Pot Luck

10/10/10 (4.00 / 2)

Something to start thinking about: 350.org's global work party on 10/10/10.  I learned about this from a typically well-reasoned plea for action by Bill McKibben at Grist. Here's a summary from 350.org:

Circle 10/10/10 on your calendar. That's the date. The place is wherever you live. And the point is to do something that will help deal with global warming in your city or community. We're calling it a Global Work Party.

A Global Work Party, with emphasis on both 'work' and 'party'. In Auckland, New Zealand, they're having a giant bike fix-up day, to get every bicycle in the city back on the road. In the Maldives, they're putting up solar panels on the President's office. In Kampala, Uganda, they're going to plant thousands of trees, and in Bolivia they're installing solar stoves for a massive carbon neutral picnic.

Since we've already worked hard to call, email, petition, and protest to get politicians to move, and they haven't moved fast enough, now it's time to show that we really do have the tools we need to get serious about the climate crisis.

On 10/10/10 we'll show that we the people can do this-but we need bold energy policies from our political leaders to do it on a scale that truly matters. The goal of the day is not to solve the climate crisis one project at a time, but to send a pointed political message: if we can get to work, you can get to work too-on the legislation and the treaties that will make all our work easier in the long run.

There must be plenty of exciting projects that are food related. Turn a vacant lot into a community garden? Do some gleaning at a farm or in the city? Etc.

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by: mental_masala @ Sat Aug 21, 2010 at 02:05:19 AM UTC

Depave... (4.00 / 1)

Not on 10.10, but close enough, the Disjecta (8371 N. Interstate Avenue) Depaving project begins.  For that matter, next Saturday Depave Portland is expanding the (already 10,000 sq. ft.) Vermont Hills Community Garden over on the west side.  I'm gonna see if I can make it for that.

They did a great job last year just down the street from me at Kailash Ecovillage, as well as Fargo Garden across the street from my old job a couple years ago...

"The essence of the independent mind lies not in what it thinks, but in how it thinks." - Christopher Hitchens

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by: JayinPortland @ Sat Aug 21, 2010 at 02:25:36 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

The McColosseum? (4.00 / 1)

Cash-Strapped Italy to Sell Colosseum Ad Space for Restoration -

Italy is shopping for a corporate sponsor willing to shell out 25 million euros ($33 million) to refurbish the 2,000-year-old Colosseum, where gladiators once did battle.

Under terms of the contract made public on Aug. 4, the bidder will pay for 100 percent of the restoration in exchange for advertising rights and associated perks linked to Rome's biggest tourist attraction. The Colosseum draws more than 5 million visitors a year, producing 35 million euros in ticket sales that is used for the upkeep of monuments across the city.

"This establishes a clear precedent," Rome Mayor Gianni Alemanno said in an Aug. 2 interview in his office overlooking the ancient Roman Forum and Colosseum. "We hope this method can be used for other large restoration projects."

"The essence of the independent mind lies not in what it thinks, but in how it thinks." - Christopher Hitchens

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by: JayinPortland @ Sat Aug 21, 2010 at 02:31:52 AM UTC

Interesting discussion of the energy analysis (4.00 / 2)

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08...

There are a lot of reasons for eating local. But it's sad, embarrassing and counterproductive to gin up deceptive ones.

Insofar as one has climate change objectives in one's eating... it sounds as if one would be far, far more effective in taking strenuous efforts to conserve and reduce home energy use.

http://budiansky.blogspot.com/...

I'll have to agree with his closing comment. Pragmatic environmentalism. Dogma (of any stripe) sucks.

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by: ogre @ Sat Aug 21, 2010 at 17:33:34 PM UTC

As does... (4.00 / 1)

Dogma (of any stripe) sucks.

As does willful ignorance.

(not you, him)

Interesting that in his blog post he seems to be backing off of some things he wrote in the NY Times piece.  Now he's moving the goalposts, and claiming he was only talking about "food gurus", when he clearly cast his net much wider in the NY Times piece -

But the local food movement now threatens to devolve into another one of those self-indulgent - and self-defeating - do-gooder dogmas. Arbitrary rules, without any real scientific basis, are repeated as gospel by "locavores," celebrity chefs and mainstream environmental organizations.

And what's with the "scare quotes"?

The most interesting thing, to me, is how he leaves out every other single part of the equation, while schoolmarmishly wagging his finger down at us from the privileged saddle of his very own high horse.

