all a president has to do is make his people think he's in charge

-while the earth is wrecked by wealthy despots. isn't that what you expected?  c'mon, remember when everyone gave you that peace prize? that was nice, right? see? you'll always have that memory.

Some of the People Are Getting Wise

new rpj site corrects cultural blindness

make your day a brighter one by being there yourself.
new things to see and experience at redplumjam-

developing a personal relationship with the natural world

is it within our capacity or range of desires to truly live lightly on the land?

whether or not our planet's current population of humans could get it together enough to operate with compassionate, humanitarian, peaceful, helpful, sharing & generous actions & intentions towards each other- or to put our technologies to work creating more efficient lives with regard to environment, ecology, energy types/sources/uses, water, local food production, transportation, facilities & their uses, waste generation- without having to cow-tow to the monied old paradigm models-

-such improbable primate altruism-

-however, it's still within our capacity to contemplate, and try to operate with these goals in mind. for instance: zen buddhism- and the necessity of instant awakening and opening to reality- at least among certain populations- was born out of the massacres & rapes of ghengis khan & mongolian invasions.

despite a crumpling economy, climate change, peak oil, water hoarding, corporate plutocracy, misinformation, propaganda, & conspiracies global & tiny- we can operate from a place that accepts these impossible parameters because we are not clinging to what is foisted upon the world.

we are deciding for ourselves what is important, making it our own- even making it ourselves- and that is what we create our world with- in the midst of chaos even. this is also the wisdom we bring to the rest of the world.

-i mean of course, if you wanted to take charge of your life like that- this is what we would bring to the world.

it's up to you.

here's a good article about a prize winning urban planning idea in sweden:

A Rolling Masterplan

why not make an amazing 2011? start with your heart, your family & then your community. lead by example, don't follow the example of our leaders. peace to you & your peeps this coming year.

numbers are ruining everything

military suicides outpaced iraq battlefield deaths 2 to 1 in 2009.

it's like a kurt vonnegut novel.

American Military Death Rates

10/10/10 is -global work party day-

350.org Global Work Party

thousands of events will occur in almost 200 countries worldwide.
these people want to raise consciousness of our accelerating climate crisis.
they are pointing towards solutions and leading by example to get there.

today, real work is being done by regular people
-on a scale they can afford
-using technologies they understand or want to learn about.

Tricycle Gardens Urban Farm Work Party

here in Richmond VA, Tricycle Gardens will host a hoop house work party at their own urban farm- at the corner of 9th & Bainbridge just south of the Manchester Bridge.

there's work you can do elsewhere too of course. take a picture of your efforts & upload them to 350.org- it's definitely more fun than pessimism and you get to use your body. awesome.

oh yeah, it's totally an economic recovery..

..if your in banking, med-pharma, or defence/intelligence services- plus there's always the wealthy to cater to. the top 1% is worth more than the bottom 90% combined- and control 84% of the wealth here in the U.S.

that relationship hasn't been so out of whack since the 20's.

austerity protests in brussels.

mortgages upside down & failing in the U.S.

china just passes the U.S. as the world's biggest polluter

[since they make everything we use].

here's a similarly stilted report by Linh Dinh that would seem maybe a little over the top if he didn't back up his stories with up close & right there photography- very heavy duty:

Welcome to the Recovery

enjoy exploring your neighborhood.

practice expanding empathy as planetary survival skill

philosophically of course this only applies to survival of a human-friendly biosphere on this planet. all kinds of life will flourish on earth [as it is called now] long after humans may have made it untenable for themselves- so the survival i'm talking about concerns all of the life forms we currently recognize & haven't yet discovered- at this point in time here on this remote blue dot.

that's us in the big sense of the word. is there a chance that we [the collective global] will be able to recognize our extended family, take it to heart, and work for all of our best interests?

how do you relate to this to this premise? are you hopeful, skeptical, cynical? will bigger walls & indomitable war machines be the answer instead? are you somewhere inbetween?

is there a way forward for the united states as it consumes proportionally 5x the energy that the rest of the world uses- with dwindling resources like energy & food & water- with huge pollution issues growing larger still- with wealth disparity increasing, middle class evaporating, human rights slipping?

is there a way forward we're not really thinking about yet? in my opinion, the U.S.- with the best & the brightest & the plenty for the short term at least, does not lead from the heart nearly enough to call itself leader of the free world:

The Empathetic Civilization by Jeremy Rifkin

sure, i know, i've been called a crackpot before- but what would your utopia resemble? what kind of personal transformation would be required for you to really love your neighbor however distant?

