wednesday, March 7, 2012, from 11:30am to 1:00pm, at UN-O Mammel Hall, 6708 Pine Street, Omaha. Green Team Roundtables are peer-to-peer networking meetings for green teams and individuals committed to sustainable business practices. Three panelists will discuss three different types of Green Jobs. Cost includes a zero-waste lunch. Registration and payment must be made by noon on Friday, March 2nd, here. For more information call Julie Diegel, 402.434.7376.

OCCUPY OMAHA . . . The current Occupy Omaha location is in transition. The official Occupy Omaha website is here. The FaceBook page is here. The Twitter feed is #occupyomaha

ENGAGE OMAHA . . . One of the nation’s first city-wide, virtual town hall websites, EngageOmaha, is now online. Omaha residents may weigh in on issues for the city to consider. Pick a topic, and join the mix here.

Greater Nebraska: Congressional District 3

KEYSTONE XL PIPELINE UPDATE . . . The first part of a two-part series on NPR about the Keystone XL pipeline featuring Nebraska opposition leaders aired Saturday, February 25, 2012. “Ranchers’ Land Becomes Ground Zero in Energy Fight,” is by Guy Raz and Brent Baughman.
A February 20th TED talk on tar sands, “Garth Lenz, The True Cost of Oil,” is an impassioned 17:34 minute video showing tar sands devastation in Canada.
Quoting Bolder Weekly: Keystone XL Would Raise Gas Prices, Not Lower Them, “Unfortunately, there’s an all-too-typical problem with the Republican line on Keystone: it’s completely unsupported by the facts.”
Ted Turner’s opposition to the Keystone XL pipeline was published in several news sources last week. Please click here and comment on his op/ed about protecting our land and water. In “Keystone oil pipeline would risk disaster” he says “…Congress should not be in the business of skirting the rules and ramming through a polluting project like the Keystone XL pipeline. Instead of supporting the transport of dirty tar sands oil, its focus should be on harnessing truly clean, renewable energy sources like solar, wind and biofuels, which will create thousands of long-lasting jobs in the United States, protect our natural resources and provide true energy and water security today and for many years to come.”
An analysis, “Royal Society oilsands report went easy on industry,” reports “a key section in a high-profile Royal Society of Canada report that cast doubt on potential environmental and health impacts of oilsands development in Alberta was plagued by “misinformation” and “out of date” data.” It says that the government report was rushed, and that tarsands are much more destructive to the environment than what the Canadian government said. “The literature review on surface water quality, impacts on aquatic organisms and fisheries, and potential pathways to human exposure was superficial, … not based on a thorough or careful analysis.”
Action Alerts still available on line include the following:
From Bill McKibben: “The Keystone XL zombie is lurching back to life and we need your help to knock it back again. The Senate is considering a series of tricks designed to force approval of the project. It’s hard to track what’s real and what’s just noise, but our friends on the Hill assure us this is a crucial moment for the public to weigh in. Click here to write your Senators.
Keystone XL is the perfect symbol of the cronyism that’s corrupting our government: the 44 Senators who co-sponsored the most recent piece of legislation have taken $22.3 million in oil and gas money — that’s more than three times as much dirty money as those opposing the pipeline. The one Democrat on this list, West Virginia’s Joe Manchin, has taken more money from the fossil fuel barons than anyone else in his party—it’s really just a game of follow-the-cash.
From Sierra Club: “There’s breaking — and disturbing — news about the Keystone XL pipeline. We knew Big Oil wouldn’t give up, and sure enough, they’re still at it, using their money to force the pipeline down our throats, thwart the President, and pass this bill.
This pipeline would carry the world’s dirtiest fossil fuel, tar sands oil, from Canada to Texas, where it would be shipped overseas. To build the pipeline, TransCanada has to seize private land from ranchers and farmers, and then expose what’s left to the threat of oil spills and leaks. Clean water, clean air, agriculture, and our shared climate would all be put at risk for what have been greatly exaggerated benefits. Take thirty seconds to tell Sen. Johanns and Sen. Nelson — put our public health before Big Oil profits. Oppose this and any other attempt to approve the Keystone XL pipeline.
Sign a Natural Resources Defense Council Action Alert telling Congress to reject all attempts to force approval of the Keystone XL tar sands pipeline by attaching it to the payroll tax bill, the transportation bill or any other unrelated legislation. The Keystone XL will deliver billions in profits to Big Oil while the people get stuck with poisoned water, contaminated land and an overheated planet.

