Wednesday, April 21, 2010

The Irony of Earth Day, 2010

Today, Earth Day, 2010, the House of Representatives honored the 40th anniversary of it’s founder, Wisconsin representative Gaylord Nelson.

While a handful of dinosaurs - excuse me, representatives - rose in turn in Washington’s almost empty people’s chamber to pay homage to an early whistle blower, fifteen thousand people from over fifty countries gathered in the Andean city of Cochabama to determine actions in favor of Mother Earth.

The People’s Conference on Climate Change and the Rights of Mother Earth was called by Bolivian president Evo Morales following the stunning rejection of these rights by the world’s richest nations at the U.N. Conference on Climate Change in Copenhagen last December.

President Obama, who led the charge at Copenhagen for modest goals and modest aide to those most at risk in the developing world, punished Bolivia’s audacity to hope for survival by cutting off the 3.5 billion aide it had been slated to receive to adapt to climate change.

While the Andean conferees discussed ways to maintain “right living” or “buen vivir” in the twenty-first century, calling on that ancient Indian tradition, air traffic to and from Europe resumed after five days of grounded planes and shuttered airports, as a result of the ash spewed over Europe from a volcano in Iceland.

As airlines scramble to find ways to beat Mother Earth the next time she pulls a stunt like this, a heretic thought forms in the mind of this committed internationalist: are the peoples of the world learning to do without the U.N. that many had hoped would evolve into an effective world government?

2 comments:

  1. I did not know about this, Deena. Actually, I am going to have to read this again tomorrow for it to sink in. I still can't get over the oil rig blowing up in the Gulf of Mexico on Earth Day.

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  2. Hi Lydia,

    See my today's post. I can't believe it's been 10 days since the last one. I'm getting
    ready to go to the Turin Book Fair where the Italian version of my book on Cuba is
    being presented. But that's no excuse!

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