Very Cool Homes for Bats, Birds & Insects

Another Super-Cool Small Animal Habitat

how do we divest ourselves of corporate self-interest enough to see what's really important here? to see who we really are and what we could be doing?

new furniture commissions for redplumjam

i have just finished the designs for 2 law desks for a new firm that will be paperless- so the desks are actually large tables instead.

i'm using all beat-up, leftover & drop materials for these designs- including some paperstone, richlite and plyboo sourced from my new [super kick-ass] job at ECOsupply- along with some antique pine, mahogany & steel from my stash- the only things we're buying retail are a little bit of white oak, some hardware & finish supplies.

the client is a fan of green building, self effacing humor, has so far paid in cash, and given me a good deal of design freedom in fleshing out each of these pieces- they're even going to be fun to build. remember to celebrate the good ones when they come round.

subsequently, i wound up designing his letterhead & business cards too- even a webpage will be coming soon..

prototyping new redplumjam furniture design-

here's a pretty kick-ass [soothing, flatpack, not gigantic] king size bed design using green-certified sheetgoods, mixed recycled hardwoods, and even some laminated corrugated cardboard. the double sky trigrams [i ching heaven] define the footboard and two upsidedown L's of laminated cardboard make the headrests of the headboard. please dig the accordion zig-zag mattress support system- that's what drove this whole design from the beginning.

prototype photos [my bed] coming soon, alongside images of other of new, or at least so far undocumented redplumjam designs.

my new shop is functional & should be in really good shape by fall. the richmond east side energy has been great for me this year & i'm super lucky to be part of this little community.

holla church hill n accomac st!

pinching a little tight on those human civil liberties mr. judge sir, your honor sir.

man oh man- i'm shopping for a new pair of SK8 Hi Vans so i don't miss the next dinosaur skate session. some people don't know this: being a custom woodworker means you love your work and it doesn't bother you that even in good times you're really still too poor to buy $50 shoes very often. it's a very dusty artist's life with its own rewards [like a sweet early demise]. i switched to driving a forklift so i could skate more often. be there in a minute, guys.

better live it up while i can, right? well, as far as finding those Vans goes: the local skateshop is so financially wobbly from this economy that they're out of stock- other local stores don't cater to the hiTop Vans crowd, so there i am buying them cheap online anonymously instead. kicking the legs out from under my local economy. we're WalMarting each other as i write this. i just WalMarted you. you'll do it to me twice tomorrow.

that only works with cheap oil, like the million gallons/day leaking into the gulf. the US uses 20 times that in one normal day.

how long does that last, how does it resonate with you, & at what cost? how much energy should we be investing in sustainable living systems, food & energy production, transportation structures, cultural modification, etc?

we in the US, like some other freaked out northern european countries, are legally reaching toward socially regressive militaristic measures to 'solve' our problems- ones that truly require adopting new points of view instead- we are legalizing racial profiling, mercenary intelligence agencies/armies, indefinite detentions, murdering citizens, rendition, many aspects of torture & humiliation, flying armed remote control robots, etc. while at the same time we're giving corporations a more defined personhood & the right to outright legally buy our elections.

now the latest: our miranda rights- the right to remain silent, to a court appointed lawyer, etc- are automatically waived if we don't clearly state right off the bat that we'd like them please and thankyouverymuch.

so when in doubt, remember to yell: "i have the right to remain silent!".

Supreme Court Favors The Top 1%

now you see it now you see it-

here's another good article by chris hedges:

At Least the Greeks Are Rioting in the Streets

the brunt of the story is about why we should resist the World's Wealthiest Wedgie Wranglers- [also mentioned in my previous rant]- but in this and David Sirota's article [previous post] are couple facts about BP contributions to both Obama & Salaazar that i'd like to juxtapose with some quotes by these two that i lifted from Democracy Now.

you know. for kicks.

"BP and its employees handed more than $3.5 million to federal candidates over the past 20 years, with the largest chunk of their money going to Obama, according to the Center for Responsive Politics." [Hedges]

says the Prez: “If the laws on our books are inadequate to prevent such an oil spill, or if we didn’t enforce those laws, I want to know it. I want to know what worked and what didn’t work in our response to the disaster and where oversight of the oil and gas industry broke down. We know, for example, that a cozy relationship between oil and gas companies and the agencies that regulate them has long been a source of concern.” [D.N.]

and then:

"Somehow, there have been almost no calls for the resignation of Salazar, who oversaw this disaster and who, before that, took $323,000 in campaign contributions from energy interests and backed more offshore drilling as a U.S. senator."[Sirota's article]

working for us, here's Ken Salaazar:"I am angry and I am frustrated that BP has been unable to stop this well from leaking and to stop this pollution from spreading. We are thirty-three days into this effort, and deadline after deadline has been missed." [D.N.]

meanwhile over 700,000 gallons of Corexit Dispersant have been poured into the gulf- [don't get that on your skin, but do put it in the water] -against orders from the EPA and right past our noses. how much was the Corexit manufacturer paid? what kind of world do we expect to to inhabit considering these kinds of actions?

