The screenprinting was for a big project for all of Jodi’s co-workers at the library.  Library Olympics… so we spent a few days printing 22 shirts (somewhere around that).  Starting to get the technique down a little better.  Came out good for five layers of color.

And last are Belle with her new friend Aussie, and the fat cat in the background of one.  And Jodi playing with the puppies.  How cute.

Oh yeh, I also, yet again, am trying to perfect ginger ale.  We’ll see how it turns out.

My Valentines present was a mushroom kit (I know, coolest gift ever).  So now I’m growing shitake mushrooms in my room.  Only been a couple days since I started it and mushrooms are already popping up.  Mmmmm.

Oh yeh, theres a picture of the stupid cat business partner that wouldn’t take a picture for promotion of the company.  Selfish jerk. I swear, all he thinks about is himself and squandering money on drugs and whores.  Put his face everywhere, and all we get is his drooly butt all over our clothes.

And of course, the most beautiful lady being all nice and smiley for the picture.

Bye now!

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/11/world/middleeast/11mideast.html?partner=permalink&exprod=permalink

http://www.zmag.org/znet/viewArticle/20203

http://www.zmag.org/znet/viewArticle/20204

Priorities should be set at keeping jobs for people and making sure everyone has food, health, and shelter.  Not until this becomes the focus will any proposition fix the problem.

The first is Chris Jordan talking about his art.  I already posted something on Chris Jordan but I just found it interesting to hear him talk about his work.

The next one is a kind of creepy video.  It’s not fantastic, but I think it is important to show consumerism’s effect on people as a drug.  It is an addiction that destroys oneself and has taken away our focus from the things that we need and find important in life.  I do think we need to value simplicity.  Sure, it is difficult to sometimes see the connections between consuming and the effects of “globalization” institutions and policies, but it is all linked.  I think we need to start focusing on food, and other necessities and work from there.  If we structure our lives and society around that, perhaps our views on goods and trade would change.

This last one I found really interesting.  As our resources for information increases we still are not all that informed.  We are being fed “information” particularly from corporations and resources with agendas for profit.  There is one part that talks about children getting more information from entities whose goal is to sell them something more than from schools or houses of worship.  We are in a downward spiral that focuses on the self while defeating self-esteem.  Corporations have redefined beauty to be corporate.

I found a couple good articles.  One was on adbusters about the credit crisis.  We need to be focusing on “real wealth,” or wealth in education, health, food, shelter, etc. not investing in bad debt. These investments are not real.  I think we do need to start redefining wealth, and not until we figure that out will we be able to deal with the “triple crisis.”

Another article I found was on zmag by Vandana Shiva.  I really like her critiques on biofuel.  I think we need to start realizing that biofuel is not as economical or environmentally-friendly as we’d like to believe.  We are deforesting land to grow crops to feed the same unhealthy addiction to cars.  The crises of food, climate, and finances are all very closely linked and hopefully this is better understand with the current financial crisis.

I believe that our agriculture deserves more attention than it is receiving.  The way we shape our agricultural sector is a matter of national security, as Pollan writes.  In fact, many of our global economic, social, and political problems all relate to the food industry.  Supporting local organic farming is not only preferable, it is essential if we want to end the global food crisis, end our dependence on oil, protect the environment, protect workers worldwide, create jobs, help our healthcare systems, and create a more equal and just world.  Yeh, it’s quite a mouthful for just one sector of our societies, but food is a necessity.  We depend on nothing more than food.  So why has it become a mere commodity, a resource, that is grown in non-biodiversified, land-intensive agriculture only to let many of these grains and foods go to waste?

This obviously is linked to a history of colonialism and the conquering of people’s lands and resources to modern economic practices and institutions.  The US agriculture system has been built off of the chemical agents of WWII as Pollan points out, and with the addition of deregulation, subsidies, and the green “revolution” large export, monoculture agriculture has been pushed beyond its threshhold.

