Note: AAEA is not a member of MCJ and AAEA supports cap and trade proposals.
The Mobilization for Climate Justice (MCJ) is an alliance of environmental justice, social justice, indigenous rights, forest protection and other groups that have united to address climate-change. MCJ is planning to confront what they consider to be false solutions at the December U.N. climate talks in Copenhagen. MCJ is advancing alternatives that they believe will provide real and just solutions to the climate crisis: leaving fossil fuels in the ground; reasserting peoples’ and community control over resources; relocalising food production; reducing over-consumption, particularly in the North; recognizing ecological and climate debt owed to the peoples of the South and making reparations; and respecting Indigenous and forest peoples’ rights,” the call to action states.
Based in the United States, the movement is organizing opposition to false solutions to climate change that impede our ability to find the real solutions, including:
False solutions are those primarily directed at maintaining business as usual and increasing corporate profit, while doing little or nothing to truly address climate change.
False solutions include carbon offset projects, such as industrial timber plantations grown in developing countries, explicitly designed to allow industries in the North to continue polluting. This solution is false because there is no evidence these carbon offsets actually offset the emissions in question.
False so-called “clean” coal. The technology at the heart of “clean” coal is completely unproven and riddled with problems such as contamination of ground water. “Clean” coal is merely a PR scheme designed to allow coal companies to continue blowing up mountaintops, expanding strip mines onto indigenous peoples’ lands and pumping massive amounts of pollution into the air.
In Copenhagen, MCJ will come together from many different associates from many different nations, backgrounds and movements, experiences and struggles: indigenous peoples and farmers, workers and environmentalists, feminists and anti-capitalists. (BurlingtonFreePress.com, 11/29/09)
Speaking of Everest, here's an interesting story from Grough.com, who are reporting that the Nepali governmental cabinet will meet at Everest Base Camp next month in an effort to draw attention to the impact of climate change on the mountain.
Madhav Kumar, the Prime Minister of Nepal, will be joined by his cabinet members who are deemed physically fit enough for the journey. The group will fly to Lukla, located at 9,383 feet, where they will board a helicopter that will ferry them up to EBC, located at 17,585 feet. The high altitude cabinet meeting is scheduled to begin later this week on December 4th, and is timed to precede a major climate conference to be held in Copenhagen soon.
For Nepal, the climate changes on Everest are quite an important matter. Not only is the mountain a valuable source of income for the country, the melting snows there help to feed the rivers and springs that deliver water to the villages in the Khumbu Valley below. As those streams dry up, villagers are having to hike several hours a day just to find water they need for day to day life. But those glaciers are retreating rapidly thanks to global climate change, and as they disappear, the amount of water provided to the valley below is going away too.
Just another way that the planet is changing around us, and an example of how it is having a direct impact on the lives of many.
Travel blog World Hum, which is always a great source of information, posted a great video today of Summit Day on Everest. There is no dialog, just some great music and a minute and forty-three seconds of images from the mountain, along with spectacular views and shots of climbers on the route. Great stuff, and definitely a reminder of what we can expect in the spring. Check it out below!
NY Times columnist, Thomas L. Friedman is often-- perhaps usually-- too glib, but he also often captures a large kernel of truth. Both Lilly Rivlin and I found reason to notice his column of Nov. 29.
Lilly mentioned the problem of running against the strictures of political correctness in agreeing that Friedman has identified a genuine problem within the Arab and Muslim worlds. At the same time, however, Friedman tends to downplay the role of Abu Ghraib and other US (or Israeli) misdeeds in lending credence to this "Narrative." Here is the core of his column:
What should we make of Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan, who apparently killed 13 innocent people at Fort Hood?
Here’s my take: Major Hasan may have been mentally unbalanced .... But the more you read about his support for Muslim suicide bombers, about how he showed up at a public-health seminar with a PowerPoint presentation titled “Why the War on Terror Is a War on Islam,” and about his contacts with Anwar al-Awlaki, a Yemeni cleric famous for using the Web to support jihadist violence against America — the more it seems that Major Hasan was just another angry jihadist spurred to action by “The Narrative.”
What is scary is that even though he was born, raised and educated in America, The Narrative still got to him.
The Narrative is the cocktail of half-truths, propaganda and outright lies about America that have taken hold in the Arab-Muslim world since 9/11. Propagated by jihadist Web sites, mosque preachers, Arab intellectuals, satellite news stations and books — and tacitly endorsed by some Arab regimes — this narrative posits that America has declared war on Islam, as part of a grand “American-Crusader-Zionist conspiracy” to keep Muslims down.
Yes, after two decades in which U.S. foreign policy has been largely dedicated to rescuing Muslims or trying to help free them from tyranny— in Bosnia, Darfur, Kuwait, Somalia, Lebanon, Kurdistan, post-earthquake Pakistan, post-tsunami Indonesia, Iraq and Afghanistan — a narrative that says America is dedicated to keeping Muslims down is thriving.
Although most of the Muslims being killed today are being killed by jihadist suicide bombers in Pakistan, Iraq, Afghanistan and Indonesia, you’d never know it from listening to their world. The dominant narrative there is that 9/11 was a kind of fraud: America’s unprovoked onslaught on Islam is the real story, and the Muslims are the real victims — of U.S. perfidy.
.... As a Jordanian-born counterterrorism expert, who asked to remain anonymous, said to me: “This narrative is now omnipresent in Arab and Muslim communities in the region and in migrant communities around the world. These communities are bombarded with this narrative in huge doses and on a daily basis. [It says] the West, and right now mostly the U.S. and Israel, is single-handedly and completely responsible for all the grievances of the Arab and the Muslim worlds. Ironically, the vast majority of the media outlets targeting these communities are Arab-government owned — mostly from the Gulf.”
This narrative suits Arab governments. It allows them to deflect onto America all of their people’s grievances over why their countries are falling behind. ... Click here for Friedman's full column online.
Progress towards the Pole, and other Antarctic destinations, continues at the bottom of the world, where teams have been experiencing overall good conditions on their respective journeys. While reports continue to be remarkably upbeat, the rigors of day to day travel have begun to take their toll as well.
The Kaspersky Commonwealth Team is reporting that while conditions remain very good, the weather has gotten colder, prompting an extra layer of insulation to hold out the wind. The latest dispatch from the team comes from yesterday, when they covered 12.4 nautical miles and then celebrated the "Festival of Sacrifice", an Islamic tradition brought to the team by Era, the team member from Brunei. Era has been working through her own sacrifices it seems, as she reports blisters upon her blisters following some long days on the ice.
