Stand On The Side Of The Planet And Free Speech

When we become aware of a great moral issue, it's good for the soul to decide which side we will stand on: with the riot police, or with the defenders of the coral reefs? This anonymous woman visiting South Korea from Hawaii was honored by villagers of Gangeong village on Jeju Island. They gifted her with the traditional Korean robe she wears so beautifully here, and she responded by playing a concert to lift the spirits of the activists. They have been standing firm for years now against the entombment of their beloved coastline and fisheries, against the destruction of the natural resources that gave them life for so many generations.

The photo above was posted by one of the bravest of many brave activists, Sung Hee-Choi, who has been arrested as well as physically attacked for putting himself between the UN World Heritage Site and the trucks that the Samsung corporation is using to destroy it. 

Source: http://www.iied.org/iucn-world-conservation-congress-begins

South Korea has been required by the U.S. to build a deep water port from which to menace the South China Sea. It needs to be big enough to handle ships like Aegis destroyers.

Aegis nuclear-equipped destroyers are ships which are built far away, at Bath Iron Works in Maine. Maine's newest Senator Angus King visited the General Dynamics facility this week to pay homage to his campaign contributors, and to vow to fight cuts to the Pentagon's budget (currently at 57% of total discretionary spending) to save the 5,500 jobs there. "Jobs" being a mythically powerful word that is repeated like an incantation by politicians looking to deliver on the favors that corporations purchase at election time.

Angus was once a hippie who hung around in the north woods smoking pot and building geodesic domes. Somewhere along the line he succumbed to either greed (he became quite wealthy on industrial wind investments) or the lust for fame. Possibly both. 

Now Angus favors fracking because his aide told me "it can be done safely" and anyway we must do it because heating oil is too expensive and we need natural gas as a "transition fuel."

Source: 8020 Vision -- Use their inteactive diagram to see what fracking does to ground water.

The inspiring example of the Jeju Island resistance will be useful when Mainers are resisting the planned corporate looting of our own wealth of natural resources. Tar sands pipelines, an East-West Corridor with mining rights and hundreds of feet wide right of way, private-public partnerships to cash in on eminent domain, a mammoth (13 stories high) LP gas tank on the Penobscot Bay, mountain top removal open pit mining, and expansion beyond the seven already existing wells to pump out the spectacular Maine aquifer are all planned.

Hearings where you can stand on the side of Mother Earth include Searsport High School on Monday, Feb 25 at 6pm with Thanks but no tank, and Fryeburg.

SAVE THE DATE - Mark your calendars! There will be a PUBLIC HEARING in Fryeburg, Maine on Thursday, March 7, 6pm at the Fryeburg Legion Hall on Bradley Street across from the Fryeburg Academy gym next to the baseball field about Nestle having an unprecedented long term contract with the Fryeburg Water Company, a public utility.

Source: Defending Water For Life in Maine

Indigenous people of Hawaii have lived for generations with corporate degradation and pollution of their island paradise. Jeju Islanders have called on international solidarity in their struggle. Idle No More has connected the First Nations of Canada with earth defenders all over the planet.

Which side will you be on? I'm happy to say I will be on the side that has the best culture workers -- the artists and musicians and dancers and writers who lift our hearts while we struggle on in the face of the obscene wealth and greed of corporations who think they own the Earth.

Today I'll be standing in Portland, Maine for information hero Bradley Manning. February 23 is his 1,000th day in jail for sharing news of war crimes and U.S. State Department complicity in corporate hijacking of resources all over the planet. Here's the poster that Kansas artist/activist Marc Saviano made specially for the occasion:

Moms Offer Hope, Call To Action: Lullaby For The Earth

Today I am sharing an inspirational message from my friend Janet Weil's friend, activist Betsy Rose:

 
Hello Friends!

Green is the perfect color for announcing this beautiful new song/video on parenting and climate change,  "Lullaby For The Earth"-a haunting rewrite of the classic "Hush little baby don't say a word".




