AlternativesMagazine

  Trash never dies. Sometimes it’s not even trash LA TIMES, December 9, 2021 That’s the notion behind a state law that on Jan. 1 will require Californians to separate organic material from their other garbage. It’s a landmark reform that aims to transform the state’s throwaway culture — not just to ease pressure on landfills but to reduce the climate-warming fallout of our trashy norm. 1/3 of the food we buy we throw away. $165 Billion Dollars a year Senate Bill 1383 mandates that Californians toss unused food, coffee grounds, egg shells, banana peels and other leftovers into bins they use for other “green” waste, such as garden trimmings, lawn clippings and leaves. Waste haulers will divert the organic material away from traditional landfills to facilities that will turn the biological mishmash in to products such as compost, mulch and natural gas. READ >>

Back in 1995, this article by Peter Vanderwicken appeared in the Harvard Business Review. Not much has changed since. Today news is nothing more than tabloid gossip . . . . and the talk show political pundits are even worse.   The news media and the government are entwined in a vicious circle of mutual manipulation, mythmaking, and self-interest. It's what has divided the country, families and friends. READ >> ACCOUNTABILITY Holding the News Media Accountable Reasons Why Every News is Not True and What is the Solution Should we all stop watching the news?? No…. But whenever we watch or read anything, we can at least try to see whether it is backed up by any evidence, fact or not. And whatever we hear, we should not blindly trust whatever they say. Always try to do self-analysis and then frame perception. Alternately, what regulatory bodies can do is at least make it compulsory for all media to disclose their stakeholder’s names and openly establish their leanings, allow...

  A record number of calves have been recorded in the Salish Sea this season, marking a significant rebound for a species that was endangered just 25 years ago. Whale watchers and researchers off the coasts of Washington and British Columbia near Vancouver, documented 21 calves, according to the Pacific Whale Watch Association (PWWA). According to Mark Malleson of Center for Whale Research, that is the highest annual number on record so far for the region, and is nearly twice as many as were reported last year, when 11 calves were documented.   READ >>

  Food production has a massive impact on the environment. In fact, how we produce and consume food is the biggest threat to our planet today. But because more than 1/3 of food is wasted, more than 1/3 of this damage is completely unnecessary. From farm to fork, food is wasted at every step of the journey - up to 1.3 billion tons every year. And an astonishing amount of this waste happens on purpose. See Save the 1/3

  The actor Woody Harrelson narrates the documentary “ Kiss the Ground ,” a frenetic but ultimately persuasive and optimistic plan to counter the climate crisis. Streaming on Netflix , the film makes a case for the healing power of the soil, arguing that its capacity to sequester carbon could be the key to reversing the effects of climate change. Directed by Joshua Tickell and Rebecca Harrell Tickell, whose credits include other socially conscious documentaries such as “The Big Fix” and “Pump,” “Kiss the Ground” takes a wide-ranging approach. The film begins by examining how tilling and the use of pesticides has led to soil erosion, and then traces the damage done to our ecology, health, and climate. The filmmakers find a solution in regenerative farming, an ethical practice designed to restore degraded lands and facilitate carbon drawdown. See the entire film on YouTube. Click below.

BUT FIRST, MY TAKE Dennis Ketterman I've read a lot of articles lately about how bicycling can save the planet and other related topics about the importance of cycling for the environment. If this is possible, and I have to agree that it could, why haven't we embraced cycling, shouted from the rooftops, gone crazy in the media, and made it the number one priority everywhere? If the simple bicycle can actually save the world, according to a lot of experts, you would think this would take precedence over everything.  Even politics. Well, one reason why we are not embracing it and saving the planet is that we are having too much fun destroying it. And there is a lot more money in doing that than there is in bicycling. The big bucks are still in oil and a bike burns none of that. Another reason is that we're just too freakin' lazy. We drive an $80,000 gas guzzler to the gym, down the block, to ride a stationary bike.  Anyway check it out, post your comments. Buy a bike. How...

  By Willard “Woody” Michels Guest Blogger A couple years ago a man named Gabriel Sherman wrote a book, “The Loudest Voice in the Room.” This book is about Roger Ailes the creator of Fox News. I’ll never forget a line in the book in which Ailes made a statement to Richard Nixon during his 1968 presidential campaign that has haunted me since reading it. I don’t recall exactly how it went but something to the effect, “the American people are becoming too lazy to make their own decisions and need someone to tell them how to think. Ailes then stated that TV would be the medium to do this.” This statement came back to me last week when I was looking for a particular business here in Mesa. I stopped at another business in the vicinity to ask directions. The lady behind the counter gave me the deer-in-the-eye-headlight look and said she had no idea. I walked out and asked another lady and she pointed across the street and down a couple of stores and said where it was. I wonder how ...