NEWS
VoteforEnvironment.ca Final Report
Analysis of the 2008 Election
10/01/08

VoteForEnvironment.ca is a non-partisan effort dedicated to electing MPs who will support the environment. The 2008 federal election presented the possibility of electing of a majority government set on frustrating international cooperation to fight climate change. Specifically, the threat was that in 96 of Canada’s 308 ridings, two or more parties looked set to split the vote and potentially allow a Conservative to win.
>> Read the Report
VoteforEnvironment.ca is Online!
Government Change not Climate Change
10/01/08


Vote Smart so the Majority Wins
To vote for the environment we need to go beyond political affiliations. We need to vote to win.

The Harper government has made it clear that they have no intention of doing anything to seriously reduce greenhouse gas emissions. They are out of synch with the rest of the planet on this issue. When the world came together in Bali this year to talk about solutions the Harper government put up road blocks. Earning them the fossil of the year award.

The world's leading scientists agree that we are at a tipping point. Greenhouse emissions are dangerous. They are reaching a level that will fundamentally destabilize the earth's climate. If the Harper government won't listen to our leading scientists and protect our children's future, who are they listening to? If those of us who care about the environment don't work across party lines, the pro-environment vote will be split, as it was in the last election, and Harper will be re-elected.

All the other parties have programs that seriously address our climate crisis concerns. And we are the majority. With solid information we can make sure that the environment doesn't get lost in old style politics. Grassroots cooperation will mean that all pro-environment parties win more seats.
There are 39 ridings where the conservatives won by a vote margin of less than 10%.
24 of them had liberals in the lead.
11 had NDPers
4 had Bloc members
and there is a real possibility of electing 2 Green party members this election.

VoteforEnvironment.ca offers all of the straight-up information you need to know. Find out which candidate in your riding supports action against global warming - AND has the best chance of winning.

By working together the pro-environment majority can win.
There is a world at stake in this election. Our world.
We don't have time to loose.

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CALL OF THE HUMMINGBIRD
DVD NOW AVAILABLE ONLINE!
In the gorgeous setting of central Brazil, a rag tag group of 1000 permaculture experts, Rastafarians, alternative health practitioners, 13 Moon Calendar activists and NGO executives work towards a do-it-yourself action plan to make the world a better place in 13 days. But who is going to deal with the garbage? Welcome to "Survivor" for social change addicts where consensus is the only way to make decisions. Anyone can speak. For as long as they like about whatever they want. And they do...
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ECO Manifesto Community
A Place to Meet...and Change the World
What's your ECO Manifesto?
We are at the end of a long era. It’s official. Just ask that UN. Human behaviour is poisoning the planet. There’s no bigger call to action. We all need a five year plan. Welcome to ECO Manifesto. Climate change is here. So is peak oil. No matter what, we will be facing big change and we all are participants in creating whatever comes next. But how are we going to do that? What is each of us planning to do? What should we do? What can we do? What actually works? What doesn’t? There are a lot of questions and a lot of answers. The over-haul we need to initiate is immense. It’s personal and political, social, cultural. It is body, mind, psychology and spirit. It’s about our relationship with industry, capital, employment and consumption. And about nature which is mysterious, overwhelming, inspiring and creative. And that doesn’t begin to describe it.
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ARTICLES
Ignatieff and Harper fail report card test
BOTH LEADERS FLUNK – IT’S NOT HOW MUCH YOU SPEND, IT’S HOW SMARTLY
06/23/09
BY ALICE KLEIN
Sure, Michael Ignatieff whipped up election panic this week over Stephen Harper’s accountability summary, but let’s be clear: the Tories and Liberals get nothing but failing grades on their report cards.

The exam is on the economy, and they are both way off the mark.

They’d better bone up, because like it or not, we are in a transformational time. For god’s sake – we just acquired a 12 per cent ownership stake in General Motors and paid inconceivably big money for it. Why? Head-in-the-sand denial of new realities and lack of innovation did in the industry.

All the indicators are pointing in a new direction. But, no, Ignatieff and Harper are like a pair of old-school auto execs. If they don’t take off their blinders and hop on the innovation bandwagon, we’ll soon be even further up shit creek without a bailout.
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Put it in drive
The new GM may end up reinventing more than itself
05/13/09
BY ALICE KLEIN
What’s wrong with this picture? The GM deal has left a lot of us scratching our heads in wonder at the power of the auto industry to garner billions in government support while the rest of us are stuck mostly going it alone, mano-?a-?mano with the recession.

But is it possible that the GM bail-?out is a case of real-?life experience that has gone so far off the rails that it’s actually nudging us toward an entirely new paradigm?

Capitalism has most certainly driven itself way beyond its own comfort zone. There is no map yet for the road ahead.
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Cloudy forecast
Harper kicks up trade storm over U.S.'s ambitious low-carbon fuel rules
05/27/09
BY ALICE KLEIN
It’s been a bad political week for the tar sands. Publicly, the Tories are still clinging to the cupid face they pulled on when U.S. President Barack Obama touched down in Ottawa this winter, but they’ve just pulled out the big, fat arrows and are aiming low.

