By Hank Edson

[This post was originally published at AmazonWatch.org on October 17, 2011.]

In celebration of Indigenous Peoples Day last week, I have been blogging about the role of indigenous peoples in the global environmental movement. I first discussed the many reasons indigenous peoples are a leading force in the global environmental movement. Part II in the series focused on a visionary contribution indigenous peoples are making in advancing the legal rights of nature and I called attention to two examples of how indigenous rights can be violated by those who champion the rights of nature: the recent violent suppression of an indigenous protest march by the government of Bolivia and the REDD (Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and forest Degradation) movement's failure to recognize and protect indigenous rights. Today, I want to tell you about the work Amazon Watch is doing to steer Bolivia and the REDD movement in a wiser, more humane and more effective direction.

As noted in last week's post, on September 25th the Bolivian government violently suppressed a 400-mile protest march by the indigenous communities being directly affected by the construction of a highway through their land, also a national park, without their consent. Aware of the mounting tension over the highway's construction, Amazon Watch co-authored and delivered a letter to the Bolivian government four days before the violence broke out. The letter was signed by 60 other leading international environmental organizations and asked the Bolivian government to respect the rights being asserted by the indigenous protestors.

In making this request, the letter discussed at length Bolivia's history of leadership and its important present role in the global environmental and nature rights movements. The letter also detailed at length the interwoven environmental and social consequences of violating...READ MORE!

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By Hank Edson

[This post was originally published at AmazonWatch.org on October 13, 2011]

Yesterday, I blogged about a number of reasons indigenous peoples are a leading force in the movement to achieve balance and harmony in human society's relationship with the environment. An important example of Amazonian indigenous leadership with respect to the environment is its contribution to the Rights of Nature movement.

In 2008, Ecuador adopted a new constitution that includes a chapter specifically devoted to the Rights of Nature and that establishes as a principle of law that "Nature or Pachamama, where life is reproduced and exists, has the right to exist, persist, maintain itself and regenerate its own vital cycles, structures, functions and evolutionary processes." The Ecuadorian constitution also gives nature "the right to be completely restored." Under the Constitution's Rights of Nature chapter, the government of Ecuador is obligated to take action to ensure the protection of these rights and ...READ ME!

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By Hank Edson

[This post was originally published at AmazonWatch.org on October 12, 2010.]

Two weeks ago I blogged about the outstanding cast of rainforest guardians working at Amazon Watch, who over the last few months I have had the opportunity to get to know as an Amazon Watch volunteer. In honor of Indigenous Peoples Day, I'd like to tell you about the real rainforest guardians – the indigenous peoples who call the Amazon their home, the people who know the Amazon intimately as a kindred being, not just a place of far off beauty and power. I'd like to tell you why it is important that I, Amazon Watch, and everyone promoting an environmentalist agenda, make the foundation of our activism a strong partnership with the indigenous peoples who still retain an authentic, sustainable connection to the ecosystems we hope to save, nurture and preserve.

It helps if we begin by acknowledging our own relationship with the Amazon out here in the blogosphere: It is as distant as a Google Earth satellite view of South America. As it turns out, however, even miles above the planet, we can deduce the important role indigenous peoples of the Amazon play in preserving the rainforest. If we look at a satellite picture of the Amazon rainforest basin overlaid with a map of indigenous owned land in the Amazon, it is hard not to notice that the indigenous-held land is green with forest while much of the surrounding land is deforested and brown. Fortunately, indigenous territories comprise more than a quarter of the Amazon basin, which means ...READ MORE!

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By Hank Edson

This post was originally published at Eye on the Amazon, the official blog of Amazon Watch

Tomorrow Amazon Watch will be holding a fundraising luncheon celebrating its fifteen years as a leader of innovative engagement in the Amazon rainforest environmental movement. This is naturally a time to remember successes, such as Amazon Watch's participation in the lawsuit resulting in a historic $18 billion verdict against Chevron for dumping more than 18 billion gallons of toxic waste into an area of pristine rainforest that is home to more than 30,000 people. It is also a time to look ahead to new challenges, such as the fight to stop the mammoth Belo Monte Dam project in Brazil, and to consider new ideas, such as Amazon Watch's focus on alternative energy solutions for Brazil.

Today, however, the spotlight deservedly belongs to the extraordinary group of individuals who make up the Amazon Watch team. This exceptional crew pursues a dynamic three-pronged approach to protecting the rainforest. First, it works primarily through indigenous groups, helping them acquire the skills necessary to advocate effectively on behalf of the rainforest. Second, it engages in sophisticated corporate accountability strategies that are rendered all the more powerful by the participation of indigenous leaders. Third, it advocates for affordable clean energy alternatives that will alleviate the development pressures that are among the greatest threats to the rainforest. Multilingual, backcountry traveling, politically savvy, technologically astute humanists, the group that not only conceives, but executes such an agenda must be remarkable. And they are.