Frances Aubrey and I created this video with the intention of convincing people to vote for earth-friendly candidates. The lullaby and accompanying website are nonpartisan, and focus on the moral dimension of our response to climate disruption.

We want 100,000 people to watch this video before the election. Please send it to everyone you know, especially friends and relatives in swing states! Also any environmental lists or websites that would post it.

http://youtu.be/MlmQMWUftbU

We hope that the song and images touch your heart, and  activate fresh ideas of ways you can join the powerful grassroots responses to industries and corporations that are threatening the health of our planet, our children, and their children.

The earth we leave our children will be a measure of our love for them. It is time to act, out of love for children and for the earth they’ll inherit.

Yours for a bright future for generations to come!

Betsy Rose
earthforourchildren.org

Our world is too dangerous for anything but truth
 And too small for anything but love.

-- Betsy Rose
Paper Crane Music
Berkeley, CA 94709
510-525-7082
betsy@betsyrosemusic.org
www.betsyrosemusic.org

"There are still people who have not sold themselves to greed"

Source: SaveJejuNow.org

How often I feel that the struggle to save Jeju Island from a navy base is emblematic of our struggle all over the planet to preserve Earth as a place where humans can live, and to resist its destruction by powerful, wealthy interests served by their police and their armies.

An artist-activist whom I deeply respect and always enjoy working with, Natasha Mayers, shared this letter from a Jeju activist reporting on the outcome of the environmental conference that just ended there.  And I'm sharing it here because it so beautifully expresses the slogan we sometimes hear chanted on marches or at Occupy events? "Ain't no power like the power of the people, 'Cause the power of the people don't stop! (Say what?)" Put another way, the power of art and creativity are with the 99%. As is the love.

from Paco Booyah:

Well, as you all know by now we did not get the Gangjeong motion 181 passed. Which to be honest was a little expected as knew it would be hard to the government votes. But still as you saw from the numbers, the NGOs overwhelmingly voted for us and almost no one voted from the governments and we even got 20 in support from governments! And we have overcome enormous obstacles, oppression and harrassment and made many many new friends who worked insanely hard for us and for whom we are incredibly grateful. The IUCN itself may be a corrupt, corporate/government sellout monster, but inside it are many truly amazing and wonderful people. Especially awesome are our lawyers from Center for Humans and Nature, our many supporters for latin and south america, and many other people many of whom i couldn't even meet or don't know the names of, but did amazing work.

No doubt the korean government/navy will spin this in their favor, as they would anything really, but really this is a victory for us. We got so much more support than ever before, so many new people and organizations and lawyers and politicians, and media, from so many different countries around the world know about us and support us 100%. And many of them have said this is not the end, and they are going to continue this work both within the IUCN and through other ways, around the world.

We are all truly grateful to so many awesome people who really came together and worked incredibly hard day and night.

We feel so cared about and know that we are not alone here.

There are people who care about justice in the world.

There are people who care about the environment and the earth.

There are people who work with their hearts and fight for truth.

There are still people who have not sold themselves to greed and power, and become liars and slaves.

So yes, to be honest we are sad that our motion did not become a resolution. Of course we cried and felt rejected once again. But tears and rejection are nothing new to Gangjeong, and after tears comes dancing! And wow, did we dance and dance and dance and sing and yell! Then we cried some more, then we hugged, then we sang and danced, then we clapped for each other, gave speeches and more hugs, then we bowed to each other, deep bows to the villagers who have fought so hard for so long and to the people who have come from far away to work so hard for us.

We will not give up! We will not stop! Our cause is just! Everyone in the world must know the Gangjeong struggle! We may lose 1,000 meaningless battles, but we will continue on. You can keeping locking us in prison, You can keep deporting us and denying our entry to korea, you can can keep beating us as you do daily, you can keep treating us like criminals and animals, you can keep mocking us as you destroy all that is precious about life. We will continue to dance! We will continue to sing! And we will love each other, our community, and even you, our enemies, with all of our hearts! And maybe one day you will join us, as many already have, and as we join in solidarity with so many other similar struggles around the world.

