For days now I have imagined everything I see and love and admire, consumed by the sludge. The trees in the forest, the animals in the field, the birds in the air, drenched in a blackening murk. I even experience what it would be like to feel it penetrating my own lungs and filling me with its black death. The sadness of the mothers as they watch their young dying in the thickening waves. Their final desperate attempts to save them met in a fateful moment of resignation, as they themselves succumb to the suffocation.

This is an event that will redefine the destruction we are capable of. It only appears in the guise of Valdez, until even that tragedy is exceeded and eclipsed by times two and three and four. What was lifted from the seabed in desperation ahead of the approaching slick, will not be nurtured in those places for generations to come, if ever. Again there is an initial moment of normalcy to be contended with; from here we move forward diminished, with the spirit of the world weakened. On the far side of this catastrophe, the entire universe will have changed. The sacred estuaries of the earth poisoned and sickened and corrupted with greed and contempt. No more will humans be nourished by those exquisite organisms.

A short report back from the Fellowship of Reconciliation 51st Annual Seabeck Regional Conference

I had a great time over the weekend at the FOR Conference at Seabeck. Turn-out was good; it was nice to be around so many kind and thoughtful people. The workshops were great, and participants were treated to two great key-note presentations.

The first key-note was delivered by Antonia Juhasz, oil industry analyst and author of, most recently, "The Tyranny of Oil". She offered a blistering critique of the oil industry: flagrant human rights abuses, environmental degradation, and corruption in the form of severe influence over governmental policy. Her new book is excellent. It's well-researched and it is a well-formulated critique of the world's most profitable industry.

The oil industry is tremendously harmful in so many ways, and on so many levels. Unfortunately, due to the power that corporations have over media, we are largely kept from hearing the truth about all of the problems relating to the oil industry, and its influence over public policy. Thanks to Antonia Juhasz for clearly presenting what should be front and center in the national debate - an honest, forthright and thorough discussion about energy, human rights, and the environment.

more below, including United Support of Artists for Africa, "We are the World" video, and a slideshow of conference photos...

I went to the Olympia Climate Action program yesterday. It was an excellent presentation/workshop. The very serious and pressing realities of climate change and peak oil were skillfully juxtaposed with the promise of creating very inpsiring, hopeful, and exciting visions for overcoming these challenges.

Olympia Climate Action has programs scheduled for the next two second Mondays, in July and August. Stay tuned, or check tcpronet, for more information.

For more information, also see: Transition Washington State

From Oil Dependence to Local Resilience: a Transition Initiative

more photos and information below the fold

Nettles are such amazing plants. you can eat them, make tea from them and make cordage from them. right now my pack is held together with some nettle twine I made last summer. i probably should get a new pack, but this works. maybe i'll work on making one from entirely natural materials. hemp makes better cord, but they throw you in jail for growing that stuff. i'm worried about how safe it is anymore though. the economic downturn is making people angry and violent. that is the problem with a materialistic culture, we fight and kill over money or a few drops of oil. Money must be abolished and communal living take over. it is the only hope for the future. we are advanced enough socially to do this. cuba is a paradise compared to the oppresive system we live under here. Castro is such a great man...

I saw the film FUEL earlier tonight at the Capitol Theater. It was good. I recommend it. It's an important film because it clearly shows the very serious problem that we, as a humanity, face in regard to the global economy's addiction to petroleum as a source of energy. But not only that, it also provides a clear analysis of some of the potential solutions to the deeply harmful and horrible aspects of reliance on fossil fuels.

The rumor is, according to the Olympia Film Society person who did the introduction, that the film run has been extended into next week. This is an important film. Please, if you have any interest at all, make an effort to see it.

Here's the trailer:

Antonia Juhasz sits down to talk with The Real News about oil politics and the potential for changes with an Obama Executive Administration.

Part One: "Antonia Juhasz: Clinton-era deregulation helped big oil get bigger"

Part Two: "Antonia Juhasz on the breakup of Standard Oil and its revival as Big Oil in the United States Pt 2/2"

TRNN: Will Obama Reign in Big Oil?

Antonia Juhasz

Antonia Juhasz at the Capitol Theater at 7 PM on Monday, October 20th, 2008 will present her new book The Tyranny of Oil: The World's Most Powerful Industry, and What We Must Do To Stop It.

Link to event details: Antonia Juhasz at the Capitol Theater October 20, 2008

Juhasz will also appear at SPSCC earlier in the day at 2 PM. More details about that event: Antonia Juhasz at South Puget Sound Community College

more about the book on the flipside:

From Democracy Now!: Antonia Juhasz interviewed by Amy Goodman:

October 07, 2008 The Tyranny of Oil: Antonia Juhasz on “The World’s Most Powerful Industry—What We Must Do to Stop It”

Along with so-called clean coal technology, both of the major presidential candidates also supporting expanded offshore oil drilling. We speak to Antonia Juhasz, author of the new book The Tyranny of Oil: The World’s Most Powerful Industry—And What We Must Do to Stop It. [includes rush transcript]

  

Guest:

Antonia Juhasz, author of the new book The Tyranny of Oil: The World’s Most Powerful Industry—And What We Must Do to Stop It. Her previous book, The Bush Agenda: Invading the World, One Economy at a Time.

AMY GOODMAN: Along with so-called clean coal technology, both the major presidential candidates—Barack Obama, John McCain—are also supporting expanded offshore oil drilling. Last month, the Democratic-led Congress let expire a twenty-six-year-old ban on offshore oil drilling.

Republican vice-presidential candidate Sarah Palin is now pushing to also allow for drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. Palin’s campaign slogan has become “Drill, baby, drill.”

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Inspired by Rick's Understanding Each Other post, I collected all eight episodes of The Prize, a series of videos based on the book, of the same title, by Daniel Yergin.

This book, and the video series based on it, is very informative to the problems regarding the unethical and immoral practices within capitalism whereby powerful individuals take the desire to dominate to extreme levels. Human beings, human societies and the world have suffered horrible consequences as a result of power politics.

Environmental degradation is ongoing. As the world becomes increasingly polluted, it is prime time to ask ourselves what we want to leave for the children of our time, and for all future generations.

Take some time to check out The Prize videos [linked]. You might gain some understanding into why PMR activists object to the imperial politics and policies of global domination. Are power politics the way you want the world to operate?

My resistance is based in environmental and social conscience.