http://www.californiaprogressreport.com/2008/07/some_califor...

Excerpted from the article...

"It sounds like one of those stories that conservatives often use to
make government look bad - the city of Sacramento is fining a household
$746 for letting their lawn die to save water. But the real issue here
isn't government - it's whether California will abandon wasteful and
even elitist 20th century values to meet the needs of the 21st century.

This basic tension according to the Sacramento Bee:

As I mentioned in parts one and two of this series, there’s power in funding your own movement and in having a broad base of support. When we support our own projects, we get to decide what we work on and our continued existence becomes less dependent on any single source.

As part of walking the walk here, we’re now accepting blogads in the sidebar of the YP4 Blog. We’re screening them for congruence with our values. Nonprofits, progressive blogs and socially responsible businesses? Absolutely. Soulless corporations? Not so much.

We intend blog advertising to become another intentional way to build our network and strengthen our partnerships.

As I mentioned in part 1, providing financial support for our own movements is key to their sustainability. In the words of Andrea del Moral, it can “keep us true to our visions, flexible in our goals, and relevant to the people who yearn and strive for justice.”

Sounds good, right? So how do we do it? Read on, friends, read on.

I recently read The Revolution Will Not Be Funded, published in 2007 by INCITE! Women of Color Against Violence. One of the book’s arguments is that the ubiquity of the 501(c)(3) nonprofit model limits the political left’s imagination and “threatens to permanently eclipse autonomous grassroots-movement building in the arena of social justice.”

Holy Igloo, Batman! The New York Times reports that after an avalanche destroyed the energy transmitters that provide Juneau, Alaska with 80% of its power, the town is suddenly the bastion of green:

Time has a neat little article about growing diversity in the the sustainable movement. It's not particuarly in depth, but favorites Majora Carter and Van Jones are mentioned.

Check it out: 

http://www.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1725017,00.ht...

Yesterday we attended probably the most exciting panel of the week, Green Collar Jobs: The New Green Deal. Everyone was psyched for this one and the speakers didn't disapoint.

Phil Angelides, chairman of the Apollo Alliance, spoke broadly about a now green century. He pointed out how the Green movement is now in the mainstream, politically, scientifically, culturally, so that sustaintable principles are popping up in the wierdest places. He joked, "Here's a big one for you, Rupert Murodch just announced that Fox News are going carbon neutral. That means that Sean Hannity and Bill O'Reilly are done."

Al Gore, eat your heart out. A sustainability expert named Annie Leonard has created an awesome short animated film to explain — in just 20 minutes — the basics of sustainability. "Sustainability" is such a weird, wonky word, but this film really lays it all out in a down-to-earth and compelling way.

We've heard it all before.

It's the story of a big company that desperately wants you to know about something good it's doing -- and how you, too, can get in on a little of that karmic ju-ju through purchasing their product and, in this case, "use your period for good" (funny, I prefer to use my period for evil...).

In some places people are trying to get rid of plastic bags in Ireland there is a 22-cent tax on them, in Bangladesh they have been banned since 2002. Across the United States, cities are trying to encourage consumers to use canvas bags. This afternoon, I was reading an article about the Bay Area's ban on plastic bags. It reminded me of that scene in "American Beauty" when the kid videotapes the plastic bag blowing around in the wind and calls it the most beautiful thing he has ever seen. Wikipedia notes that Alan Ball, who wrote "American Beauty," came up with the idea for the film when he saw a plastic bag floating around in New York City.

The image certainly fits in with the film's existential themes. It is emblematic of our wasteful, single-use society. How can we change our world so that preservation and sustainability become symbols of who we are as a nation?