Samsung, Daelim, Hired Thugs, Police, Coast Guard, Courts, Judges, ROK Navy, Ministry of Defense, U.S. Navy, Politicians, ROK Government, U.S. Government: You've fought for greed and for power, through violence, lies, and theft. You've already lost because you've lost yourself. We do not fight to win, we fight because we've already won. Peace has already won. We are just here to shout it from the streets!

No Naval Base! Justice for Gangjeong! Life and peace for all creatures of the Earth!
 ##

Sign a petition to Samsung and the government of South Korea here.

World's Largest Enviro Org Ethical Quandry: Serve Samsung or Earth?

Photo source: The Battle for Jeju Island: How the Arms Race is Threatening a Korean Paradise by Robert Redford

Contact:  Koohan Paik                                                        FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

savejejunow@gmail.com

 

WORLD’S LARGEST ENVIRONMENTAL ORGANIZATION IN

ETHICAL QUANDARY:

Should it answer to conference sponsors Samsung and Korean government, or 

to its historical mission to protect  environment and social justice?

 

JEJU ISLAND, SOUTH KOREA – September 14 - The world’s largest and oldest conservation organization, the International Union for Conservation of Nature, is holding its giant quadrennial convention on Jeju Island, South Korea. But what conference planners weren’t expecting was massive protests from the local community, joined by international activists, against a gigantic navy base being built seven kilometers away. As a result of this controversy, an emergency motion to stop base construction has been drafted, which will be voted on tomorrow, Saturday, September 15.

 

The South Korean government, which is subordinate on military matters to the U.S., under the US-ROK Mutual Defense Treaty, is building the enormous base on the coast at Gangjeong, a traditional farming and fishing community. If the project is allowed to continue, it will be large enough to hold 20 warships, including Aegis destroyers, aircraft carriers, nuclear submarines and 8,000 troops. South Korea is already one of the most militarized places in the world. But this new base is part of the Pentagon’s recently announced plan to move 60 percent of its military resources from Europe and the Middle East to the Asia-Pacific region – the “Pacific pivot.” The idea is to circle China with Aegis missiles. Islanders fear the base would destabilize the region, lead to a new Cold War, and turn their home into a first-strike target.

 

A recently leaked communiqué, obtained by a Korea National Assembly member, reveals the close connection between the Pentagon and base construction. The communiqué, sent by the commander of the US Naval Forces, Korea, to the South Korean defense minister, directly requests that the base plan be designed to accommodate an American nuclear-powered aircraft carrier.

 

The base would also destroy local livelihoods, biodiverse habitats in land and sea, contaminate one of the cleanest and most abundant freshwater sources in the world, kill the planet’s largest temperate soft-coral habitat (15 acres), contaminate the rich volcanic soil in nearby farms as well as nearby UNESCO World Heritage Sites and a UNESCO Biosphere Reserve. Korea’s last 100 dolphins which frequent Gangjeong would also suffer. The villagers have been protesting for over five years, facing arrest, imprisonment without habeus corpus, and daily police brutality.

 

On May 30, 2012, three UN Special Rapporteurs sent a joint allegation letter to the South Korean government regarding numerous “acts of harassment, intimidation and ill-treatment of peaceful protestors in Gangjeong village,” requesting a response within 60 days. That was three and a half months ago, but the Korean government has yet to respond.

 

An American scientist, Dr. Imok Cha, was deported upon arrival at the airport on the first day of the conference, where she was expected to give presentations on an independent environmental assessment that exposed the flaws in the Korean government’s Environmental Impact Assessment for the base construction.