Oil Company Calls the Shots While Playing by Washington Rules

there so little charade left in our little charade- but enough of my mouth-

let's let Fred Hampton carry this one home from 1969:

"Now, let me show you how were gonna try to do it in the Black Panther Party here. We just got back from the south side. We went out there. We went out there and we got to arguing with the pigs or the pigs got to arguing-he said, "Well, Chairman Fred, you supposed to be so bad, why dont you go and shoot some of those policemen? You always talking about you got your guns and got this, why dont you go shoot some of them?"

And I've said, "you've just broken a rule. As a matter of fact, even though you have on a uniform it doesn't make me any difference. Because I dont care if you got on nine uniforms, and 100 badges. When you step outside the realm of legality and into the realm of illegality, then I feel that you should be arrested." And I told him, "You being what they call the law of entrapment, you tried to make me do something that was wrong, you encouraged me, you tried to incite me to shoot a pig. And that ain't cool, Brother, you know the law, dont you?"

I told that pig that, I told him "You got a gun, pig?" I told him, "You gotta get your hands up against the wall. We're gonna do what they call a citizens arrest." This fool dont know what this is. I said, "Now you be just as calm as you can and don't make too many quick moves, cause we don't wanna have to hit you."

And I told him like he always told us, I told him, "Well, I'm here to protect you. Don't worry about a thing, 'm here for your benefit." So I sent another Brother to call the pigs. You gotta do that in a citizen's arrest. He called the pigs. Here come the pigs with carbines and shotguns, walkin' out there. They came out there talking about how they're gonna arrest Chairman Fred. And I said, "No fool. This is the man you got to arrest. He's the one that broke the law." And what did they do? They bugged their eyes, and they couldn't stand it. You know what they did? They were so mad, they were so angry that they told me to leave.

And what happened? All those people were out there on 63rd Street. What did they do? They were around there laughing and talking with me while I was making the arrest. They looked at me while I was rapping and heard me while I was rapping. So the next time that the pig comes on 63rd Street, because of the thing that our Minister of Defense calls observation and participation, that pig might be arrested by anybody!

So what did we do? We were out there educating the people. How did we educate them? Basically, the way people learn, by observation and participation. And that's what were trying to do. That's what we got to do here in this community..

A lot of people get the word revolution mixed up and they think revolutions a bad word. Revolution is nothing but like having a sore on your body and then you put something on that sore to cure that infection. And Im telling you that were living in an infectious society right now. Im telling you that were living in a sick society. And anybody that endorses integrating into this sick society before its cleaned up is a man whos committing a crime against the people. "

right or left, we're hanging by our underwear

whether we want to believe we can 'return' to prosperity by reversing social progress & turning our backs on each other- or that we can move forward towards it by expecting our government to bootstrap a whole new healthcare, banking, infrastructure, education, foreign policy or energy paradigm with us: no matter what we want to believe, we're all in effect receiving a giant atomic wedgie from the powers that be.

Myths We Try So Hard to Believe

david sirota riffs on the recent gulf oilpocalypse-

"We know that before the disaster, President Barack Obama recklessly pushed to expand offshore drilling. We also know that his Interior Department gave British Petroleum’s rig a “categorical exclusion” from environmental scrutiny and, according to The New York Times, “gave permission to BP and dozens of other oil companies to drill in the Gulf without first getting required [environmental] permits.” Worse, we know that after the spill, the same Interior Department kept issuing “categorical exclusions” for new gulf oil operations, and Interior Secretary Ken Salazar still refuses “to rule out continued use of categorical exclusions,” as The Denver Post reported (heckuva job, Kenny!).

