“If only the war on poverty was a real war, then we would actually be putting money into it.”
(via egyptianmuslima4life)
Source: weheartit.com
![sustainablesex:
(via Guerrilla Grafters Bring Forbidden Fruit Back To City Trees : The Salt : NPR)
“We don’t have a supermarket and we have very few produce stores [here],” she says. “What better to alleviate scarcity of healthy produce in an impoverished area than to grow them yourself and to have it available for free.”](http://24.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m24vyr87W81rpm4r7o1_1280.jpg)
(via Guerrilla Grafters Bring Forbidden Fruit Back To City Trees : The Salt : NPR)
“We don’t have a supermarket and we have very few produce stores [here],” she says. “What better to alleviate scarcity of healthy produce in an impoverished area than to grow them yourself and to have it available for free.”
Source: NPR
Alternative building material - hemp, hempcrete, hemp plaster, hemp insulation. Check out Steve Allin’s hemp building website, as well as the international hemp building assoc.
Source: aiisagulko
Financials Lead US Stock Losses
By MATT JARZEMSKY
NEW YORK—U.S. stocks traded lower as a Friday report that employers added fewer jobs than expected last month cast doubt on the pace of the labor market’s recovery.
All 10 S&P 500 sectors retreated Monday, with financials tumbling the most. Bank of America BAC -3.09% and J.P. Morgan JPM -1.33% were among the biggest decliners among Dow components.
Nonfarm payrolls grew by 120,000 in March, the Labor Department reported. The result snapped a three-month streak of 200,000-plus job growth. Economists surveyed by Dow Jones Newswires had expected, on average, an increase of 203,000.
Looking ahead, Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke is slated to speak at a conference in Georgia after the market closes. Investors are watching for signals about the prospects for more monetary stimulus efforts. Tuesday, Alcoa AA -0.36% is due to report first-quarter earnings. The aluminum maker’s report signals the unofficial start of the corporate earnings season.
Crude-oil futures slid 2.3% to $100.99 a barrel, while gold futures rose 0.7% to $1641.80 an ounce. The U.S. dollar lost ground against the yen but edged higher against the euro.
In corporate news, shares of AOL AOL +45.40% soared after the company said it agreed to sell more than 800 patents and related patent applications to Microsoft,MSFT -0.60% and grant Microsoft a license to its retained patents in exchange for $1.06 billion in cash. Microsoft shares slipped.
Source: The Wall Street Journal
It’s a bit sad when I consider that one of the kindest things humanity could do for the earth and all the things existing on earth, would be to develop virtual reality to the point that humans no long need to act upon and harm the earth to achieve all of the freedoms, experiences and luxuries we so desperately seek. I picture the Matrix, but instead of the outerworld being dreadfully decayed and infested with mechanical design, it is green and flourishing with life.
Question is, how many resources would be required to devise of , build and power such a matrix? Think it could be possible and sustainable?
(via sushisaid)
Source: pleatedjeans
If we have a few rich and powerful men on the pinnacle of fortune and grandeur, while the crowd grovels in want and obscurity, it is because the former prize what they enjoy only in so far as others are destitute of it; and because without changing their condition, they would cease to be happy the moment the people ceased to be wretched.
Source: anthony-john534
The 10-metre wide, helium-filled inflatable turbine, called the Airborne Wind Turbine (AWT), is able to produce more than twice the power that a conventional tower turbine can generate at the same height. Prototype by Altaeros Energies, a wind energy company formed out of MIT
This is a huge breakthrough for 2 reasons:
- The higher the altitude, the stronger the winds! As you get farther from the land the wind finds less resistance and goes at higher speeds which only means more power.
- This allows unprecedented mobility and flexibility to wind farms. You could practically chase the wind. Moreover, it would let you prevent major damage to your wind farm in case of hurricanes or severe storms. You would just have to ground your turbine-blimps and the next day you would be operating like nothing happened.
Pros and cons? What are people’s thoughts?
Source: wired.co.uk
Just think, if you work hard, take on massive student loan debts, and crawl on the backs of countless others, you too can live in luxury (maybe, probably not, and if not, clearly you are a failure at life). /sarcasm
Source: thedigitalcitizen
Class War in Congress
Source: cheappoet
Passing tests doesn’t begin to compare with searching and inquiring and pursuing topics that engage us and excite us. That’s far more significant than passing tests and, in fact, if that’s the kind of educational career you’re given the opportunity to pursue, you will remember what you discovered.