Eric Larsen and his teammates continue steaming towards the Pole as well, In his latest update, Eric says that they have put the mountains behind them and are now on the Antarctic plateau, with the ground nearly flat and level. He also says that they have encountered almost no sastrugi so far, and progress continues at a great pace. In fact, on the day of the post, the boys knocked off 14.7 nautical miles, although things have slowed down a bit as they have been slogging up hill for some time. Most people don't realize that Antarctica is the highest continent in the world, and there are a few portions of the South Pole trek that require explorers to over come some rather long, slow, climbs.
Meagan McGrath posted a new audio update today announcing that she is on the ice at Hercules Inlet at last. She is spending today getting her equipment finalized and ready to go, and then tomorrow she'll be officially underway on her solo, unsupported journey to the Pole. She reports conditions are good, with temps "only" sitting at -10ยบ below zero. From the sound of her voice, it seems Meagan is eager and ready to get things underway.
Ryan Waters and Cecilie Skog are continuing on their unsupported expedition to the Pole as well, with their latest update coming last Friday, when they were reportedly preparing to drop their skis and switch into crampons for the climb up Wujek Ridge. In an earlier post, the gave some details on their day to day proceedings which are broken down like this: "Each day we do 12 runs of 35 minutes, which add up to 7 hrs. skiing. We take alternating 5 or 10 min. breaks between runs when we eat lunch on the go... chocolate, nuts, cookies etc" At the end of the day, they hit the tents, repair gear, melt snow for drinking water, and try to relax some. Just another day in the life of a polar explorer I suppose.
Finally, back across the water to Patagonia, Borge Ousland and his crew are reportedly done with their expedition to traverse the Patagonian Icecaps. The team was plucked from the ice by a boat yesterday, and they're now on their way back to Santiago before departing for home. Borge and the crew had such a good time though, the intend to make the journey again next year, and are inviting us to join them. Anyone want so sign up for a Patagonian adventure with a polar legend? Sounds like fun!
One of the feature stories for today's line-up is a piece I wrote on my selection of the top 10 adventure travel destinations for 2010, in which I select the places that I think will offer the best adventure experiences for travelers in the year ahead. The list consists of some old classic stand-bys, such as Peru and Nepal, but with some hopefully surprising additions to the list too, perhaps even offering some new suggestions that you might not have considered in the past.
When deciding what to put on the list, I thought about the places that I might like to go, while balancing the activities that those locations had to offer. I also thought about the expense of traveling to those places, as we all know that adventure travel doesn't tend to be cheap. Still, with the economy still struggling a bit, I think there will once again be some great travel bargains next year, which means that the places on this list should be as accessible as they have ever been.
So, tell me what you think of my choices. What did I leave off? What's your top destination for 2010? More importantly, can I come along with you? :)
Editor's note: Today’s guest blogger is John Buckholz, VP of Information Technology for LCC International, Inc., a global wireless engineering company with 1,200 employees in North America, Europe and the Middle East. Following eight years as a management consultant with Accenture, John has since led the IT groups at three global companies. John has managed Lotus cc:Mail, IBM Notes/Domino, and Microsoft Exchange systems during his career, but his most recent choice for messaging and collaboration is Google Apps.
John will be speaking on a live webcast this Thursday at 2:00 p.m. EST / 11:00 a.m. PST / 7:00 p.m. GMT.
LCC International designs, builds, operates, and maintains wireless networks throughout the world. We have a diverse user base, including field technicians who collect statistics on cell phone signals, radio frequency engineers who use applications specific to our industry, and administrative staff who support the business operations. We operate in more than 20 countries throughout North America, Europe, the Middle East, and North Africa. With standard workweeks varying by country, along with the various time zones across the globe, our workforce operates around the clock, 365 days a year – which means a lot of coordination to keep everyone in sync.
For email, we had most recently been using Microsoft Exchange. Prior to that, we had IBM Notes/Domino and before that, Lotus cc:Mail. The company intranet was based on Microsoft SharePoint. These on-premise solutions required a fair amount of ongoing support and maintenance. We had a total of 10 IT people supporting all of our systems, and we frequently found ourselves addressing issues on weekends, especially early on Saturday mornings as our colleagues in some countries were starting their workweek. We were stretched too thin with covering all of these products around the clock. It felt like firefighting a lot of the time.
We wanted a solution that would lower our overall costs and free up IT time. At the same time, we knew that we couldn't afford to have downtime. We initially wondered if Google Apps was enterprise-ready. Then we attended a webcast featuring Genentech, and we thought to ourselves, “If Google Apps are good enough for Genentech, it’s good enough for us.”
We conducted a pilot, and, to our surprise, everything was silent. We thought no one was using the Apps. But it turns out that people were doing fine and accessing Google’s training materials on their own when they had questions.
That’s when we decided to move into the cloud in earnest. We’ve been on Google Apps for one year now, after what I would say was a fairly easy transition with a little help from SADA Systems, a Google Apps partner. We now have good email service, including reliable access for mobile users. We collaborate on documents using Google Docs.
And we converted the company intranet from SharePoint to Google Sites. We took the least experienced person on our IT staff and asked him to try converting the intranet to Google Sites. He really amazed us. With no formal training, he just built the whole thing. It’s a testament to how easy Google Apps is to learn and use.
With Google Apps, we are now saving 60% over other alternatives, and my team no longer spends their weekends monitoring system uptime and addressing email issues. Most importantly, IT has been able to shift resources to more mission-critical initiatives. We now have a smaller IT team and a much less complex environment. A few short years ago, we were slaying dragons day and night. Now, we can all get down to supporting the business in more strategic ways.
UPDATE 12/02/09: Our apologies for the faulty link in the first reference to this webinar. We've corrected it and are sharing the direct link here: http://whitepapers.techrepublic.com.com/webcast.aspx?docid=1181191. We're sorry for the confusion.
Come see our volunteers try their hand as guest bartenders! We'll be pouring beers and mixing drinks at Maddy's alongside the pro's. In exchange for our hard work behind the bar, we will receive 5% of the proceeds that are brought in between 6-9 p.m. and any tips will go towards Grameen America in Washington, DC.
Spread the word! Help us promote the event! On December 8, celebrate having raised over $1 million of our $2 million goal!
December 8, 6-9 p.m. Maddy's Bar & Grille (old Timberlake's) 1726 Connecticut Avenue NW Washington, DC 20036
During the holiday season, we hear reports about Black Friday, monthly economic indicators, and consumer spending. We analyze the competitiveness of Fortune 500 companies, whether Asia is buying US goods, which products are hot this holiday season. During the holiday season, we hear reports about Black Friday, monthly economic indicators, and consumer spending. We analyze the competitiveness of Fortune 500 companies, whether Asia is buying US goods, which products are hot this holiday season.