Undoubtedly, had this been the behavior of a Republican administration, “The Left’s” big environmental organizations would be scheduling D.C. protests and calling for firings, if not criminal charges. Yet, somehow, there are no protests. Somehow, there have been almost no calls for the resignation of Salazar, who oversaw this disaster and who, before that, took $323,000 in campaign contributions from energy interests and backed more offshore drilling as a U.S. senator. Somehow, facing environmental apocalypse, there has been mostly silence from “The Left.”"

redplumjam project garden sequence initiated

i made a tiny raised bed for my garden this year- with some scraps leftover from renovating my garage space into a workshop. my neighbors allow a common compost just on the other side of a waist high fence- which keeps my dogs out & the birds well fed-

another step toward a more sustainable self- that happens to also be part of a much larger unsustainable culture.

The Drones Delivered by Democracy

speaking of this culture, mine- sustained on massive weapons sales & brutal, hi-tech military action abroad- and domestically we've outsourced everything but exotic economic shell games, catering to the rich and entertainment-

so- speaking as a lover & connoisseur of conflicted self-cancelling sensational urges: i propose this reality television series:

Gangsta Rules Texas Shark Cage Death Match Over a Pit of Vipers Hidden by Mustard Gas.. MILITARY SHOWDOWN!!

superdicktacular right?

we could break it down to individual units- black ops death raids specialists for instance- we could pit them against 'some dudes' from blackwater in a control room with livefeed drones..

you see where i'm going here. get all the military branches & subunits involved as well as the contractors. there could be a big prize they're fighting for or not- really it doesn't matter too much. there will be interest & viewership & therefore good sponsorship- ensuring continued military funding, research & no-bid contractor royalties. super-kick-ass all around.

think of how peaceful the rest of the world might become.. shoot, we might even be able to get Israel or Iran on the show, maybe North Korea- aaww yeeeah. they could flex some muscle, be cheered on & paid all at the same time: in a 'controlled remote arena' of some sort- perhaps a space station to add to the potential risks. Virgin Mobile might sponsor that now- anyhow, still working out those bugs..

i'd much rather see that scenario play out than for those drones to become used by police forces domestically- yikes.

i'll leave you with a couple of viewpoints about our future as collections of much smaller and sharper-witted sustainable communities- which is probably more likely to come to bear than the Military Showdown Show:

A Mindset to Start Adopting About Local Relationships

Videos: Building a Small Sustainable House

the eichmannization of culture

'what?'

radio voice: as a citizen of the USA you have a lot of say in what happens in this world! but you know, there are some that feel overwhelmed, ineffective, or powerless with regard to what happens in our name. are you happy with or do you give much thought to the way we deliver democracy to ourselves? how about our military role in the middle east? do you think it will bring those countries a good democracy like ours? with the 2010 elections coming- these will be the first bonafide state sanctioned corporate owned elections- do you still feel empowered and in control of your country's destiny? of CIA operations, of rendition flights, of drone attacks, of guantanamo or baghram, or your own citizenship? do companies like Blackwater, Chevron, Coca Cola, or BP keep our best interests in mind when making operational decisions? does your authority over these matters give you comfort and a clear vision of an environmentally & economically stable future for your children?

'look: i'm tired after work, my kid's a diabetic, i've got heartburn from my dollar menu meal, i'm trying to enjoy this can of PBR before i make dinner, clean the kitchen, pay bills & fold laundry. get it, weird radio voice?'

radio voice: ha ha! so nihilism & schizoprenia have become the norm in the USA for anyone with enough time or energy to pay attention. instead of dealing with this directly, may of us seek continual distraction. these conditions, along with the accompanying low regard for 'society' have been fertile ground for [myopic, self serving, resource consuming, population exploiting, environmental hazard creating, & now with free speech-$] corporations to bloom and flourish.

radio voice: ..so perfectly seamless- see, there's no disconnect because we're all disconnected now!

BP Annointed Eichmann of the Moment

And Have a Great Day!

virtual living without cerebral interference

this article had a great point, but for the life of me i can't think of a single related anecdote. i will likely forget this completely by the end of the day.

"Simply put, our culture is hostile to thinking and talking. About the only American environment where discussions are encouraged, or just made possible, is the university, but these are conducted mostly by people without dirt under their fingernails, hence the gross disconnect between the academy and the rest of us.

In Italy, there's a quaint custom known as the passegiatta. For a couple hours before dinner, people actually hang out or walk around their local square. This bonding and soothing practice embraces even foreigners. This is not possible here because we don't have the proper spaces. Our few squares are landscaped, with paths dictating traffic, unlike an open piazza that encourages congregrating and loitering, that allows free movement and wide vistas. In most American localities, there are no squares at all, only shopping mall food courts."

Marketers Made Me Into a Meathead