RE: I give up
Not a sentiment I am proud of, but one that is my reality. I’ve been struggling for some time with the idea of seeking change in a world where I often feel so powerless and helpless. I’m surrounded by maddening and disheartening injustice that I am helpless to change. I am…
“And I can tell you this much - that isn’t a problem of Occupy. That is a problem of humanity.”
I actually stopped reading there.
OWS failed and has been failing SINCE DAY 1 not because humanity is imperfect but because the movement claimed to be something it NEVER was. It claimed to be David taking on Goliath, it claimed to fight injustice and stand for the oppressed, which it never did. Despite claims that the movement is headless, it was and still is unofficially led by cis white middle-class men, these are the people who started the first protests. All the attempts to GENUINELY take into consideration the plight of PoC, women, and queers were either ignored or abruptly shut down. We told you time and time again, yet you refuse to listen, you were only interested in unity in YOUR terms. Without unity, OWS is doomed to failure
Let me rephrase. That isn’t a problem specific to Occupy. I would ask you what the social movement groups you do support have done for the oppressed in China, India, tribes in Central and South America? I ask that not to question your integrity or willingness to help those who are oppressed, but to illustrate that there will always be a group that goes ignored (which is NOT to say that is okay). The reason for this goes beyond Occupy. I feel this is a problem with humanity. It is our myopic, self-serving nature as a species. We serve and stand by the issues we identify with.
Would you really have wanted Occupy to speak for PoC? For the most part I have found that it has been an unwelcome intrusion. Black people specifically make up a small % of the US American 99%, so by definition, if Occupy was to represent the 99%, black people would be out numbered and buried in the voices. Hence the problem of living as a minority here in the states and in many countries. Those in the minority feel they continually go unheard, largely due to prejudice and also largely due to statistical reality of being a minority (fewer voices are harder to hear). So how do you get heard? By asking other PoC and whites to stand beside you. On issues specific to black people, white people should take a back seat. Those in the majority have no right to champion the causes of those in the minority. Granted, many who do are not doing so to control poC or overpower PoC - their motives are often well-meaning, but unwelcomed or misplaced.
But what of economic inequality and other issues that affect and oppress all colors of people (which is what Occupy was all about)? What would you have Occupy do? What is the proper way for white activists to approach social and economic issues that affect them as well as PoC? This is a genuine question and I am genuinely listening.
”We told you time and time again, yet you refuse to listen, you were only interested in unity in YOUR terms.”
Because I write under the name Occupy, you presume I am all of those things. In fact, I am a mixed-race, queer, disabled, lower class female.
Occupy was an idea. An idea “co-opted” by people who make a life out of activism. Many of whom being more concerned with arguing over proper terminologies and going by the book of Marxist ideology than about truly understanding what it means to be oppressed and helping those who are. The real 99% are your average citizens (yes some of them white who are poor, dumb, scared and/or oppressed), all people who feel trapped and scared and tired. The thousands of people who went to the street in NYC and Oakland, those are your Occupiers, that is what this was really about, who it was about. It was Occupy the Hood, it was Occupy Homes, it was Occupy Banks, it is not and will never be (unless we redefine it to be) just a bunch of cis white male pretentious elitist racists arguing over proper use of the term “liberal”. I am not Occupy, no one person or one group is Occupy. Therefore the actions of some are not the actions of all. I have never once disregarded the opinions of PoC or other minorities, nor do I accept anyone who does and claims to speak for Occupy.
I’m not defending Occupy. “Occupy” doesn’t matter. Call it whatever you want, I don’t care about brand name and frankly no one should. Prior to Occupy, I have never affiliated myself with any group or movement. For me, Occupy served as an umbrella that heretofore happened to encompass many social issues I supported and changes I wished to see happen. I still support those issues and those are still the changes I wish to see happen. Nothing has changed. All that has changed is the perception of what Occupy stands for or failed to accomplish or failed to represent.
Do we take Occupy back and define it by our terms, by the terms we all believed Occupy to originally stand for or do we toss it aside and go back to square one? What is the most productive way forward?
Source: enlighteningnews
does America still have a ‘working class’ ? If so it’s become strangely invisible because all the media and politicians ever talk about is the ‘middle class’. To listen to them you’d think everyone but the super-rich 1% is ‘middle-class’. Weird ..
Half of what used to be considered middle class is under that same shitty umbrella, I’m afraid to say. Having multiple degrees and working 9-5 in an office doesn’t guarantee health coverage. Most politicians, who are themselves rich, are severely clueless as to the kind of lives their constituents live.
(via rawrevolutionepidemic)
Source: cartoonpolitics
