A Hard Swallow

It's hot already here in Sacramento and I'm thirsty. We have a rocket testing plant just up the American River that polluted a large area of ground water years ago. Some of the chemicals have leached into the river at times which is where our water comes from. Probably more important than who controls oil is who controls water. It is already being privatized in many areas. I believe the key concept being missed by all, conservative and liberal and some progressives is the concept of the commons. Natural resources and necessities like food, water and air belong to everyone and it our duty to preserve theses resources for the benefit of all (The Commons). Here is a glimpse at part of the problem:

Water shortages leave rural America high and dry

May 11, 2006 By Bennett Gordon,Utne.com

Spring is here, a time when many American suburbanites pull out their sprinklers and douse their lawns with clean, potable water. But in much of the world, drinking water shortages are reaching critical proportions. Seed reports that one out of every five people live on less water per day than it takes to flush a toilet. Scientists are predicting that a worldwide water crisis will come very soon, but for some Americans, it's already here.

In East Texas, along County Road 329, residents were told back in 2003 that the water from their local wells was unsafe for consumption. The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has been delivering water rations to the area since last year, but according to Lisa Sorg of The San Antonio Current, many believe this situation is unsustainable.

The African-American residential area of CR 329 exists in a veritable no-man's land for state water suppliers. "CR 329 is in the middle of two public water suppliers," says the Rev. David Hudson, "but we can't get service from either." Water wells were the primary source of water for the area, but studies detected unsafe levels of hazardous chemicals such as benzene, barium, and petroleum hydrocarbons making the water unsuitable to drink or even bathe in. "When I take a bath in it, it burns," says resident Earnestene Roberson.

Hudson and other local activists believe that neighboring oil facilities are polluting the water. Crude oil extraction creates a noxious saltwater by-product that oil companies often dispose of in special wells. In many states, such as Louisiana, there are regulations prohibiting having these saltwater-disposal wells within 500 feet of residential areas. Sorg reports that no such regulations exist in Texas. According to Hudson, "They can't put this stuff in Louisiana so they bring it over here."

Excessively polluted drinking water is becoming a problem for rural areas across the United States, but rather than going through the costly procedures of cleaning up the water, the EPA is now trying to change the regulations. According to the National Resources Defense Council (NRDC), the EPA ignored its own expert panel's suggestions on how to clean up many of the toxins found in rural drinking water. Instead, under intense pressure from the Bush administration, the EPA has proposed a policy change to allow up to three times the current levels of acceptable toxins in the tap water flowing through rural areas and small towns. The NRDC believes this would create a "two-tiered drinking water system in America," robbing potable water from people who cannot pay for it. The NRDC is calling for help petitioning representatives to reject these measures, and a decision is expected by the end of May. In the meantime, the NRDC's sentiments have echoed the words of CR 329 resident David Hudson. "Clean drinking water," he says, "should be a human right."

Go there >> Not A Drop To Drink
Go there too >> Don't Let the Bush Administration Allow More Toxins in Our Drinking Water

Related Links:
Troubled Water
Water Wars: Privatization, Pollution, and Profit
Related Links from the Utne Archive:
Pandora's Bottle
Hosed
Getting Soaked

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Principles of Spiritual Activism

I got this from a group posted by Allan Butcher. It is such a clear presentation of the primary principals for the activist as we enter this active period of Summer.

Principles of Spiritual Activism

http://www.satyana.org/principles.html

The following principles emerged from several years' work with social
change leaders in Satyana's Leading with Spirit program. We offer
these not as definitive truths, but rather as key learnings and
guidelines that, taken together, comprise a useful framework for
"spiritual activism."

1 Transformation of motivation from anger/fear/despair to
compassion/love/purpose. This is a vital challenge for today's social
change movement. This is not to deny the noble emotion of appropriate
anger or outrage in the face of social injustice. Rather, this entails
a crucial shift from fighting against evil to working for love, and
the long-term results are very different, even if the outer activities
appear virtually identical. Action follows Being, as the Sufi saying
goes. Thus "a positive future cannot emerge from the mind of anger and
despair" (Dalai Lama).

