Coal

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.  

Speaking at anti MTR giant Larry Gibson's Memorial; photo journalist Paul Corbit Brown explains part of why social movements frequently fail.  He was speaking to several hundred activists gathered in Charleston WV to mourn the collective loss of a great leader in the fight against mountain top removal and several hundred activists from across the country who had tuned in to this live broadcast.

http://www.paulcorbitbrown.com

The entire memorial presentation is right here just click play.

Friends and family of Larry Gibson, the “Keeper of the Mountains,”
celebrated his life and legacy
on Sunday, October 14 from 2 to 6 p.m. in Charleston, WV

The event was broadcast LIVE right here.
1 hour of Tribute videos follows the memorial in this playlist.

On August 30th, 2012, seven members of Earth First! locked down at the Teco Big Bend Station, Florida's dirtiest coal power plant. Teco gives copious amounts of money to Republicans and the RNC allowing Teco to avoid cleaning up its act. One member locked down to a truck with a u-lock. The other six hooked themselves into sleeping dragons and blocked the main road. Six hours later, all seven were released with no charges, tickets, or arrests. Needless to say, business as usual came to a halt for those six hours as hundreds of law enforcement officers descended on the dirty coal burning plant to remove the Earth First!ers. Activists, community members, and occupiers arrived at the plant via buses to give support.

this is the summer of "solidarity & mobilization," where convergences on emergency action in an attempt to restore environmental sanity to a crazy, overheated, world are taking place. this past weekend was chock full of extraction awareness trainings and action campaigns, from the tar sands blockade training in east texas, to the "stop the frack attack" teach-in and rally in dc, and the ramps "mountain justice mobilization" in west virginia. all in all, thousands of concerned citizens and environmental activists gathered for these events. 

the "stop the frack attack" campaign drew thousands of concerned citizens who descended upon the capital from across the nation and the world, to protest the use of hydraulic fracturing as a method to extract natural gas and oil from shale beds and abandoned coal mines. this method includes drilling through the earth's crust, smashing up rocks in a dormant well site and capturing the vapors. it has been known to make water so toxic it can literally be set on fire while streaming out of the taps. it is also believed that it destabilizes bed rock to the degree that it creates small earth quakes in areas where fracking is practiced. 

RAMPS pulled off the largest MTR direct action to date against the largest mountain top removal site in WV on Saturday.  The Hobet Surface Mine was shut down for about 3 hours through a series of coordinated diversions, lock downs, tree-sits and banner drops.   It has been reported that this was the only mine in WV without beefed up security in anticipation of the publicly announced action.  Hobet was apparently too big & scary to imagine that Tree Huggers would have the balls to walk onto their site.  The Police arrested about 25 people including atleast 3 credentialed press with total bail set at over a 1/2 million dollars.  WV resident Dustin Steele has reportedly been beaten in jail and is being denied medical attention.

Mo'Fo' @ http://RampsCampaign.org

10 of 20 arrestees now released.

Today, hundreds of us will march onto a strip mine in West Virginia and shut it down.  Concerned community members and activists are preparing to take nonviolent direct action to do what the politicians, the regulators and the courts have been unwilling to do: to defend the land and the people; to stop strip mining.

http://rampscampaign.org

If you would like to support the RAMPS Campaign, please consider donating at
http://bit.ly/mm-donate

Mo'Fo' @ http://stopthekaboom.alterjournal.org
Stop the KaBoom is an annual music fest to benefit organizations fighting Fracking and Mountain Top Removal.  This year 7/20-22 I VJed.
http://www.frackban.org
http://rampscampaign.org

Jen Osha speaking at the Keyboard
http://auroralights.org

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Zombies Defend Destroying Blair Mountain at Historical Panel
The West Virginia cultural museum hosted a panel on the importance of Blair Mountain to Union and Coal aficionados yesterday. During the "official" panel there was hardly a mention of the current efforts of out of state coal mining companies to destroy this piece of history and the psychological & economic impact it could have as a tourist attraction. Best quote of the afternoon: In the school system West Virginia history is Morgan Morgan lived in a tree and fought Indians, the civil war and that's the end of it... never a mention of the largest insurrection our country has seen. They don't want to teach kids the power of organizing. Blair Mountain use to be on the national registry of historic places and therefore protected from strip mining. Legally, locals may object to the historic designation if they choose. The effort to rustle up objectors netted 2 zombies who now live peacefully in the heart of a millionaire coal exec somewhere. Mo'Fo' www.friendsofblairmountain.org From: FluxRostrum Views: 144 7 ratings Time: 09:45 More in Travel & Events

Netroots Nation panel on Dirty Energy pt 2
Netroots Nation Panel on Dirty Energy includes: Bruce Baizel of Earth Works Michele Boyd of Physicians for Social Responsibility Tim DeChristopher of Peaceful Uprising Mary Anne Hilt of Sierra Club From: ThePunkPatriot Views: 31 2 ratings Time: 10:53 More in News & Politics

Netroots Nation panel on Dirty Energy pt 1
Netroots Nation Panel on Dirty Energy includes: Bruce Baizel of Earth Works Michele Boyd of Physicians for Social Responsibility Tim DeChristopher of Peaceful Uprising Mary Anne Hilt of Sierra Club From: ThePunkPatriot Views: 76 6 ratings Time: 10:58 More in News & Politics

The March Up Blair Mountain
The last day of our 6 day march finds 1000 people marching up 1900 ft to the summit of Blair Mountain. mo'fo' www.friendsofblairmountain.org From: FluxRostrum Views: 1452 13 ratings Time: 13:25 More in News & Politics

people power ~ Blair Mountain March day 5
A few days ago someone blocked the public access road to the Blair Mountain Battle Field with boulders that were clearly brought from a mine site. This would prevent the march from using this state road turnout off the highway as a pick up and drop off spot for Marchers who intended to walk up the Public Road to the historic site. A small group of marchers took the initiative to move those boulders with their bare hands. They opened up the road while jeering miners, private security and state police looked on. The action had been cleared by the Dept of Transportation because this turnout was an important safety feature on this windy steep mountain road that is frequently traveled by fast moving over loaded coal trucks. From: FluxRostrum Views: 2411 23 ratings Time: 06:12 More in News & Politics

Blair March day 4
The March on Blair Mountain has lunch at an camp spot of the original 1921 march and enters Logan County. From: FluxRostrum Views: 1024 10 ratings Time: 07:47 More in News & Politics

March on Blair Mountain day 3
Marchers tell personal accounts of the impact o their lives from Mountain Top Removal and the battle to save their own personal histories and the sustainability of the land. Spirits are high as the march passes through Madison WV. marchonblairmountain.org From: FluxRostrum Views: 1468 15 ratings Time: 05:48 More in News & Politics

Union Miners Support the March on Blair Mountain
A little bit of Union History, morals & ethics in regard to the Blair Mountain Historic Battle Field; the site of the largest Armed insurrection in the United States since the Civil War. 10000 union miners engaged in armed conflict with coal company thugs and the US Military over the Unionization of the coal mines in 1921. From: FluxRostrum Views: 2506 19 ratings Time: 06:31 More in News & Politics