South by Southwest: Seems like everybody's doing it --

Wednesday, April 01, 2009

Seems like everybody's doing it --

[4/1/09]

Today the streets of London have been teeming with protesters and it has turned rather nasty. People are angry about what has happened with the world economy. Since many of the world's leaders, including our own U.S. President, are in London, protesting is a perfectly predictable response, though the violence is disturbing.

Many people in the United States are upset over the way the TARP money has been distributed. Even members of Congress have taken up the idea of joining their populist constituents' protest against monied interests and banks. Politico reports that "witnesses feel the heat as members of Congress channel the anger from home." Four banks, feeling the heat, have reimbursed the the Treasury the money they received.
Jim Dean, Governor Howard Dean's brother, let me know about their joint efforts to get health care reform that would apply to all Americans. My regular activist e-mails from groups are, thus still in the game, though their protests couldn't be put in the same category as the marchers' in London. Democracy for America says,

Our goal: Get 250,000 petition signatures and deliver them personally to every member of Congress before Obama's health care legislation gets out of committee. Delivering the petition is only the beginning of this aggressive campaign which will include neighborhood canvasses, congressional meetings, calls, rallies, and targeted ads to move the message in the media.

We need all hands on deck to win. ADD YOUR NAME NOW -- THEN SEND IT TO A FRIEND!. HMO's and Insurance Companies are already working to stop us. They may have lobbyists and money, but they don't have the American people on their side -- and with your help, we're going to prove it.

Josh Peck, who heads the ONE campaign, is calling it an "outrage" that Senator Kent Conrad proposed cutting "$4 billion from the President's International Affairs budget -- the part of the budget funding almost all of our anti-poverty work, from fighting global AIDS to making sure the hunger crisis doesn’t turn into a starvation crisis.

Cathy Zoi, writing for the "RepoWEr America Campaign," forwarded an unemployed worker's story with the title, "The worst day of my life." The WE campaign works to develop green jobs in the effort to have "100% clean electricity within 10 years." And in a not-so-surprising development, WE announce:

Mar. 27, 2009 – Today, the Alliance for Climate Protection announced that CEO Cathy Zoi has been nominated by President Barack Obama to serve as Assistant Secretary for Energy Efficiency & Renewable Energy in the Department of Energy. The Alliance is also pleased to announce that veteran campaign leader Maggie Fox will take Zoi’s place as CEO.

Zoi joined the Alliance in 2007 when former Vice President Al Gore, chairman of the Alliance’s bipartisan board of directors, asked her to serve as CEO of his new nonprofit aimed at persuading Americans of both the urgency and solvability of the climate crisis.

See also Behind the Links, for further info on this subject.

Carol Gee - Online Universe is the all-in-one home page for all my websites.