 

Leadership at the IUCN conference have refused to give the Gangjeong villagers their own exhibition booth to expose the litany Korean-government violations, offering no explanation. On the last day of his tenure as president of IUCN, Ashok Khosla denounced the campaign to save Gangjeong Village from base construction, calling the movement “colonial” because non-Koreans were involved. However, attendees know the reason that IUCN officials have done their best to silence the Gangjeong villagers: the main sponsors of their conference in Jeju are the Korean government ($20 million) and Samsung Corporation, which is also the lead contractor of base construction.  Soon after Khosla issued his “colonialism” charges, a group of South Koreans representing 189 South Korean organizations, denounced Khosla, and charged him with ignoring their clearly expressed opposition to the base that had been going on for over five years.

 

As a result, a massive division within the formidable organization has been cleaved between its Secretariat and the 8,000 members in attendance who object to leadership’s decision to side with it sponsors. One organization, the Center for Humans and Nature, from Indiana in the U.S., has drafted an emergency resolution to stop the construction. It will be on the Assembly floor for a vote before international governments and NGOs, this Saturday (Korea time), the last day of the conference.

 

Many members feel the entire future and credibility of the 64-year-old conservation institution is at stake, if politics prevent the resolution from passing.

##

1009 General Kennedy Ave. #2 | San Francisco, CA 94129 US

Source: The Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory

During the Stellar Avenger exercise, the Aegis-class destroyer USS Hopper (DDG 70) launches a Standard Missile-3 Block IA, successfully intercepting a sub-scale short range ballistic missile launched from the Pacific Missile Range Facility, Barking Sands, Kauai. This was the 19th successful intercept in 23 at-sea firings for the Aegis BMD program. 

Courtesy: U.S. Navy

Read My Lips: No New Roads in #Maine

Source: Bangor Daily News "Renewed interest in east-west highway reaches State House"

I live in the hollow middle of Maine, according to the Cianbro Construction CEO who wants to construct a private 2000 foot wide “corridor” road through it. My family has lived in the hollow middle for generations, clinging to the shores of either the Kennebec or Carrabassett rivers, but I traveled all the way down to southern Maine to attend a discussion with transportation experts in Biddeford this week including consultants, engineers, plus my hollow middle former state senator Peter Mills, now head of the Maine Turnpike Authority.

I arrived late for what was billed as a centrist discussion of all matters pertaining to transportation in our state, but no one had yet talked about “the elephant in the room” as investigative journalism Lance Tapley of the Portland Phoenix termed it when he was finally able to raise the issue about an hour into a two hour meeting.

OneTable, free and open to the public, is put on by OneMaine, a group affiliated with Elliot Cutler, the man who brought us Governor LePage. Cutler swooped in out of nowhere with a resume full of Chinese venture capital and flooded the market, especially the internet, with advertising, claiming he was a centrist, and independent like Maine. As a result of splitting the liberal vote, our now infamous buffoon governor claimed victory with 39% of the votes. I did not spot Elliot Cutler in the crowd, along with not spotting David Bernhardt, Commissioner of Maine Department of Transportation, who was supposed to be on the panel but canceled.

Once the topic that most interested the audience was raised, precious little was said about it. Panelists feigned ignorance of the shocking fact that the plan for the E/W Corridor specified a 2000 foot right of way. (The current Maine Turnpike has 300 ft at its widest.) They expressed finding this “confusing.” Panelists also said it was too soon to talk about the project, even though $300,000 of taxpayer money was allocated to a feasibility study for what is intended as a private, limited access road connecting Canada to Canada across the – yup, hollow middle.

Source: Kenny Cole, Maine Draw-A-Thon blog

Dennis Damon, a retired legislator, said disingenuously that “the state” shouldn't build any new roads until it has a plan for maintaining what's already in place but crumbling. I think Damon was playing word games because the E/W, of course, would be a private road, not built by the state. He did give me the idea for a good resistance slogan though: NO NEW ROADS. So simple, even a first grader in the hollow middle wouldn't feel confused.

One panelist who wasn't afraid to support the E/W Corridor, Maria Fuentes, said the spinoff (whatever that is) of the highway would “connect Washington County to the rest of the world.” I guess the county hasn't even made it to hollow middle status; like so much of rural Maine, it is still nowhereville.