All while the poorest among us are working on even tougher issues and facing even thornier dilemmas.
"Should I give up on my business and apply for welfare?" "What can I sell right now so I can get through next week?" "How can I occupy my daughter so she forgets about getting a present?"
The poorest among us face heartbreaking problems this holiday season. Imagine if just surviving through next week were a more pressing issue than analyzing the success of Black Friday. Consider that going on government assistance, a first in your neighborhood, would be a bigger worry than switching from EU as a sales market to refocus on Asia. Deciding whether to buy your mother a mini laptop or a more comfortable larger model is an easy problem compared with figuring out how to assure your child that she is loved, even though she will not receive a Christmas present.
Let's put our problems in perspective this holiday season. Help our neighbors who have tougher choices to make.
Join us in alleviating poverty through microfinance. $1,500 can help a borrower to start a new business and begin solving those problems for their family. Be part of the solution.
The fans were out in full force at the West Virginia Mountaineers game this past weekend. Yuengling and the TailgateHaven.com group “The Logan Blue Lot Crew” got together for a pregame tailgate event to start the day off right! The Blue Lot Crew had the heaters going to keep warm, great food for the whole group, and a great selection of Yuengling available. Fans enjoyed Lager, Light Lager, and Black & Tan at the tailgate, and were very excited that the Yuengling brands have finally arrived in their state. Inside the stadium, WVU faced off against their neighbor to the east, Pitt., and the stadium was packed. The WVU Mountaineers came away with a 19-16 win for the day and the fans couldn't have been happier. Thank you to everyone who participated in this event and to our partner TailgateHaven.com. Enjoy the pictures below.
I am pleased to announce that the second edition of my book, In The Court of Public Opinion, is now a bestseller on the American Bar Association website.
What to make of the Tiger Woods situation? As a public relations advisor, I thought his statement was measured and credible. But will it work?
Well, there are several problems. First, the statement certainly should have come earlier. His initial silence created its own storyline, making the story all-the-bigger. A great quote in this regard comes from a New York Times article on the topic, from a fellow crisis communications practitioner, Michael Paul:
“My advice to Tiger is pretty simple,” Paul said. “Own it, say it yourself, say it yourself with full conviction and responsibility and get it out of the way.
“You have an opportunity to change rumor and innuendo into truth. Moving past fear and doubt — that’s something they did not do well during the first 24 hours.”
Then there is the fact that -- depending on what you believe -- Woods has continually postponed, and then canceled altogether, interviews with the Florida Highway Patrol. Mistake. This feeds another storyline, i.e., "Why won't Tiger meet with police?" (one example, here). Granted, part of the problem may be that he's a bit pissed at the whole bunch of them, since some of the public statements from local police department -- including that Tiger's injuries were "serious," when he had already been released from the hospital -- helped to feed the initial media frenzy.
Advice: put emotions aside. Meet with them even if you don't have to, even if you're not required to by law. Put that storyline behind you. Sometimes you have to take proactive steps beyond what is legally required to satisfy the court of public opinion.
Finally, there is the most troubling cloud on the horizon for Tiger: the supposed other woman in an alleged affair, Rachel Uchitel. She has denied anything went on between them -- and has vowed in the past that she's not the "kiss-and-tell" type (Daily News story, here). But for some inexplicable reason, she flew from New York to Los Angeles on Sunday to meet with... celebrity lawyer Gloria Allread.
Seeking legal counsel itself is not the odd part: she's entitled to representation just like anyone else, particularly if she is being defamed in the National Enquirer and elsewhere. But if you're trying to keep your head down and protect your legal rights, do you hire a L.A. attorney best known for her television appearances? In my business, the first thing we do is check out the media savvy of opposing counsel to get a sense for how the other side might handle the public aspects of a high-profile legal issue. Uchitel's motives may be totally pure, but it may also be the case that she realizes her "window of infamy" won't be open forever, and is looking for advice on how to cash in.
(Which, by the way, would be another sad example of how our reality show chickens have come home to roost. Tiger should hope the Real Housewives of New Jersey crash President's Obama's speech on Afganistan this week -- in a balloon -- to knock his story right out of the headlines.)
But seriously, some additional advice to Tiger: prepare for Uchitel looking for ways to keep herself in the public spotlight, and "game-out" a plan to manage the resulting public attention. You don't have to respond to every allegation, and you don't have to say much... but you do have to have a strategy to respond.
So let me recommend another book, this time a novel, by Barbara Kingsolver: The Lacuna. This book is an unbelievable tour de force, in a whole number of ways; and it unexpectedly turns very political at the end, darkly hinting (it seemed to me) at right-wing forces that are likely to engulf us in the course of the next decade (I hope I'm wrong). It also indicates that when such things happen, an empire is on its last legs.
However, it wasn't the politics that attracted me here; it was the prose. What a writer! Comparing her power as a novelist with my own feeble efforts in this direction, I could see what a long row I'd have to hoe, if I continue writing fiction, to come even close to this level of achievement.
At least half the novel is set in Mexico, and her genius for Mexican slang, for the nuance of the Mexican way of life, is equally impressive. The following paragraphs capture some of the things I adore about this country--things I felt from the 1st time I visited in 1979, but which I could never seem to put into words. In the hands of a master like Kingsolver, the ineffable is 'made flesh', as it were:
"In the afternoon when the sun lights the stucco buildings across the street, it's possible to count a dozen different colors of paint, all fading together on the highest parts of the wall: yellow, ochre, brick, blood, cobalt, turquoise. The national color of Mexico. And the scent of Mexico is a similar blend: jasmine, dog piss, cilantro, lime. Mexico admits you through an arched stone orifice into the tree-filled courtyard of its heart, where a dog pisses against a wall and a waiter hustles through a curtain of jasmine to bring a bowl of tortilla soup, steaming with cilantro and lime. Cats stalk lizards among the clay pots around the fountain, doves settle into the flowering vines and coo their prayers, thankful for the existence of lizards. The potted plants silently exhale, outgrowing their clay pots. Like Mexico's children they stand pinched and patient in last year's too-small shoes.
"Here life is strong-scented, overpowering. Even the words. Just ordering breakfast requires some word like toronja, triplet of muscular syllables full of lust and tears, a squirt in the eye. Nothing like the effete 'grapefruit,' which does not even mean what it says."
The following quotations are from ch. 3 of Chris Hedges’ most recent book, Empire of Illusion.