Over the past few months it has been my privilege to volunteer at Amazon Watch and to get to know its special mixture of sophistication, guts, and compassion, which is leavened with a down-to-earth sense of humor and heated with a passionate commitment to the planet. I'd like to share with you a few odds and ends I have picked up about this team because...READ MORE!

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By Hank Edson

I find Facebook fun and informative – a great way to stay connected to my friends and to be enriched by the things they share.  There may be negatives to the evolving social network culture, but I prefer to focus on the positive.  My purpose in writing today is to highlight one really great positive: the Rainforest Action Network!

If you are like me, your most frequent Facebook encounter involves checking your News Feed where you can see posts from your friends and the organizations you like.  When I do this, I apply my own selective filter: there are the people whose posts I slide by like a greased pig and there are the ones close to my heart whose posts I not only read, but whose links I follow, whose pictures I comment on, and whose videos make me laugh and cry. 

I value certain people’s posts enough to give them my time based on my high estimation of their je ne sais quoi, the way they complement and entertain my own quirky outlook.  I bet you have some such type of filter too.

The reason I’m writing today is to make the case for devoting some of your News Feed mental space to following the Rainforest Action Network with affection and attention. 

To do this, the first thing you need to do is “like” the Rainforest Action Network.  You can do this by going to its fan page, http://www.facebook.com/rainforestactionnetwork, and clicking the like button next to its name. 

Now, let me quickly give you five reasons I think you will come to highly value the posts Rainforest Action Network shares with you:

1.  Teeth:  The Rainforest Action Network (RAN) is not a timid bunch.  Their motto is “Environmentalism with Teeth,” and they put their mouth where their motto is...READ MORE!

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The St. Croix National Scenic Riverway provides a wealth of beautiful scenery, recreation opportunities for paddlers and anglers, and a haven for wildlife, all within a short distance from the Twin Cities metropolitan area.  For these reasons, the St. Croix was protected as a "Wild and Scenic River" many years ago.  In the intervening years, the precious and irreplaceable value of the St. Croix has only increased as development and polution leave less and less room in our nation for wild rivers and the thriving natural ecosystems they support.

Now for the first time in the 40 years since Congress passed the Wild and Scenic Rivers Act, an ambitious politician wants to roll back protections extended under that law and to sacrifice the St. Croix to her own presidential political agenda.

Representative Michele Bachmann has introduced legislation to build a massive four-lane freeway-style bridge at a price tag of $690 million despite 20 years of resistance by local residents and a number of more appropriate alternative proposals.

Bachmann's legislation would not only cause irreparable harm to the St. Croix; it also sets a precedent exposing Wild and Scenic rivers nationwide to harmful development and pollution. 

Everyone who cares about America's precious river ways needs to let their congressperson know that Bachmann's behemoth bridge is unacceptable and that we expect our elected representatives to defend all protections previously extended under the Wild and Scenic Rivers Act. 

Sign this petition to let the members of the Natural Resources Committee in the House of Representatives how you feel.

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By Hank Edson

Osama Bin Laden, a man who manipulated people with twisted claims about spirituality to mobilize and glamorize an on-going campaign of mass murder, has been stopped dead in his tracks.  Normally, I could see why this would be cause for celebration.  Indeed, I am relieved he has been stopped from killing anyone else and stopped from continuing to voice justifications for violence and inhumanity.

But celebration is unfitting given the tragic and criminal history of our former leaders’ use of Osama Bin Laden’s attacks against the United States as cover for committing devastating war crimes in the name of the American people. We are responsible to remember that the ten-year hunt for Bin Laden was a part of a ten-year war of aggression in Iraq and a War on Terror waged with torture and other criminal conduct many in the world will never forgive. In view of the criminal conduct associated with our response to 9/11, our celebrations are heedless of the enormous suffering our nation has caused many people who are just as innocent as the victims of 9/11 and their families. 

From non-existent meetings in Prague between al Qaeda and Iraqi agents to non-existent uranium in Niger to non-existent mobile biological weapons labs in Iraq to aluminum tubes falsely described as used in manufacturing nuclear weapons, the Bush administration deliberately engineered false evidence to justify waging an unprovoked war of aggression against the Iraq nation that ultimately has killed hundreds of thousands of innocent human beings.  Knowing that the evidence was false, our leaders purposefully devised a sophisticated public relations campaign to create a political climate in which it would not be possible to block their pursuit of unjustified war. Because of our leaders' lies, we all now have blood on our hands. It simply isn't right to celebrate until we have washed our hands by holding our leaders accountable.  

Our president's national security advisor invoked images of mushroom clouds on network TV.  Our president told lies in the State of the Union address on the floor of the House of Representatives.  Our secretary of state delivered a slide show of false evidence to the United Nations.  Our vice president began a personal campaign aimed at creating support for the use of torture.  At the same time, this same vice president headed a secretive energy task force involved in coordinating State Department plans to obtain control over Iraqi oil fields for the likes of Exxon, British Petroleum and the rest.  (See Ray McGovern’s recent column discussing the latest document discoveries disclosed in Greg Muttitt’s new book, Fuel on Fire:  Oil and Politics in Occupied Iraq, or Richard Behan’s 2007 articles, “Connecting the Dots with Oil” and “If the Iraqi People Get Revenue Sharing, They Lose Their Oil to Exxon”.)  And when a diplomat exposed the lies being advanced by the Bush administration, the vice president’s office took political revenge on his wife by exposing her status as a CIA agent, callously endangering the lives of many other agents serving our country.

