As I am about to post this blog piece, I just got a call from a man named Garvard Good Plume at Pine Ridge telling me that Wounded Knee is being auctioned off RIGHT NOW.  I feel sick.  Meanwhile, here's what I wrote earlier today....

I am sitting in a cafe in Rapid City, South Dakota on the Pine Ridge Reservation, early for my interview with Charmaine White Face.  I watched the riveting, heartbreaking and informative film "Red Cry" for the second time last night to prepare for this interview.  I also studied the very specific and helpful directives about how non-indigenous people can support indigenous people at www.lakotagrandmothers.org.  

Corporate-Approved State Bills Kick Low-Wage Workers While They’re Down

WS – You didn’t really think Obama would raise the minimum wage without  giving Big Businesses a few loopholes and more profits off the low wage workers sweat. Get ready for the big spin folks. 

President Obama called for a modest raise in the federal minimum wage to $9 in his State of the Union Address, and several Democratic legislators have upped his bid with a proposed increase to $10.10.

But an insidious effort to lower the wage floor is already underway much closer to the ground—in the state legislatures where right-wing lobbyists have been greasing the skids for years for an onslaught of anti-worker policies.

An extensive analysis recently published by labor advocacy organization the National Employment Law Project tracks more than 100 bills introduced in 31 states since January 2011 that “aim to repeal or weaken core wage standards at the state or local level.” Each bears the fingerprint of notorious super-lobbying organization the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), which acts as a forum for “private sector leaders” to advise public officials. Most of the anti-worker bills were proposed by lawmakers directly linked to ALEC and include language that echoes that of “model legislation” developed by ALEC. Among the proposals are measures to undercut minimum wages for teenage workers, restrict overtime pay and repeal or ban local laws to improve working conditions.

Marine toxicologist, Riki Ott explains the FAQs about Corexit and other oil dispersants in regard to their use in oil spill clean up and the associated health risks to humans, animal and plants.  A part of the "Making it Right for Real: Working together to Ban Dispersants and Make Democracy Work!" event on Feb 23rd.

http://www.rikiott.com
http://www.ultimatecivics.org

Revisiting a dark chapter in Canada’s history-Our Men In Iran?-Man charged with disorderly conduct for whistling too loudly-Israel ‘secretly deports’ 1,000 Sudanese who may face persecution at home-Two fiery protests in as many days, Tibetan self-immolator passes away

Two fiery protests in as many days, Tibetan self-immolator passes away
WS – When compared to the Tibetan Monks; My activism is “no match”.
In more alarming reports coming out of Tibet, another Tibetan, who is a close relative of a Tibetan self-immolator, set himself on fire today protesting China’s continued occupation of Tibet.

Tsezung Kyab, 27, torched himself in front of the main prayer hall of the Shitsang Monastery in Luchu region of eastern Tibet at around 1:30 pm (local time). He passed away at his protest site, the same place where his cousin Pema Dorjee, 23, passed away in his self-immolation protest on December 8, 2012.

At the time of filing this report, additional details on today’s protest are awaited.

This is the second self-immolation protest in Tibet in as many days. Yesterday, Phagmo Dhondup, a Tibetan in his 20’s set himself ablaze near the Jhakhyung Monastery in Palung region of eastern Tibet. His condition and whereabouts are not known. More…

Today is “National Pistachio Day”  - What makes them more special than Cashews? This is just “Nuts”!

Click to view Slide Shows

US sees ‘biggest-ever’ climate protest over Keystone XL pipeline
Tens of thousands of protesters marched through the streets of Washington, DC, on Sunday to protest the controversial Keystone XL project, which would see an oil pipeline run across the US Midwest.

­The march’s organizers, environmental movement 350.org, estimated that 40,000 people from 30 states took part in the ‘Forward on Climate’ rally, described as the biggest climate march in US history; police have not yet provided an official estimate.