Ms. Fuentes seemed to be on a first name basis with Cianbro's CEO, and assured us that she has heard him say he doesn't want to build the road unless he can do it right. Also that the $300k seed money made all the sense in the world, because as long as the road gets approved, the investors will pay the state back.

Extracting resources is the most likely raison d'etre for the corridor, which also contains provisions for mining rights. Tar sands from Canada, water from the Appalachian aquifer, lumber from the great north woods – okay, and maybe some potatoes from the county.

Luckily there were some knowledgeable folks in the audience, in particular Chris Buchanan of Defending Water For Life, who helps ask the right questions of elected and un-elected officials involved in the “private-public partnership” pushing for the Corridor to be built. Video below of what she had to say about that prospect, plus plans to supposedly avoid conservation land (“just not possible”), and the feasibility of protecting wildlife by building bridges for them across the 2000 feet of hollowness.

Panelists (l to r): Moderator Sarah Skillin Woodard, One Maine; Peter Mills, Director of Maine State Turnpike Authority; Maria Fuentes, Maine Better Transportation Association; Dennis Damon, former Senate Chair of the Maine Legislature’s Joint Standing Committee on Transportation; Matt Jacobson, Oxford Networks; Steve Workman,Workman Consulting; and Kristina Egan, Transportation for Massachusetts.

For more information about Cianbro's East/West Corridor you can visit stopthecorridor.org.

We Need Feminism Cuz Mother Earth Needs Patriarchy To Step Down Now

Facebook album "I Need Feminism Because" on A Girl's Guide to Taking Over the World

Who knows how much progress we've missed out on because of sexism?

Do most young people even relate to the concept of feminism? And if so, what do they mean by that term?

Here I share my short video of just a few out of hundreds of conversations on that topic, and on how to save the world. From the Feminist General Assembly held at the Occupy National Gathering in Philadelphia, July 1, 2012.

Special thanks to Curtis Cole for much of the video. And for modeling his Bring Our War $$ Home black and white t-shirt on camera -- looking good!

Facebook album "I Need Feminism Because" on A Girl's Guide to Taking Over the World

Yesterday I blogged about why Israeli and U.S. policies aim to keep smart young Palestinians down.

Today I'm asking myself, why would elites in the Dominican Republic want to keep smart young women down?

And, can earthlings afford to keep anyone down who might have good ideas at this point in human history?

Satellites See Unprecedented Greenland Ice Sheet Surface Melt Source: NASA

Cannon Fodder Is Cheap But Drones Are Mega Expensive

REAL MEN MAKE ART, NOT WAR. Draw-in to Bring Our War $$ Home, Augusta, 2-18-10.

"Friendly" drone fire, the ultimate oxymoron, was the fate of two young U.S. citizens killed on April 6 in Helmand, Afghanistan. They died as the result of operator error on the part of their own side. Too many guys on too many computers with too many chat rooms to keep track of, or something like that, led to their deaths.

According to Nick Turse in "The Crash and Burn Future of Robot Warfare" (Truthout): 

In 2001, Air Force Predator drones flew 7,500 hours. By the close of last year, that number topped 70,000.

And as we all know, the new improved U.S. Military with the continuing gargantuan budget plans to downsize personnel in favor of more -- you guessed it -- robotic warriors. Would it surprise you to know that some of them have already "gone rogue" i.e. escaped from human control?

Apparently a lot of drone accidents happen. More than 70 times in the last decade, drones have crashed or exploded, resulting in $2 million OR MORE in damages EACH TIME.

But no price is too high for the fanatical adherents of the empire, those still true-believing enough to cheerfully send their kids into the meat grinder. From this account on PBS of the friendly fire incident:

 “I know whoever was at that joystick is devastated,” said Jerry Smith, the father of [the late] Marine Sgt. Jeremy Smith.  ”If I could meet them, I’d hug them and tell them I don’t have any ill feelings toward them.