“The elite universities disdain honest intellectual inquiry, which is by its nature distrustful of authority, fiercely independent, and often subversive....The established corporate hierarchies these institutions service...come with clear parameters, such as the primacy of an unfettered free market....Those who critique the system itself–people such as Noam Chomsky, Howard Zinn, Dennis Kucinich, or Ralph Nader–are marginalized and shut out of the mainstream debate. These elite universities have banished self-criticism. They refuse to question a self-justifying system. Organization, technology, self-advancement, and information systems are the only things that matter.”
“The bankruptcy of our economic and political systems can be traced directly to the assault against the humanities...A culture that does not grasp the vital interplay between morality and power, which mistakes management techniques for wisdom, which fails to understand that the measure of a civilization is its compassion, not its speed or ability to consume, condemns itself to death. Morality is the product of a civilization, but the elites know little of these traditions. They are products of a moral void.”
“There has been a concerted assault on all forms of learning that are not brutally utilitarian.... Only 8 percent of college graduates...now receive degrees in the humanities....Business majors since 1970-1971 have risen from 13.6 percent of the graduating population to 21.7 percent....Any form of learning not strictly vocational has at best been marginalized and in many schools abolished....[The] defense of knowledge for its own sake, as a way to ask the broad moral and social questions, has been shredded and destroyed. Most universities have become high-priced occupational training centers.”
“And as small, liberal arts schools have folded–at least 200 since 1990–they have been replaced with corporate, for-profit universities....The myopic and narrow vision of life as an accumulation of money and power...has become education’s dominant ideology....The flight from the humanities has become a flight from conscience.”
“Our elites...do not have the capacity to fix our financial mess. Indeed, they will make it worse. They have no concept, thanks to the educations they have received, of how to replace a failed system with a new one....Their entire focus is numbers, profits, and personal advancement. They lack a moral and intellectual core. They are as able to deny gravely ill people medical coverage to increase company profits as they are to use taxpayer dollars to peddle costly weapons systems to blood-soaked dictatorships.”
“People like Lawrence Summers, Henry Paulson, Robert Rubin, Ben Bernanke, Timothy Geithner, AIG’s Edward Liddy, and Goldman Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein, along with most of our ruling class, have used corporate money and power to determine the narrow parameters of the debate in our classrooms, on the airwaves, and in the halls of Congress–while looting the country. Many of these men appear to be so morally and intellectually stunted that they are incapable of acknowledging their responsibility for our decline.”
“Obama is a product of this elitist system. So are his degree-laden cabinet members. They come out of Harvard, Yale, Wellesley, and Princeton. Their friends and classmates made huge fortunes on Wall Street and in powerful law firms. They go to the same class reunions. They belong to the same clubs. They speak the same easy language of privilege, comfort, and entitlement....Our power elite has a blind belief in a decaying political and financial system that has nurtured, enriched, and empowered it. But the elite cannot solve our problems. It has been trained only to find solutions, such as paying out trillions of dollars of taxpayer money to bail out banks and financial firms, to sustain a dead system. The elite, and those who work for them, were never taught how to question the assumptions of their age. The socially important knowledge and cultural ideas embodied in history, literature, philosophy, and religion, which are at their core subversive and threatening to authority, have been banished from public discourse.”
“The elite...know only how to feed the beast until it dies. Once it is dead, they will be helpless. Don’t expect them to save us. They don’t know how. They do not even know how to ask the questions. And when it collapses, when our rotten financial system with its trillions in worthless assets implodes and our imperial wars end in humiliation and defeat, the power elite will be exposed as being helpless, and as self-deluded, as the rest of us.”
By switching to the income method to determine property tax assessments for billboards, the City of Milwaukee is expected to raise an additional $1.2 million in revenue from the two largest billboard operators in the city, according to the Milwaukee Business Journal.
Clear Channel, which has over 800 billboards in the city, is likely to see its tax bill jump from just over $100,000 last year to over $1.1 million this year under the new method. Lamar Advertising's bill would increase from $82,000 to $320,000- a nearly 300% increase.
Clear Channel has filed suit to challenge Milwaukee's new assessment method, but the city believes a recent Wisconsin Supreme Court decision involving a similar case in the city of Madison gives the city an ample basis to use the income approach.
Expect more cities to follow the lead of Milwaukee by seeking increased revenues from an industry that would not exist without public investment in roads.
In this episode, the teams have completed the climbing course, and we catch up with them in a transition area, where we see them moving from being on foot back to the bikes. The racers discuss the challenges of the race so far, and the conditions that they've been competing under.
These videos have been shot and edited by Randy Ericksen. For more from Primal Quest and other videos from Randy, click here.
Remember the Kamchatka Project? It's the kayaking expedition to the Kamchatka Peninsula, located in Siberia, Russia that I wrote about a few weeks back. In the summer of 2010, seven paddlers will explore that region, making several first descents of rivers there, while researching the impact of salmon fishing on the region.
In an effort to raise funds for the expedition, the team is running a raffle over the next few days. For every $5 that you donate to the cause, between now and Friday, you'll receive one entry into the raffle, and if you donate $35, you'll not only receive a bonus raffle ticket, you'll get a sweet Kamchatka t-shirt too. The winner, who will be announced on Monday, Nov. 30th, will receive a Kamchatka Survival Kit, which includes a Nau Motil Commuter bag, a Primus EtaPackLight Stove, footwear from END, and a Kamchatka Project T-shirt. Two second place winners will also receive shoes from END. To help contribute to this very exciting project, simply go to this page and fill out the entry form.
So tomorrow, while lounging around, fighting off a tryptophan induced nap, hop on over to the Kamchatka Project website, donate to the cause, and give yourself a chance to get some great gear.
Through the We Were Strangers, Too campaign, the Jewish community is sending thousands of postcards to Congress with a clear message that we want immigration reform in the 111th Congress.
To receive hard copies of the cards, contact Liza.Lieberman@hias.org. The message from the Jewish community on this website is an electronic version of the card that you can send to your Senators and Representatives with one click.
Click on the headline or go here to send the card: http://capwiz.com/hias/issues/alert/?alertid=14367511
This bipartisan caucus was formed in 2003 to give greater visibility to refugees, internally displaced persons, and asylum seekers to mobilize support within the House of Representatives for refugee resettlement and overseas protection and assistance.
As a member of the Caucus, your Representative will help the U.S. Government keep abreast of actions needed to sustain U.S. leadership in responding to the global refugee crisis and represent our refugee community members.