2 Non-attachment to outcome. This is difficult to put into practice,
yet to the extent that we are attached to the results of our work, we
rise and fall with our successes and failures ­a sure path to burnout.
Hold a clear intention, and let go of the outcome ­recognizing that a
larger wisdom is always operating. As Gandhi said, "the victory is in
the doing," not the results. Also, remain flexible in the face of
changing circumstances: "Planning is invaluable, but plans are
useless."(Churchill)

3 Integrity is your protection. If your work has integrity, this will
tend to protect you from negative energy and circumstances. You can
often sidestep negative energy from others by becoming "transparent"
to it, allowing it to pass through you with no adverse effect upon
you. This is a consciousness practice that might be called "psychic
aikido."

4 Integrity in means and ends. Integrity in means cultivates integrity
in the fruit of one's work. A noble goal cannot be achieved utilizing
ignoble means.

5 Don't demonize your adversaries. It makes them more defensive and
less receptive to your views. People respond to arrogance with their
own arrogance, creating rigid polarization. Be a perpetual learner,
and constantly challenge your own views.

6 You are unique. Find and fulfill your true calling. "It is better to
tread your own path, however humbly, than that of another, however
successfully." (Bhagavad Gita)

7 Love thy enemy. Or at least, have compassion for them. This is a
vital challenge for our times. This does not mean indulging falsehood
or corruption. It means moving from "us/them" thinking to "we"
consciousness, from separation to cooperation, recognizing that we
human beings are ultimately far more alike than we are different. This
is challenging in situations with people whose views are radically
opposed to yours. Be hard on the issues, soft on the people.

8 Your work is for the world, not for you. In doing service work, you
are working for others. The full harvest of your work may not take
place in your lifetime, yet your efforts now are making possible a
better life for future generations. Let your fulfillment come in
gratitude for being called to do this work, and from doing it with as
much compassion, authenticity, fortitude, and forgiveness as you can
muster.

9 Selfless service is a myth. In serving others, we serve our true
selves. "It is in giving that we receive." We are sustained by those
we serve, just as we are blessed when we forgive others. As Gandhi
says, the practice of satyagraha ("clinging to truth") confers a
"matchless and universal power" upon those who practice it. Service
work is enlightened self-interest, because it cultivates an expanded
sense of self that includes all others.

10 Do not insulate yourself from the pain of the world. Shielding
yourself from heartbreak prevents transformation. Let your heart break
open, and learn to move in the world with a broken heart. As Gibran
says, "Your pain is the medicine by which the physician within heals
thyself." When we open ourselves to the pain of the world, we become
the medicine that heals the world. This is what Gandhi understood so
deeply in his principles of ahimsa and satyagraha. A broken heart
becomes an open heart, and genuine transformation begins.

11 What you attend to, you become. Your essence is pliable, and
ultimately you become that which you most deeply focus your attention
upon. You reap what you sow, so choose your actions carefully. If you
constantly engage in battles, you become embattled yourself. If you
constantly give love, you become love itself.

12 Rely on faith, and let go of having to figure it all out. There are
larger 'divine' forces at work that we can trust completely without
knowing their precise workings or agendas. Faith means trusting the
unknown, and offering yourself as a vehicle for the intrinsic
benevolence of the cosmos. "The first step to wisdom is silence. The
second is listening." If you genuinely ask inwardly and listen for
guidance, and then follow it carefully­you are working in accord with
these larger forces, and you become the instrument for their music.

13 Love creates the form. Not the other way around. The heart crosses
the abyss that the mind creates, and operates at depths unknown to the
mind. Don't get trapped by "pessimism concerning human nature that is
not balanced by an optimism concerning divine nature, or you will
overlook the cure of grace." (Martin Luther King) Let your heart's
love infuse your work and you cannot fail, though your dreams may
manifest in ways different from what you imagine.

All I Want to Know is Are You Kind?

UNCLE JOHNS BAND (Grateful Dead)

Video Code provided by VideoCodeZone.Com

I just spent most of the week living on Fillmore just off of Haight. Spent an afternoon in the East end of Golden Gate Park and West end of Haight. I met some pretty incredible people. There is so much creativity alive and flourishing in San Francisco. I just wanted to share some of the vibe with this old Grateful Dead Video.

Peace,

SpringWind

I'm Still Alive

If you have checked in the last few days and wondered, "Where did Alan go?