I know their daddies are just as proud of them as I am of my son.”

Wow. Life is growing increasingly cheap in the 21st Century. As the industrialized rule of patriarchy confronts the reality that its continued domination of the planet is regarded by most as being anti-life, it reacts by becoming even more anti-life.

Will the 99% seize control of itself, and its necessary stewardship of the Commons, before it's too late?

A bowhead whale, among the oldest mammals on earth and the only whale that lives exclusively in arctic waters, which is under increasing threat from arctic oil exploration and increased risks of oil spills. (Image: Copyright Martha Holmes | naturepl.com/ARKive.org)

Or will the drone masters and their fodder take us all down with them?

Wall St. = War St. Amen To That, Brothers and Sisters.

Source: Black Agenda Report blog by Glen Ford.

Looking forward to some fun today, making a copycat video in the "Sh*t Folks Say" series which has lampooned, among other groups, Ron Paul supporters. A compilation of some of the funnier ones here in Mother Jones inspired me to look for the inevitable "Sh*t Obama Supporters Say" but oddly enough I could not find one. Since my husband comes home regularly steaming over shi*t people have said in his presence defending the Obomber, I knew we could generate plenty of absurdities.

Online to do a bit of research, of course I thought of Glen Ford and the Black Agenda Report, who have been telling it like it is all along about the first Black man in the White House.

I also remembered one of those Xtranormal animated shorts with the cute bunnies and teddy bears discussing economic policy (my all time fave is the one where they explain, in context, quantitative easing). So I mined the video below for some sh*t Mark can say while cross-country skiing, snow shoeing, or splitting wood outdoors on a gorgeous winter day like today.

Arguing with an Obama Supporter
by: mjk2527

I'm going with an LLBean catalog-type look because I think that's a neat cultural fit for privileged  liberal white people still clinging to their get-out-of-racism-free card by making apologies for the warmonger and civil liberties destroyer Obama. I know, I know, the video should be funny, not bitter. Working on that.

It is Martin Luther King Jr. Day, a day off for many of us clinging to our middle class jobs. Dr. King was angry but he did something about it, and we're still reflecting on his words and deeds even while knowing that he was a cheating husband and a male supremacist.

In my opinion, you will know that the old order is crumbling when you stop seeing the patriarchy still in charge. We are a long way from that yet. But the cracks are in the foundation. And humans probably won't survive unless this great sea change back to being guided by the collective wisdom of the indigenous grandmothers happens pretty damn soon.

Source: International Council of 13 Indigenous Grandmothers website

Mission statement from their website:

We represent a global alliance of prayer, education and healing for our Mother Earth, all Her inhabitants, all the children, and for the next seven generations to come.

We are deeply concerned with the unprecedented destruction of our Mother Earth and the destruction of indigenous ways of life. We believe the teachings of our ancestors will light our way through an uncertain future.

We look to further our vision through the realization of projects that protect our diverse cultures: lands, medicines, language and ceremonial ways of prayer and through projects that educate and nurture our children.

I'll just end by saying my belief that it makes very little difference who ends up in the White House. As long as we have the current system in charge of the commons of Mother Earth, humankind is doomed. I intend to keep raising my voice, though, and having some fun doing it -- while we ride into an uncertain future on this heavily armed missile that our planet has become.

Methane Plume under Arctic Ice / Source: bpoilspillcrisisinthegulf.webs.com

Uprooting trees

Human rights in the Occupied Territories › Separation Barrier › Action against uprooting of trees in Beit Jala, 03.03.2010

I once learned that 60-80% of trees were believed to have been destroyed by war in Afghanistan 1980-present. What a shocking amount. War is one of the most destructive activities humans engage in, and it is an issue for the entire globe when our common Earth is threatened.

Here we see a woman watching removal of olive trees from her family's land in March, 2010 in Beit Jala. Settlements are allowed by Israel to continue to fence in agricultural land used by Palestinian families for herding or orchards. Bulldozers dig up trees and cart them away. Fences keep shepherds from grazing their flocks, or farmers from walking to their fields that need tending.