But then again, I guess things like community, food security and healthy local economies (amongst many other benefits) aren't really of any concern to folks like him.

"The essence of the independent mind lies not in what it thinks, but in how it thinks." - Christopher Hitchens

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by: JayinPortland @ Sat Aug 21, 2010 at 18:03:13 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

All important. (4.00 / 1)

Local economies are the biggest reasons (IMO) to eat locally, and (for that matter) to not shop at Wal-Mart.

"Locavores" may be his scare quotes--or some NYT editor's prissy quotes around a word that's new enough to not be dusty in the OED.

I've been sorely troubled myself about the waving of hard data as reason to eat local, be vegan, etc. Too often I find the assumptions to be driven by bias. Being able to say "look, this helps with this, this and this, and if it's done that way, with that, as well, and..." is good.

I'm over in the camp that's doing stuff about a range of important things from health care to SSM... and underneath all that, my biggest single concern is climate change (and the correlated mass extinctions, etc.). Driving efforts into eating locally and telling people that they're helping save the world from that truly catastrophic threat is an obscene deception IF it's not making a significant difference. If their time and dollars are committing to that change, and it's not really going to matter, that's... evil. Far better to get people to eat local for all the right and honest reasons--and to save and spend to cut back on wasted energy at home, etc.

Not that the small savings in transportation isn't worth capturing too, because the level of change we need is so big that just doing the big things won't be enough. BUT it's critical that we identify and tackle the big things and know what they are. Or we're screwed.

He's not anti-locavore. And any movement that doesn't embrace its internal critics is making a grave mistake.

Here's one problem I'll just point out; in embracing the deceptive rhetoric that food transportation is the Great Satan, people set up those who are investigating to catch the lie and reject the entire movement because of it.

The very same deceptive over-simplified and over-stated crap's gone on around eating meat, and the result is that some of us simply tune out the claims on other things; their purveyors have already been outed as liars or ignorant fans.

Honesty goes a long way.

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by: ogre @ Sat Aug 21, 2010 at 18:23:47 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

From what I hear... (4.00 / 1)

...he's fudged numbers himself.  This next week will surely see more back and forth.

And as for the rest, well isn't he being as intellectually dishonest as those he attacks when he completely ignores every other single point made by them?  Which again, it looks like even he admits now in backing off some of his original article.

And as for embracing internal critics, there comes a point when one crosses the line from simply playing Devil's Advocate to lending a veneer of credibility to those who aren't interested in an honest debate.  

As for the scare quotes, considering that three years ago locavore was Oxford American Dictionary's Word of the Year... I'm pretty sure it's a currently acceptable phrase in the NY Times' style guide.

And who's talking about veganism here?  And I sure hope you don't mean to insinuate that the rest of us aren't -

I'm over in the camp that's doing stuff about a range of important things from health care to SSM... and underneath all that, my biggest single concern is climate change (and the correlated mass extinctions, etc.).

As far as -

Here's one problem I'll just point out; in embracing the deceptive rhetoric that food transportation is the Great Satan, people set up those who are investigating to catch the lie and reject the entire movement because of it.

Again, it isn't hard to build a strawman and attack it at its weak spots.  But where is his proof that "the entire movement" is a bunch of liars and hacks?  Oh that's right, he doesn't have any and there isn't any.  For that matter, I highly doubt there's even one real person who makes the arguments he 'counters' in his op-ed piece.  All I see there is things like, "some sustainability advocates say", and "local foods advocates say this"...

That's a pretty old trick. ;)

"The essence of the independent mind lies not in what it thinks, but in how it thinks." - Christopher Hitchens

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by: JayinPortland @ Sat Aug 21, 2010 at 18:46:50 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

back and forth (4.00 / 1)

Sigh. You're probably correct. I wish people wouldn't take something seriously just because NYT published it.

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by: count @ Sat Aug 21, 2010 at 20:48:06 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Judith Miller. (4.00 / 1)

The New York Times has a spotless, incredibly impeccable history!

Oh, wait...

"The essence of the independent mind lies not in what it thinks, but in how it thinks." - Christopher Hitchens

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by: JayinPortland @ Sat Aug 21, 2010 at 21:11:10 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

yes but (4.00 / 1)

I'm trying to decide if I should retract my comment. I do think NYT is a disreputable rag, but gosh, Jill might write for the paper one day.