STOP FRACKING NOW . . . Quoting Bill McKibben in “Why Not Frack?” last week, “The planet is running short of the easy stuff, where you stick a drill in the ground and crude comes bubbling to the surface. The great oil fields of Saudi Arabia and Mexico have begun to dwindle; one result has been a rising price for energy. We could, as a civilization, have taken that dwindling supply and rising price as a signal to convert to sun, wind, and other noncarbon forms of energy-it would have made eminent sense, most of all because it would have aided in the fight against global warming, the most difficult challenge the planet faces. Instead, we’ve taken it as a signal to scour the world for more hydrocarbons. And it turns out that they’re there-vast quantities of coal and oil and gas, buried deep or trapped in tight rock formations or mixed with other minerals. Getting at them requires ripping apart the earth: for instance, by heating up the ground so that the oil in the tar sands formation of Canada can flow to the surface. Or by tearing holes in the crust a mile beneath the surface of the sea, as BP was doing in the Gulf of Mexico when the Deepwater Horizon well exploded. Or by literally removing mountaintops to get at coal, as has become commonplace across the southern Appalachians.
Ted Glick also wrote about “Fracking, Obama and the 2012 Debate” for Reader Supported News last week: “President Obama says that fracked natural gas allows us to essentially chill out. Because of it, ‘we don’t have to choose between our environment and our economy.’ What a disappointing, inaccurate and alarming statement. It’s as if the around-a-thousand – so far – documented cases of water poisoning from fracking are caused by one or two ‘bad apple’ companies in the gas industry that can be easily made to see the error of their ways.”
Petition Congress: “We, the undersigned, call on Congress to pass the Fracturing Responsibility and Awareness of Chemicals Act this year. It’s time to hold the oil and gas production industry to the same standards as any other industry to ensure the safe protection of America’s drinking water.”

PETITION THE EPA . . . Tell the Environmental Protection Agency to immediately prohibit the use of clothianidin and conduct a full scientific review to determine its impact on honey bee populations. Learn more about clothianidin and sign the petition here.

TELL PRESIDENT OBAMA NOT TO CAVE TO MONSANTO AND THE BIOTECH INDUSTRY . . . The Obama administration has unbelievably chosen to approve three biotech crops, Roundup Ready genetically modified alfalfa, Roundup Ready genetically modified sugar beets and a new industrial biotech corn for ethanol production. These decisions are a devastating blow to our democracy and the basic rights of farmers to choose how they want to grow food on their land and the rights of consumers who increasingly choose organic and sustainably grown food for its positive health and environmental impacts. Please tell the President it’s time to stand up to Monsanto and reject GMO crops.
From FitLife.tv, “In the wake of a 12-year battle to keep Monsanto’s Genetically Engineered crops from contaminating the nation’s 25,000 organic farms and ranches, America’s organic consumers and producers are facing betrayal. A self-appointed cabal of the Organic Elite, spearheaded by Whole Foods Market, Organic Valley, and Stonyfield Farm, has decided it’s time to surrender to Monsanto. Top executives from these companies have publicly admitted that they no longer oppose the mass commercialization of GE crops, such as Monsanto’s controversial Roundup Ready alfalfa, and are prepared to sit down and cut a deal for “coexistence” with Monsanto and USDA biotech cheerleader Tom Vilsack.”
To help organize or coordinate a Millions Against Monsanto and Factory Farms Truth-in-Labeling campaign in your local community, sign up here. To pressure Whole Foods Market and the nation’s largest supermarket chains to voluntarily adopt truth-in-labeling practices, sign editable text here.

BUY FRESH. BUY LOCAL . . . . Farmers, gardeners, and craftspeople meet through The Nebraska Food Cooperative, an on-line, year-round farmers’ market and local food distribution service offering the best in local freshness. For ordering and pickup schedules, refer to the calendar here. Click here for products and prices from North Star Neighbors, a Cooperative member that doesn’t therapeutically medicate or unduly confine animals. Click here for Tomato Tomäto, Omaha’s year-round indoor Farmer’s Market at 156th & West Center. Shop for fresh foods grown in or very near your own community at Open Harvest, Lincoln’s member-owned natural foods retail cooperative at 1618 South Street. Buying local grows family farming, grows the local economy, and is thousands of miles fresher.

HELP NEBRASKA GREENS WITH GOODSEARCH . . . Each time you search the Internet (or shop online at a participating store), a donation can be made to Nebraska Green Party at no cost to you! To help NGP in this way, enter Nebraska Green Party where it asks you to name your cause here. Bookmark the GoodSearch Homepage, or make it your own Home Page. Enter the url you want in the GoodSearch search box. Each time you do, one penny will be donated to Nebraska Greens. THANK YOU for your support!

Remember, every man-made by-product of the petroleum industry could be replaced by hemp. “Help Save the Earth, Time to Substitute Hemp for oil.“