Occupation looks like a mad giant, careening through space,  crushing things under his feet.

Last night I went to a talk at Boston University by young Israeli resisters called Anarchists Against the Wall. Noam Lekach and Elinor Amit shared images like the one above which photographers collectively gather and save as documentation of the ever-expanding occupation of Palestine.

There were several current maps showing the absurd cantonment of the West Bank, and multiple walls with checkpoints that look like the Canada-U.S. border. These are staffed by private contractors. How tidy and profitable they look.

AATW presented exuberant photos of struggle with popular committees in occupied villages and towns. They go in support of what the local people are doing to resist the containment and destruction of the land. Cutting fence never looked so exhilirating, but they are always under threat of interference by IDF or settler militia waving automatic weapons.

Burning olive tree, which caught fire due to tear gas shot into the dry groves. Weekly demonstration against the Wall, Ni'lin, Ramallah district, July 17th, 2008. Keren Manor/Activestills

The apartheid is partly accomplished by roads that only Israel's citizens are allowed to drive on, many built with funding by U.S. aid.

Israel has been the largest recipient of cumulative U.S. aid since WWII.

Bring Our War $$ Home!

Women's work

"The U.S. Air Force has dropped 700 bombs on the people of Afghanistan in September alone. They have dropped more 2,000 bombs on the country since July. The Pentagon has also carried out a record 21,000 unmanned drone sorties in Pakistan and Afghanistan so far in 2010." from a letter by Brian Becker, ANSWER, 10/15/10

Today CODEPINK Maine has organized a mini-retreat, a convergence event for women to get together on an island in Maine to grieve, to report out, and to share our commitment to work for peace and justice.

We'll be hearing from Mariam Raqib about her excellent tree reforestation project in Afghanistan, Samsortya. She'll also be sharing the grave concerns of her family and the villagers who care for the trees, about what lies ahead for Afghanistan.

Ridgely Fuller and Carolyn Coe will bring us news from Gaza, the western end of the war torn Middle East region being plundered by bullies. Gaza is commonly referred to as the largest open air prison in the world, where the collective punishment of 1.5 million people continues, funded by both Israeli and U.S. taxpayers. Activists in our region are fundraising for clean water for kindergartens there, mental health services for Gazans, and relief efforts like U.S. Boat to Gaza. The Israeli "Defense" Force continues to stop humanitarian workers in international waters and confiscate their supplies: medicine, building materials, toys and the like. Reports are they will use dogs on the next boat that tries to get through the blockade.

In such troubled times it helps to listen hard for the voices of sanity. When indigenous people got together in Cochabamba, Bolivia to discuss the distress of our Mother Earth, laboring to bring forth life as death rains down from the skies, they produced a statement. Six months ago delegates to the World People's Conference on Climate Change and the Rights of Mother Earth and signed a People's Agreement that begins like this: "Today, our Mother Earth is wounded and the future of humanity is in danger." It goes on to list some of the issues, and has a statement of rights for the life producing system that is our planetary home:

• The right to live and to exist;
• The right to be respected;
• The right to regenerate its bio-capacity and to continue it’s vital cycles and processes free of human alteration;
• The right to maintain their identity and integrity as differentiated beings, self-regulated and interrelated;
• The right to water as the source of life;
• The right to clean air;
• The right to comprehensive health;
• The right to be free of contamination and pollution, free of toxic and radioactive waste;
• The right to be free of alterations or modifications of it’s genetic structure in a manner that threatens it’s integrity or vital and healthy functioning;
• The right to prompt and full restoration for violations to the rights acknowledged in this Declaration caused by human activities.

Today we women in Maine are exercising our right to gather for support and renewal. We are now the grandmothers of our troubled world. We come together in the kind of circle that indigenous people have always held when faced with crisis. We will hold Mother Earth and her children in our hearts.