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by: count @ Sat Aug 21, 2010 at 21:31:34 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Case by case basis... (4.00 / 1)

Jill's writings are Jill's writings, and she would bring her own credibility.

;)

"The essence of the independent mind lies not in what it thinks, but in how it thinks." - Christopher Hitchens

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by: JayinPortland @ Sat Aug 21, 2010 at 21:41:02 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

And to be honest... (4.00 / 1)

Frankly, I just think this guy started an unnecessary crapstorm simply in the interest of self-promotion.

He's not even saying or doing anything new.  Paul Roberts, another curmudgeonly skeptical self-proclaimed locavore, built a part of his recent book, The End of Food, around this argument a couple of years ago.  So Dubiansky is even a few years late on being 'edgy', too. ;)

"The essence of the independent mind lies not in what it thinks, but in how it thinks." - Christopher Hitchens

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by: JayinPortland @ Sat Aug 21, 2010 at 19:11:19 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Who's Budiansky (4.00 / 1)

and why should a body pay any attention to him on this issue? I've never heard of him, never read anything by him.

What he says is what matters, of course, not who he is, but so far in his life he seems to have written only one thing on food policy, agricultural policy, economic development, ag sustainability, energy use, or anything else in this group of issues. He wrote a letter to the editor, of all things, in 2002. The LTE, with footnotes, was to Nature. (Was he Washington editor in 2002? I don't know.)

How affluence could be good for the environment

Use of chemical fertilizer and of hybrid and other high-yielding varieties of grains could let developing countries match Western diets with little or no increase in land use.

Seems like a waste of a degree in applied mathematics.

His website directs readers to that pdf with a link titled

Affluence is Good for the Environment (Okay, Up to a Point)

Stephen Budiansky

Funny haha, he's been around for quite a while and has written several books and articles, but never had even a wiki stub until two days before the NYT published his opinion.

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by: count @ Sat Aug 21, 2010 at 20:45:32 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Portland Polish Festival 2010... (4.00 / 1)

Wow, this thing is authentic!

In ways good and bad.

I'm trying to work out my volunteer shift for next month right now, and to be honest I can't even begin to understand what the hell these people are asking of / want of me?!

I've received two completely incomprehensible emails today.  And my grandfather was born in Poland, so it's not like I'm not familiar with Native-Polish-Speaker-English.

The problem is, I think these people are maybe speaking through a Google Poland-to-Mars-to-Ukraine-to-Germany-to-Uzbekistan-to-Argentina-to-USA translation program?

Oh well, if it doesn't happen it doesn't happen.  Which would be a terrible thing, in that apparently Portland's (tiny) Polish community isn't interested in welcoming 2nd-Generation Polish Americans like myself into their inner circle?  Maybe there's a reason the community's so small to begin with, eh?

"The essence of the independent mind lies not in what it thinks, but in how it thinks." - Christopher Hitchens

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by: JayinPortland @ Sat Aug 21, 2010 at 21:57:21 PM UTC

Clarification... (4.00 / 1)

Should also note that the second email was from an event organizer who asked me to go back to the original website form and fill in some more (personal) information before I'd be accepted.

You know what?  I'm gonna say no.

I mean, really... the organizers have enough info to personally contact me, but not enough to 'accept' my offer to volunteer for their festival?

Yeah okay, gfyourselves...

Maybe I should start my own ethnic festival here?

;)

"The essence of the independent mind lies not in what it thinks, but in how it thinks." - Christopher Hitchens

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by: JayinPortland @ Sat Aug 21, 2010 at 22:46:20 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Camel milk (4.00 / 2)

Dubai camel dairy hopes to milk health food market

BRIAN MURPHY, Associated Press Writer - Sat Aug 21

Hinkle estimates there are more than a dozen small camel dairies across the United States, with interest even being shown by traditional Amish farmers. She knows well that camel milk is truly the fringe of the fringe for American consumers. But so was sushi and kiwi fruit at one time.

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by: count @ Sun Aug 22, 2010 at 04:10:11 AM UTC

oh. wow. (4.00 / 2)

not sure I'm ready to drink camel milk. Strangely enough, I saw a 2-hump camel in the middle of VERMONT last year!

"I can understand someone from Iowa promoting corn and soy, but we are not feeding the world, we are feeding animals and soft drink companies." - Jim Goodman

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by: Jill Richardson @ Sun Aug 22, 2010 at 06:21:20 AM UTC

[ Parent ]