As U.S. climate initiatives rev into real action, it shamefully ain’t our love that we Canucks are sending stateside.

On Tuesday, May 19, Obama announced historic new rules for reducing auto emissions that will meet the stringent standard set by California’s low-carbon fuel regulations. The nationwide standard will take effect in 2012 and is expected to produce a 40 per cent cleaner and more fuel-efficient car and truck fleet in the U.S., averaging 35.5 miles per gallon by 2016.
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Job splash
Shrewd Canucks swim against work-loss current
05/20/09
BY ALICE KLEIN
Canadians are taking the recession into our own hands, and we have the employment numbers to prove it. Have we hit bottom? Not necessarily, but, hey, we the people aren’t using this time of economic stagnation to stand still and do nothing.

That’s the poetry of the new job numbers for April that came out last week.

The surprising tally shows that instead of declining, the number of jobs rose by 35,900 last month, despite constant news of layoffs both threatened and real.
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Meet the new boss
WITH ALL THE ODDS AGAINST THEM, CAN A UNION-OWNED GM AND CHRYSLER OVERCOME?
05/05/09
BY ALICE KLEIN
The high drama in the auto sector keeps speeding along on a mind-bending course.

Due to just-announced concessions from U.S. banks and bond-holders, it appears at press time that both Chrysler and GM will avert bankruptcy though radically reduced job and projected sales numbers, and U.S. auto workers will be their new controlling shareholders.

Chrysler could be 55 per cent worker-owned and GM 39 per cent. That’s a major milestone.

While the Canadian government watches closely and is careful not to rule out taking equity in GM itself, many voices are predicting only looming failure for companies moving so beyond the pale of private enterprise.

The restructured auto companies do have just about everything going against them, including the long-term drop in market demand, plus pending green regulations requiring retooling for fuel-efficient small cars (which already have the lowest profit margins). Oy. It’s a nightmare.
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How to arrive alive
HEY, KEN LEWENZA, THESE CHRYSLER TALKS WON’T BE PRETTY, BUT DO US ALL A FAVOUR – STRIKE A DEAL THAT TAKES YOU OUT OF YOUR RUT AND STEERS INTO THE FUTURE
04/28/09
BY ALICE KLEIN
It’s auto showdown time.

As the April 30 deadline nears, we’re entering the final week of negotiations between Chrysler and its union. GM is close behind with its June 1 drop-dead date. (Sorry the term is so applicable.)

As he sits at that negotiating table, CAW head Ken Lewenza faces a nightmare-scape filled with different ways to lose. What’s a union leader to do?

Unfair as it may be, it’s a dark road ahead, and sacrifices are going to be made. What are the offsetting gains that might come with them and sustain the best outcome for auto workers and Ontario taxpayers called upon to be generous in their support?

I’m hoping both union leaders and CAW members will be employing some new thinking as they truck on through the political and economic minefield ahead. If they are, they’ll be saints in a land of sinners, because the other sides are offering up the opposite of a new perspective.
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Let’s play G20 questions
LEADERS EDGE TOWARD GLOBAL GOVERNANCE AT UK HYPE-FEST, BUT CAN THEY DO THE SAME FOR CLIMATE CHANGE?
04/15/09
BY ALICE KLEIN
London, England – I am at the cavernous Excel Centre in the outskirts of Canary Wharf with a press corps of thousands (but only 28 from Canada) who, like me, have gone through an inscrutable two-bus switch and security process to get here April 2.

But for hours, a small spate of press conferences and a few carefully managed photo ops are really all there is to feed actual news appetites. So we’re all munching on free sandwiches and pounding out stories and broadcasts about... well, mainly we’re guessing what the story will be once the final G20 communiqué’s out.

By the end of the day, it’s such a hype-fest that Brit PM Gordon Brown’s enthusiastic rundown of final agreements – on everything from reforming the global banking sector, controlling shadow banking, hedge funds, credit rating agencies and CEO compensation to kick-starting fair and sustainable international trade – has the bullshit detectors beeping pretty loud.
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VoteforEnvironment.ca Final Report
Analysis of the 2008 Election
10/01/08

VoteForEnvironment.ca is a non-partisan effort dedicated to electing MPs who will support the environment. The 2008 federal election presented the possibility of electing of a majority government set on frustrating international cooperation to fight climate change. Specifically, the threat was that in 96 of Canada’s 308 ridings, two or more parties looked set to split the vote and potentially allow a Conservative to win.
>> Read the Report
CALL OF THE HUMMINGBIRD
DVD NOW AVAILABLE ONLINE!
In the gorgeous setting of central Brazil, a rag tag group of 1000 permaculture experts, Rastafarians, alternative health practitioners, 13 Moon Calendar activists and NGO executives work towards a do-it-yourself action plan to make the world a better place in 13 days. But who is going to deal with the garbage? Welcome to "Survivor" for social change addicts where consensus is the only way to make decisions. Anyone can speak. For as long as they like about whatever they want. And they do...
>> More