Earth Day 2009

(I sent the following to the National Committee, Green Party US this morning.)

It is one month and one day until Earth Day 2009.

This is a day that wants to be branded with the name Green. The Earth Day Network site says that this year they will start the Green Generation Campaign. The list of Earth Day Events starts with one on April 19th... Earth Day at the National Mall, but events will be held all over the country.

I can easily remember the first Earth Day. I thought it was a great event. At that time, 1970, it was very much at the center of the national consciousness. There were two highly respected members of Congress heading the committee: A Democratic Senator (Gaylord Nelson - WI) and a Republican Representative (Pete McCloskey - CA).

Today is very different. A recent (March 5-8, 2009) Gallup Poll says that American concern for economic growth is higher than their concern for the environment. This, at a time when economic growth deals with the quality of life and the environmental issue is whether we will be able to sustain life as we know it at all.

April 12 - 18 has been named National Environmental Education Week. It is an effort to raise the level of awareness for children in K-12 schools.

So, what do your State and Local Green organizations plan to do for these events?

Last week was the International Scientific Congress on Climate Change: Global Risks, Challenges & Decisions in Copenhagen, DK. Attended by over 2000 scientists, the Conference published some key findings, beginning with the fact that what was recently considered to be worst case scenarios for climate change must now be considered most probable outcome. Coupled with the current economic crisis, we will see social disruption on a massive scale. Consider that the homes of over 20% of Vietnamese will be flooded.

Do we just let this happen or do we try to turn the spotlight on the Know Nothing Republicans and the Do Nothing Democrats? This is a time of moral crisis and future generation, if there are any, will judge us by what we did or didn't do.