Click on headline or go here to sign the message: http://capwiz.com/hias/issues/alert/?alertid=14374556
The NY Times has just published an article on this acrimonious matter that I've blogged on a couple of months ago (see here and there). Reporter Patricia Cohen's tone is matter of fact:
... “The Invention of the Jewish People,” ... spent months on the best-seller list in Israel and is now available in English. Mixing respected scholarship with dubious theories, the author, Shlomo Sand, a professor at Tel Aviv University, frames the narrative as a startling exposure of suppressed historical facts. The translated version of his polemic has sparked a new wave of coverage in Britain and has provoked spirited debates online and in seminar rooms.
Professor Sand, a scholar of modern France, not Jewish history, candidly states his aim is to undercut the Jews’ claims to the land of Israel by demonstrating that they do not constitute “a people,” with a shared racial or biological past.
One area that I didn't much address in my previous posts is Sand's point that the Jews were not literally "exiled" by the Romans. My understanding was not that the Romans decreed that Jews could no longer live in Judea/Palestine (although they did forbid Jewish settlement in Jerusalem), but that Jewish independence was destroyed and that the depredations of the Romans in putting down the two great Jewish rebellions, in the years 66-73 C.E. and then 132-135 (Bar Kochba's rise and fall) depleted the land and made it exceedingly difficult for Jews to live as Jews there---even outlawing Judaism for a time after Bar Kochba's revolt. Irregardless, the widespread devastation made it difficult for a large population to continue to earn a livelihood there.
The longing for the ancestral homeland (whether exactly biological or not, fully a spiritual homeland) is expressed clearly in Jewish liturgy and collective memory for nearly 2,000 years. But it is only the catastrophic antisemitism of the late 19th century and early to mid 20th that made a massive "return to Zion" plausible and even desirable. It is the history of malignant and persistent antisemitism that merits the ire of the anti-Zionist left-wing ideologues, not Zionism---the latter being an amazing and unprecedented popular reaction to oppression by a weak and scattered people.
Finally, I will repeat what I've indicated in a prior posting, that all nationalist notions are "an invention." In the words of Palestinian-American historian, Rashid Khalidi: "National identity is constructed; it is not an essential, transcendent given...." It's shocking that a left-wing scholar has to be reminded that what defines a "people" is political consciousness rather than biology.
Jeff and Ed have done it again. After opening 67 Burger in Fort Greene Jeff Maslanka has brought his less-expensive burger concept Black Shack to Midtown Manhattan. Though the name sounds like an amalgam of Shake Shack and Pat LaFrieda's Black Label blend, the idea for Black Shack was kicking around far before the two burger staples even existed. "I wanted to open Black Shack before 67," Jeff told me.
The burger at Black Shack is cooked the same way as at 67 (over a flame grill) but is half the size (and almost half the price). Although the burgers are cooked over a flame, the obligatory propane taste that most gas-driven restaurant 'grills' impart is surprisingly absent. That's because...well, I'm not telling you - this secret is too good. Some of you know that I'm not a fan of the gas-grilled burger and let's just say that Jeff's method made me a believer.
Where the signature 67 Burger is a beast (a glorious, blue cheese-and-bacon beast), the burgers at Black Shack are very manageable and depending on your appetite may require a second patty (offered at a cheap $2 extra.) There are three burgers on the menu (which I just noticed offers things like a chicken sandwich and something called 'tofu'.) Expert burger taster Kris B and myself opted for the Black Shack Burger and the Western Burger. The Black Shack is a tasty, straightforward, loaded burger and the Western is piled high with thin house-made crispy onions and a tangy BBQ sauce. Kris asked for the extra patty on his Western and the toasted white squishy was up to the task. The Western was a hit with both Kris and I, those onions...
After eating a signature 67 Burger a few months back my wife (a recently converted vegetarian) exclaimed, "This is one of the most amazing burgers I've ever had - I have to stop eating burgers." A ridiculous statement, I agree. Let's see if I can get her to Black Shack so she can swear off those too.
Jeff and Ed have done it again. After opening 67 Burger in Fort Greene Jeff Maslanka has brought his less-expensive burger concept Black Shack to Midtown Manhattan. Though the name sounds like an amalgam of Shake Shack and Pat LaFrieda's Black Label blend, the idea for Black Shack was kicking around far before the two burger staples even existed. "I wanted to open Black Shack before 67," Jeff told me.
The burger at Black Shack is cooked the same way as at 67 (over a flame grill) but is half the size (and almost half the price). Although the burgers are cooked over a flame, the obligatory propane taste that most gas-driven restaurant 'grills' impart is surprisingly absent. That's because...well, I'm not telling you - this secret is too good. Some of you know that I'm not a fan of the gas-grilled burger and let's just say that Jeff's method made me a believer.
Where the signature 67 Burger is a beast (a glorious, blue cheese-and-bacon beast), the burgers at Black Shack are very manageable and depending on your appetite may require a second patty (offered at a cheap $2 extra.) There are three burgers on the menu (which I just noticed offers things like a chicken sandwich and something called 'tofu'.) Expert burger taster Kris B and myself opted for the Black Shack Burger and the Western Burger. The Black Shack is a tasty, straightforward, loaded burger and the Western is piled high with thin house-made crispy onions and a tangy BBQ sauce. Kris asked for the extra patty on his Western and the toasted white squishy was up to the task. The Western was a hit with both Kris and I, those onions...
After eating a signature 67 Burger a few months back my wife (a recently converted vegetarian) exclaimed, "This is one of the most amazing burgers I've ever had - I have to stop eating burgers." A ridiculous statement, I agree. Let's see if I can get her to Black Shack so she can swear off those too.
Yuengling Brewery is a destination spot for beer enthusiasts from around the world. Recently we had a family come all the way from New Zealand to tour the brewery! The Butcher family visited the United States the first time in October to attend their son's wedding. Michael Butcher, the groom, is a bartender in the Washington D.C. area and an avid Yuengling fan. After telling his family all about America's Oldest Brewery and our products, it was a must see destination when they came to the country for the first time this fall.
The Butcher family joined their soon to be in-laws, the Kelly's for a private tour of the brewery and were lucky enough to meet Mr. Yuengling along the way. They had a great day at the brewery and were appreciative of the chance to walk through such a historic American landmark. The wedding that followed was a wonderful event, that was held at the Schuylkill County Council for the Arts, which is located in the former Yuengling family mansion. This building was donated to the SCCA in 1978 and is on the National Register of Historic Places.
Congratulations to Michael Butcher and Bridgette Kelly on your recent marriage. Thank you for including Yuengling as part of your wedding events!
January 12th Black Enterprise gathers some of the most progressive minds on energy to discuss policy, employment and business opportunities.