This is the time to deal with these problems.  I love Pollan’s idea of the president setting the example for the American public: having dinner as a family cooked from only local in season foods, gardening and growing food on the White House lawn, posting recipes on the White House website.  It does involve changing our lifestyles and the ways we view food and view ourselves.  But this is the reality that we must face.  Our conusmer, production-driven society is unsustainable, not only environmentally, but socially and economically.  We need Change!  I have hope that Obama will be more open to truly dealing with these issues.

(Secretary of Agriculture: Michael Pollan!)

I found these sweet charts searching for images on the internet.  Professor Phil Howard at Michigan State University has made the links between big multi-national corporate giants to organic brands.  Some of these links I knew about, but some companies that I thought were small and privately owned are actually supporting corporations like Hershey (sorry Dagoba).  Although the green movement is growing for organic food, it isn’t always the vision of the small farm of a local family that is growing that organic produce or products that you consume in the store.

The real focus must be on supporting local food.  This is the greatest way we can make our voice heard in making food just.  By supporting local small farms, the idea of industrial food production is challenged.  Eating in season, going to the farmer’s market, making foods from scratch, taking the time to can and process fruits and vegetables when they are in season, etc are all things that not only will help the local community, but people around the globe.  This ends our dependence on foods from other countries where we are, under trade agreements (WTO, NAFTA) and loans (World Bank, Structural Adjustment Programs), making people grow monocultures for export.  This is not a sustainable system.  As Vandana Shiva said, this is “forced trade” not “free trade.”  This export system is depleting local resources for one crop that cannot sustain a healthy diet.  This is a monoculture of both the mind and in actuality as Dr. Shiva so well states.

By supporting organic, you are also standing against GMOs.  Corporations like Cargill and Monsanto have, under the Trade Related Intellectual Property Rights Agreement of the World Trade Organization, patented life by genetically modifying seeds.  This is biopiracy, forcing farmers to buy and pay fines to these corporations for altering a crop that has had both historical and spiritual importance to people of a region.

We would be better off creating trade policies that help small farmers gain land rights to have the ability to grow their own food for their own community.  And for those commodities that we do trade at further distances must be fair trade.  This would end the food wasted with the current system that is in a downward spiral to destroy the land and earth, and the people on it.

I find that art can play in important part in bridging people for causes and thoughts.  Two of my favorite artists are Banksy and Mantis.  Their art is all over the globe in the midst of a consumer culture, often where people are seperated from the things around them.  In the midst of advertisements, poverty, and self absorption, this art stands out and stands for something.

Mantis’ picture of a starving African boy with an ipod and the words “ineed” is powerful and draws in the viewer.  Sure, this does not necessarily say what the causes of hunger and the gap between the rich and the poor are, but it brings awareness.  Banksy and his art of the children raising the tesco flag with their hands over their hearts questions the democracy of countries and whether or not we represent the people or corporations.

This art allows for thinking beyond the usual jumble of advertisements, cars, and buildings.  It questions the things we have come to accept as normal (i.e. poverty, pollution, corruption).  It is a creative form of protest.  When a corporation pays for wall space to advertise, it is not considered graffitti, but if someone paints an image, it become unacceptable.  Public spaces have become controlled by corporations and governments, and these artist are reclaiming it.

This is a prime example of how multi-national corporations play a major role in supporting corrupt governments and military to push forward free market ideologies that benefit a few while increasing poverty amongst the many.  Trade unionists have been warning against this increase in foreign investment because, as Hallinan says, “it has led to the privatization of government-owned services, such as hospitals and water systems.”  This is the typical story, especially as third world nations take loans and “aid” from the IMF and World Bank, having to agree to privatize all social sectors, rid of all subsidies, and abandon tarriffs.  This money is apparently benefiting Uribe’s corrupt government where multi-national corporations like Nestle, Chiquita, and Coca-Cola are targeting unionists.

It is also interesting that the US is moving a military base to Palanquero, Colombia, an obvious defeat to the human interests of the people of Colombia.  It is more important to keep our alliances under free-trade agreements (particularly the Central American Free Trade Agreement) that give us military access rather than standing up to a corrupt government that the US (particularly the rich and corporations) benefits politically and economically from.