Protesters chanted "Keystone pipeline? Shut it down," as they marched around the White House, calling on President Obama to reject the Keystone proposal and follow through on climate pledges made during his inaugural

Idle No More - Sacramento - Departure Song 1/26/2013

~ Earth First Presentation at NAASN

• Panagioti, “No System but the Ecosystem: Earth First! and Anarchism”
• Moderator: Jeff Brite

Panel Presentation from the North American Anarchist Studies Network Conference
experience is the best teacher

In 1980, Keith and seven friends started the first Food Not Bombs chapter in Cambridge, Massachusets. At first more of a street performance than a protest, the group provided entertainment and vegetarian meals in Harvard Square and the Boston Commons after making deliveries of uncooked food to most of the housing projects and shelters in the area. After eight years of serving free food in New England, Keith moved to San Francisco where he started a second Food Not Bombs group. He was one of nine volunteers arrested for sharing food and literature at Golden Gate Park on August 15, 1988. In the following years, Keith was arrested over 100 times for serving free food in city parks and spent over 500 nights in jail. He faced 25 years to life in prison under the California Three Strikes Law but in 1995, Amnesty International and the United Nations Human Rights Commission brought about his release.

• Keith McHenry “The Anarchist Response to Sandy, Katrina, and the Global Economic Crisis”
• Moderator: Sean Walsh

Panel Presentation from the North American Anarchist Studies Network Conference

Sethness-Castro, Javier. “For an Ecological Anarcho-Communism” (via SKYPE)

Due to Technical Difficulties the End of Javier's and the beginning of Gabriel's presentation were lost to fluctuating bandwidth from the livestream. 
Below, in text, is the missing part of Gabriel's presentation.  
Below that is the remainder of the panel.

Piser, Gabriel. “Frack and Friction: The Contested Futures of Development in Appalachia”
Engel-Di Mauro, Salvatore. “Anarchism and Environmental Degradation” 
Moderator: John Clark

Weaving Together Ungovernable Flesh: The Activist Threat of State Legibility

In the days leading up to Hurricane Sandy I watched along with countless others as the Media frenzied Halloween coinciding "Frankenstorm" Sandy appeared to make a beeline for New York and New Jersey. Sandy brought with it an ecological wake up, with a swirling natural example of a Fibonacci sequence contained in an immense storm and delivered to the doorstep of Wall Street in New York. Sandy had more “wake-up” painted on it than the equally sad storm of Honey Boo Boo foisted on the American public during prime time people programing hours. Sandy headed quite literally for ground zero of the Wall Street/Governmental poster child for disparity replete throughout our present system and the heart of Americas Occupy movement. The sweeping northern arm of the storm was in a placement for optimal damage around New York and New Jersey. The BBC had aired the scenario in a 2009 Episode of Hot Planet and it had painted this exact scenario as a probability of Global Warming due to slight temperature rises in the Atlantic. Hot Planet could not have been more uncanny in its prediction or theory. Add to this, the screaming silence of omission in the presidential debates about the environment and global warming. Now a "monster storm" was headed dead on and like it or not debate stopped upon the fact that this was to be massive! Indeed it was massive. Its' wake is equally so on many levels. The storm hit, emergency services scrambled, store shelves vacated, generators flew from the Home Depots stores in my area as if beamed up by Scotty on the Starship Enterprise prior to an ion storm that would deplete the dilithium crystals and render warp drive inoperable. The cacophony of preparation soon met the cacophony of real-time emergency action. It stretched many services to the breaking point as well as many lives. The onslaught of the activity is almost impossible to outline in coherent form, but chaos is a word now familiar to those who bore the brunt of it. The after effects equally so in scale and ramification. In its wake Sandy left emergency response further politicized by Mayor Bloomberg's reluctance to cancel the mass of supplies headed to 40,000 marathon runners while another 40,000 were literally and figuratively left in the dark. Bloomberg is reported to have finally conceded to pleas and threats from senior staff and even the New York Marathon organizers themselves. Mayor Bloombergs marathon priority in the face of so many suffering was demonstrative Hail Mary bonehead play if there ever was one. Clearly it showed the disconnect that exists in the disparity of real lives and the uppity out of touch privileged rich and galactically misinformed and/or uncaring. After affects met with slow or no response by FEMA bureaucracy, along with other large Aid agencies, some neighborhoods completely leveled by fire, a total disaster for great swaths and a near miss for others around New York. Yes, disaster all around was an understatement. continued below---

Occupy Sandy Relief - My House is Your House is Our House