The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act has committed more than $80 billion in clean energy investments, one signal that President Barack Obama has placed a high priority on the importance of creating a new economic model around energy. The government hopes to invest $150 billion over the next ten years in new technologies and the Green Economy is now touted as one the strongest areas for expected job growth. What will these initiatives mean for African American professionals and business owners?
A CONVERSATION ON ENERGY hosted by Shell Tuesday, January 12, 2010 10:00 AM – 2:00 PM The Liaison Capitol Hill 415 New Jersey Avenue, NW, Washington, DC 20001
Google Apps is helping millions of companies save money, but more importantly, Google Apps helps businesses move beyond the slow, multi-year innovation cycle typical of legacy technologies. We’ve released over 100 significant improvements and updates over the last year, and businesses automatically have access to these updates without having to manage complex and costly upgrades.
Last week I hosted a webcast titled Google Apps Premier Edition Innovation – Year in Review to spotlight the most important improvements we’ve made recently. You can watch the replay below or see it on YouTube.
Innovation happening across the web is rapidly translating into better business email tools, more efficient collaboration choices for coworkers, and more secure, higher reliability technology for companies. We’re excited about what’s in store for Google Apps, and to keep up with future developments, you can subscribe to the Google Apps Updates RSS feed, or sign up for email alerts.
Posted by Jeremy Milo, Google Apps Marketing Manager
This video has been making the rounds the last couple of days, but it's definitely worth sharing. It features National Geographic photographer Paul Nicklen telling about an amazing experience he had while taking shots in Antarctica. Paul was actually in the water, getting shots of penguins and seals, when one of the lion seals, a 12-foot long predator, seemingly mistook him as one of its own kind, and proceeded to attempt teach him how to hunt, and even showing him how to feed. The seal was so persistent, that it attempted these things for several days, and Paul managed to get some amazing photos of the event. Really interesting stuff. Check it out.
When we launched the Google Apps Connector for BlackBerry® Enterprise Server in August, we focused on addressing the needs of companies operating their own BlackBerry Enterprise Servers, typically supporting a couple hundred BlackBerry smartphone users per server.
Of course, companies of all sizes are adopting Google Apps, and their needs for supporting BlackBerry smartphones are as diverse as their businesses. So today we're making it easier for companies large and small to manage their BlackBerry smartphones and save money.
With Google Apps Connector for BES version 1.5, large businesses can now support 500 BlackBerry devices per server, double the previous capacity. This lets them serve more users with fewer servers.
Small businesses get more flexibility too. The Apps Connector now supports BlackBerry Professional Software, which is designed for up to 30 BlackBerry smartphones. We've also made it possible for a single BlackBerry Enterprise Server to serve users across multiple companies, enabling low-cost hosting services to be offered by hosting partners.
Stay tuned for more announcements from partners offering hosting services for Google Apps customers with BlackBerry smartphones. In the meantime, we're going to continue to make it easier for you to manage mobile devices of all types with Google Apps.
Posted by Zhengping Zuo, Software Engineer and Darrell Kuhn, Site Reliability Engineer
As he prepares for the first of his Seven Summit climbs, Alan has also started blogging for Outside Online, offering up his first entry yesterday. In this initial post, Alan introduces himself to a new audience over at Outside, while outlining his plans for what he'll be writing about, which will include his own climbs, analysis of the Everest climbing season, and mountaineering news in general. Personally, I can't think of a better person to make these contributions to the Outside Blog, and Alan's writing will make an already great source of news and information even better.
Alan's Seven Summit bid will begin next July, when he'll start with Kilimanjaro and then move on to Elbrus the following month. From there, he'll climb Vinson in the fall of 2010 and Aconcagua, which he's already summitted, in early 2011. He'll tackle Everest in the spring of that year, before returning to Denali that summer. He'll finish up on the technical Carstensz Pyramid sometime in 2011 as well, and while in the neighborhood, he'll head to Australia and stroll up Kosciuszko too. The best part of this adventure is that we can all be a part of it. You can help Alan reach that $1 million goal by clicking here, and you can join him on one of the climbs by clicking here.
Congratulations on the new gig at Outside Alan, it is much deserved, and good luck on the Seven Summits. You know I'm behind you on that endeavor as well.
Former Congressman, the Reverend and Doctor Floyd H. Flake, Sr. Pastor of the 20,000 member Greater Allen AME Cathedral in Jamaica, Queens, NY spoke to nearly 170 attendees from 73 faith-based organizations and agencies at the first “Faith in Action Conference: The Role of Faith Based Organizations in Stabilizing Massachusetts Communities.”
Reverend Flake described the shift in his church’s organizational structure during the 80’s and 90’s to embrace a paradigm shift toward church-centered, faith-based action that led to quality education and market oriented community and economic development for his community. He urged pastors and church members to think beyond their church structures and envision a more entrepreneurial role in sustaining, stabilizing and transforming communities.
“The synergy between NeighborWorks America and the faith-based participants was just bubbling with enthusiasm during the entire event," said LaRayne Hebert, director of NeighborWorks America's New England district. "This is just the beginning of new collaborations that reach more deeply into communities to create and preserve affordable housing.”
During closing minutes of the conference, organizers agreed that faith based organizations can play an important role in transforming communities so long as they continue to be strategic, collaborative and innovative.
The 18th Annual Great Brews Classic Beer Festival was a great success this past weekend. The festival included sampling sessions on both Saturday and Sunday. This years event was held in three large rooms at the resort and included great live entertainment all day long.
Yuengling joined over 50 other local, regional, and international breweries that were on hand sampling their portfolios. Thirsty attendees had a great selection to choose from at the Yuengling table, including Light Lager, Lord Chesterfield Ale, Dark Brewed Porter, and Original Black & Tan. The Yuengling fans came back quite a few times to get their fill of all these wonderful Yuengling brands. Notably, Yuengling Light Lager was one of only a handful of light beers available at the festival, and attendees definitely enjoyed having a lighter choice in the room. Thank you to our wholesale partner United Beverage of NEPA for making this another successful year at Split Rock!
Scottish Information Commissioner Press release 23 November 2009
Research published today by the Scottish Information Commissioner has revealed that, while the Scottish public's general awareness of freedom of information (FOI) remains high, their understanding of what the FOI right means in practice has decreased significantly. The research, which was conducted on behalf of the Commissioner by Progressive Scottish Opinion, reveals that while a general awareness of FOI stands at 76%, those understanding that FOI provides a legal right to access any information from public authorities, subject to certain exemptions, has dropped to 39% in 2009 (from 49% in 2008).