Commencing a war of aggression is known as the supreme war crime, but American use of torture, extraordinary rendition, and inhumane weaponry (such as daisy cutters, depleted uranium shells, and phosphorus bombs) over the last decade constitute additional war crimes, as do our termination of habeas corpus and our usurpation of Iraqi self-determination in economic and political affairs ..READ MORE!

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An original version of this article was published by CommonDreams.org on March 1, 2011

The trial began yesterday of an environmentalist civil dissenter who, as a student in 2008, disrupted a government fire-sale auction of oil and gas leases near Arches and Canyonlands national parks.  At 27 years old, Tim DeChristopher disrupted the auction by bidding nearly $2 million on leases he did not have the money or intention to actually purchase.  He is now known as “Bidder 70,” and he is a true hero of the environmental movement.

This course of action was more than just civic minded in its desire to prevent the people’s wildlands from being forever injured by development of these oil and gas leases.  It was also an act of intervention on the side of due process and the law.  It was civil disobedience resorted to by a graduate student as a rogue president in his final days in office rushed to give away more of the American commons to an industry that brought him to power. 

At the time of Tim’s actions, the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance and a number of other environmental organizations had filed suit against the Bush administration, alleging that the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) failed to comply with requirements of the National Environmental Policy Act concerning...READ MORE!

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Declare a Democratic Worldview 

by John Hank Edson

This Fourth of July, let's give America the birthday present she cannot do without. Let's give the people back their Declaration of Independence.

The Declaration of Independence sets forth a worldview that, back in the 18th century, served as the foundation of our new nation. This foundation was composed of the principle of human equality and the rights of self-determination implied by the famous phrase "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness."

Back then, this foundation was sufficient to support the society we hoped to build, one free of the economic monopolies, religious authoritarianism and military brutality embodied, respectively, in the English nobility, the Church of England and England's Redcoat soldiers. As large as these forces loomed over the colonists in the New World, these were forces still dwarfed by the Atlantic Ocean, the American wilderness and the sheer number of people they aimed to dominate.

In a day of bayonets, wooden hulls and musket balls, mere consciousness of the principle of human equality was enough to give the people confidence in their ability to rewrite the social contract, even if it had to be written in their own blood. "Give me liberty or give me death," Patrick Henry cried. In his day, he could calculate the odds of success as reasonable against an enemy that was still on a human scale. He could look his enemy in the eye and say to King George with confidence, our equality is self-evident.

When we won our independence, we dismantled all the power platforms setting some human beings above others. Against the concentration of wealth and power of the classist aristocracy, we built the one-person, one-vote principle. Against the psychological oppression of religious authoritarianism, we constructed the doctrine of separation of church and state. And against the physical domination of mercenary armies, we instituted civilian control of the military.

But then we lost our way.

After the Civil War, corporations stole the principle of equality and put it in the service of nonhuman monetary engines antagonistic to our democratic political process. During World War II, the military-industrial complex grew into a powerful privatized industry no longer answerable to the people. After the civil rights movement, the corporations and the military-industrial complex offered the authoritarian religious right political legitimacy in exchange for their votes. It took us far too long to recognize the Republican Party as embodying the same feudal alliance of authoritarian platforms we once revolted against.

Simply put, for more than two centuries, we did nothing to defend ourselves against the anti-democratic forces in society that were themselves constantly seeking ever-increasing sophistication and power. Thus, while economic monopolists, religious authoritarians and military industrialists developed subtle strategies for placing the people under their control, the people remained content with a merely "self-evident" equality. As a result, today we harbor serious doubts about our equality, our ability to rewrite the social contract, and the future of our democracy.

Fortunately, our understanding of the principle of human equality, the rights of self-determination that flow from it, and the people's power to rewrite their social contract need not remain in its 18th century "self-evident" condition. A logical explication of these truths exists. We can give America the birthday gift she so desperately needs if only we will make thinking seriously about the democratic worldview our responsibility. Our original articulation of the democratic worldview changed the course of history in 1776. In 2009, it is high time we upgrade that worldview to meet the sophistication of our 21st century society. In so doing, we will once again expose the ideologies of authoritarian supremacy advanced by economic monopolists, religious authoritarians and mercenary militarists as directly in conflict with the people's rights and humanity's well-being. Equipped with this new understanding, we will find the true direction of change that America is wishing for as her birthday candles all blow out.

"The Declaration of the Democratic Worldview" can be purchased at: http://democracypress.net

Copyright © Hank Edson 2009