I've been in San Francisco and haven't had internet access. We had the first performance of our clown show, "Lost and Clowned" last night and have our final performance this time around tonight. I hope to see some of you there tonight. I was so happy to see Judith and Lia there last night.

I'll be getting back home tonight and post about this journey.

Let your fool out to play today.

Peace and Joy,

Alan

I Missed the Day - May 4 But This is a Very Important Date

Why Kent State is important today
By Michael Corcoran | May 4, 2006


THIRTY-SIX years ago today, Ohio National Guardsmen shot 13 college students at Kent State University who were protesting US incursions into Cambodia as part of the Vietnam War. Nine victims survived, including one who is confined to a wheelchair for the rest of his life. Four students -- Jeffrey Miller, Allison Krause, Bill Schroeder, and Sandy Scheuer -- were killed.

The students were unarmed, and the closest was more than 60 feet away from the Guard at the time of the shooting. There was no warning shot; the National Guard never issued an apology; and no one ever spent a day in jail for the killings despite the fact that the President's Commission on Campus Unrest, appointed by President Nixon in 1970, found the shootings to be ''unwarranted and inexcusable."

Yearly, since the tragedy, Kent State students, alumni, and others have met on the anniversary of the shooting to reflect and remember. Alan Canfora, who was shot by the Guard, says, ''The students today act as the conscience of the college, and the country . . . just like the students did in 1970."

This year's memorial will come, as the last three have, in the midst of a war that has become increasingly divisive. While the memory of Kent State and other violent clashes from that time between protesters and authorities did not deter the incumbent president from leading the country into another unpopular war, it is important to honor Kent State's spirit of dissent and what it taught about the bloody consequences of intense division.

Halfway across the country, the lessons of Kent State are taught each semester in debate classes at Emerson College. J. Gregory Payne, associate professor of organizational and political communication and a Kent State historian, has been teaching students about history, advocacy, and rhetoric through the lens of Kent State for decades.

According to Payne, remembering this tragedy is important because ''Kent State is not about the past -- it's about the future."

Consider the similarities: In 1970, just as today, we had an unpopular president carrying out an unpopular war for questionable reasons.

Richard Nixon and George W. Bush embody many of the same divisive characteristics. Bush tells the world: ''You are with us or you are with the terrorists." Nixon's public statement after the shootings blamed the students: ''When dissent turns to violence it invites tragedy."

Again our civil liberties are being threatened. Bush has ordered the wiretapping of US citizens without a warrant and holds detainees indefinitely without trial; Nixon was spying on student activists and what he called ''domestic radicals."

But, perhaps the most telling comparison is the sharp division within the nation, both then and now. Americans are now, as we were then, split to the core on matters of war and peace, life and death, and cultural values. The President's Commission concluded it was ''the most divisive time in American history since the civil war." Bill Schroeder's parents received signed letters after the shooting saying, among other things, that their ''riot-making, communist son" deserved to die.

Today antiwar protesters are unfairly discredited by the administration as they were in 1970. When Cindy Sheehan took antiwar positions after her 24-year-old son, Casey Sheehan, died in Iraq, she was smeared by pundits like Bill O'Reilly, who said she was a pawn of ''far-left elements that are using her" and that Sheehan was ''dumb" enough to let them do it.

Of course, the absence of a draft now and its presence then may explain why the antiwar movement during the Vietnam War had a greater intensity then it does now. Still, as the protests in New York City last week indicate, the longer the war in Iraq drags on, the more vehement the opposition seems to get.

Musicians, once again, are singing songs of dissent. Last Friday Neil Young, who in 1970 wrote ''Ohio" in reaction to the shootings, began streaming a new antiwar album ''Living with War" for free on his website. Days later, Pearl Jam also released an album made up entirely of protest music.

My generation can't ignore the lessons of Kent State. The same mindset and failure in leadership that led National Guardsmen to fire at students of the same age and from the same Ohio hometowns is similar to what led US soldiers to torture detainees in Iraq.

Kent State should remind us of what happens when a grossly misguided war divides a country. If we can speak candidly and openly about our history and our present -- even the worst elements of it -- then we can ensure that the lives lost on May 4, 1970, were not in vain.


Michael Corcoran is a journalism major at Emerson College.



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