Commenting on the findings, the Scottish Information Commissioner Kevin Dunion said:
"It is surprising that understanding of freedom of information legislation has decreased. There have been many examples reported in the media of people and organisations using freedom of information legislation to access information, most recently in relation to MPs' expenses, and from this coverage we might expect understanding of FOI rights to be increasing. The finding of this research highlights the importance for Scottish public authorities, when responding to requests, to inform people of their FOI rights, and more generally to include clear information about FOI on their websites.
"With this in mind I have instituted a programme of Practice Assessments to ensure that Scottish public authorities are following good practice in terms of FOI."
Our most recent course analysis is by Samantha Saeger, who analyzes a recent Blue course at Bear Hill. Follow along on the map:
Bear Hill November 8, 2009
Start-1: Ran up the hill on the trail and, actually, got too high and had to come down to the control.
1-2: Down the hill instead of contouring the rocky hillside. Cut in off the trail and could see the control in front of me.
2-3: Around on the trail as I knew the green on this map was thick. I did take a look off the trail as I was running down, but it looked thick enough that going around would be faster. Cut in off the trail and around the bottom of the first cliff to the second cliff and my control.
3-4: I purposefully left the control to the east to avoid extra climb, but I never came back south. Meant to run through the dark green, but as one can see from the track I was slowed down quite a bit by the green. At some point I looked at my compass and the slope down to the swamp and finally turned south. I was then moving nicely along the hillside, but then convinced myself that the control was at the top of a reentrant. So as I came into the reentrant I ran to the bare rock at the top and started looking around. Finally collected my wits and realized that I really needed to be on the nose and ran down to the control. It wasn’t a case of inverting the contours. I think I originally thought to run by the reentrant, but then got the idea of a reentrant stuck in my head.
4-5: Saw Dad coming in as I was leaving. Ran on my compass for most of the leg. Was running up the reentrant at the end of the leg before the last trail crossing. Right at the end I was about to run into the wrong reentrant but saw the control off to my left.
5-6: Ran straight. Saw the reentrant, the fence and then the cliff.
6-7: Made a plan to follow the reentrant up to the large trail, which worked just fine. Looking at it now I should have stayed on the main trail and come in from the back. Instead I thought it was a good idea to go to the top. Misread the rock on top and got on the main top right above the control, even though I meant to cut down sooner. No trouble from there.
7-8: Ran back to the top, thinking then I could run down the nose. Got too far to the right. In retrospect the control is sitting on the side of a small reentrant and that information would have ben helpful. Got too low and checked out a cliff before noticing I was too close to the trail. Had to climb back again.
8-9-10-11-12-13: Dad was again running in as I was leaving 8. These controls were fairly straightforward for me. Run along trails and cut into the control. A little bit of confusion about halfway to 11 with the parking lots, but corrected by looking at my compass to get back on track.
13-14: Disaster strikes. Another similar leg with trail running and then attacking through the woods. I was doing ok, and when I hit the trail north of 18 I turned the correct direction. Unfortunately, at the next intersection I did a 180. The trail stopped making sense, but I figured I would just keep running the correct direction on my compass. I ran all the way around back to where I first started on the small trail between the ponds. The whole time I thought I was running the correct direction on my compass. I knew the trails didn’t make sense so I was just following my compass in the “correct” direction. I was desperately looking for a trail that ran east-west along a pond/swamp, but I was looking too far south for me to see where I was. Frankly, the only thing that saved me was Dad coming out of the woods from 13. I knew he must be on the way to 14, so I turned around and ran behind him as we ran back the way I just came. As soon as we ran around the first corner I realized I was thinking backwards and turned everything around in my head. Ran the trails and cut into the green before the control. Noticed I had to climb 2 contours which led me too far to the right and I climbed the larger hill. Got part of the way along the swamp before realizing there shouldn’t be a big swamp to my left. Turned around and ran back.
14-15: Possibly still shaky from my last control and hesitated a lot going into this control even though I knew I was in the reentrant.
15-16-17-18: Running along trails and relying on contours features as I attack each control. Stopped one hill too early on 17, but immediately figured it out.
18-19: Disaster #2. Again starts off fine, running along trails. When I cut down off the hill to the east-west trail south of the control I somehow thought that I hit it to the west of the junction I was looking for. In retrospect, this doesn’t make much sense, as I would have had to climb down the big cliff. But, I don’t remember crossing the small trail and that contributed to me thinking I was really turning up the trail to the west of the control. I should have also kept my head up and seen the next intersection right in front of me, or noticed the trail was going up a nose instead of a reentrant. Cut off the trail and ran right into 12, but didn’t realize it was 12. Knew it was too soon so kept going, but nothing really made sense. Decided I had gone too far north and I could see the next trail so cut south and came to a large, flat, low area. Couldn’t for the life of me figure out what this was, and so bailed out to the trail and ran it to the intersection. Of course, thinking the whole time I am on the north-south trail to the east of the control. Run back up the trail, pace counting. Then the trail forks and I am momentarily baffled before I mentally kick myself, hard, and go run to, finally, find my control.
19-20: Trail and then good running on my compass down the nose.
20-21-22: Cut off the trail later than I thought which caused me to cut at the wrong angle into 21. Had to pause to relocate. Trail and field to 22.
22-23: Out through the swamp and then very careful to make sure I was cutting off the trail in the correct place. Possibly unnecessarily cautious, but I was done with being lost.
23-24: Trails around the whole way.
24-25: Lots of trouble really figuring out what cliff it was one in the center of the circle. Every time I thought I had it I would go there and then realize I was still one cliff off. Took awhile to get myself to the right spot.
25-26-27-finish: Up the reentrant and following trails into 26. Around the water tower and looked for the nose to find 27. More green at the bottom of the hill and slightly wrong angle led me to take a bad route to the finish.
Strengths: Planning my exit from the control and my routes.
To work on:
Concentration. I often made mistakes when I saw dad and did something silly. Also I got lazy when running on long trail runs and then made mistakes when I went to attack my control.
Planning the end - Having a firm plan for the entire route and visualizing what it will look like might help me avoid the kinds of mistakes on 12, 19 and 25. I sometimes oversimplified and relied on only one feature for navigation.
Counselors are giving tips and information and even interview clothing to these people. Anything to help them be successful here in this difficult economy. - - Donna Poisl
Agency provides interviewing tips and more
By Georgia East, Sun Sentinel
They come to refugee resettling agencies hoping to find any kind of lead.
They listen closely to this country's interviewing tips - smile, maintain eye contact, give a firm handshake. Most have given up on landing a job in their field.
But the harsh reality is that at a time when the unemployment rate is high for American citizens, for refugees with the legal right to live and work here, finding a job in South Florida is a daunting prospect. Click on the headline to read the rest of this story! This is only a small part of it.
This new funding will help immigrants in the workforce learn English through programs with their employers. - - Donna Poisl
By Erin Shannon
BROCKTON - The state Executive Office of Labor and Workforce Development is expected to announce $1.4 million funding for the statewide Learn at Work program in a press conference Monday at the downtown HarborOne Credit Union.
The $1.4 million will be used to fund programs throughout the state for immigrant workers to learn English.
Mayor James E. Harrington is expected to announce on Monday additional funding for the same program for the Brockton area through the Brockton Area Workforce Investment Board. Click on the headline to read the rest of this story! This is only a small part of it.
Several groups helped hand out food and warm clothes to day laborers. Most of the men are Hispanic and most of these charitable groups are Hispanic too. - - Donna Poisl
By Magdalene Perez, Staff Writer
STAMFORD -- There wasn't any turkey, stuffing or mashed potatoes under the shadow of the Interstate 95 underpass Saturday morning. No cranberry sauce and doting aunts and uncles or wine in a cardboard box.
Instead, more than 80 immigrant men, mostly from Guatemala and Ecuador, formed lines at the day laborer pick-up site at Lafayette and South State streets to collect Thanksgiving donations of winter hats, coats and sweaters.
Volunteers from Hispanic community groups passed out the clothing, as well as doughnuts, bread and hot drinks. A man with a bullhorn distributed Peruvian fruit cakes. A makeshift band, consisting of a guitarist, singers and a percussion player on the gourd-shaped Latin American guiro instrument, belted out "Besame Mucho," and other Spanish-language favorites. Click on the headline to read the rest of this story! This is only a small part of it.
Making in-roads in the understanding of the human dimension of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is not an easy task. In my book “Planting Hatred, Sowing Pain: The Psychology of the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict” I argue that psychological factors, such as mistrust, fear, hatred and prejudice, are more important than the political issues of borders and refugees in solving the conflict. This is, however, a concept that generates a lot of controversy and not a little disagreement.
Among several positive reviews, I encountered an interesting paradox: Some reviewers characterized the book alternatively as too objective (Fox, 2007), biased towards the Israeli-Western perspective (Elbedour & Ferguson, 2008), or biased against Israel (Salamon, 2007) because it “overlook[s] the issue of [Islamic] fundamentalism” as the major cause of the conflict. The fact that it has been criticized from all sides is, in fact, a welcoming fact that shows it belongs in what I call, "the radical center."
First, in his review, Fox argues, rather convincingly, that in order to understand this protracted conflict, we cannot avoid the politics behind it, and detach it from its historical perspective, and therefore the academic objectivity of the book is an obstacle to understanding of the conflict. Fox, however, misses the point of the book. The question is whether depoliticizing the conflict can help move towards a solution.
One of the main premises of the book is precisely that in order to solve the problem, there is no choice but to move away from the parallel, contradictory and irreconcilable political and historical contextual narratives, and into a human paradigm with an orientation to the future. Counseling psychologists have shown that you can only resolve a conflict when you are able to move beyond the past, and as long as we insist on focusing on who is to blame for the conflict, we will never be able to solve their problems.
Psychological phenomena such as self serving bias and cognitive distortions make it impossible to agree on past events, creating parallel narratives and an endless cycle of blaming the other. It is this fact, and not, as Dr. Fox argues, my own personal history as a progressive Zionist activist, that drives my deliberate attempt to separate the usually neglected social psychological dimension of the conflict from its historical and political contexts. Dr. Fox’s implication that the conflict must be seen as “an indication of injustice and oppression” is, in my opinion, an example of a “culpability orientation” that is focused on blame, and is precisely an obstacle to achieving peace.
Second, as Elbedour and Ferguson point out, the book is indeed skewed in its sources because it presents many more studies that analyze the conflict from a Western/Israeli perspective than from the Palestinian/Arab one. However, in this case, rather than it being the result of conscious or unconscious biases, it is the result of a methodology in which the content of the book was driven by the available literature, and a sad reality in which the majority of the research is done by Israeli or Western scholars. It would be great, for example, as Elbedour and Ferguson suggest, to use the more contemporary theories of prejudice, such as Stephan & Stephan "integrated threat theory." However, once again, there is no research available directly and, although it would be tempting to hypothesize, I believe it would be a mistake to include such speculation in an empirically driven literature review.
Elbedour and Ferguson also explain that occupation and security are the main issues you would need to analyze, which is true if you are making a socio-political analysis. However, the point of the book is precisely to move beyond the political realm, and more in terms of the subjective experience; for example, occupation might be a reality, but hatred is the subjective result. Security might be a real concern, but fear is the underlying emotion.
In conclusion, I believe that the question one must ask to move beyond the past and into a future orientation, is not what is the historical and political context of the conflict, but rather: what is currently preventing the Israelis and Palestinians from reaching an agreement? I believe, as is the main point of the book, that psychological factors such as mistrust, hatred, fear, stereotypes, and prejudice-- often overlooked-- are as important as disagreements over borders, refugees, and settlements. The historical narratives only serve to maintain a perception of injustice on both sides that is not conducive to dialogue and reconciliation.
Dr. Fox asks if “reconciliation requires acknowledging past injustice." And the psychological evidence would suggest it does. But as a process, it can come only after rapprochement, not as a precondition. Only after the sides stop hurting each other, agree to end the fighting, and begin to build trust, can violence and abuse be sincerely acknowledged, and only then can it be forgiven.
Dr. Fox’s contention that a substantial percentage of the population oppose "splitting the difference through decontextualized dialogue and then moving on” might in itself exemplify how both sides’ obsession over past atrocities, result in a culpability orientation because of a misguided quest for subjective justice. This is the main obstacle to a final and just solution to the conflict.
*This article is based on a version originally published at Analyses of Social Issues and Public Policy, Vol. 9, No. 1, 2009, pp. 341--343.
The Mobilization for Climate Justice (MCJ) is an alliance of environmental justice, social justice, indigenous rights, forest protection and other groups that have united to address climate-change. MCJ is planning to confront what they consider to be false solutions at the December U.N. climate talks in Copenhagen. MCJ is advancing alternatives that they believe will provide real and just solutions to the climate crisis: leaving fossil fuels in the ground; reasserting peoples’ and community control over resources; relocalising food production; reducing over-consumption, particularly in the North; recognizing ecological and climate debt owed to the peoples of the South and making reparations; and respecting Indigenous and forest peoples’ rights,” the call to action states.
