fascinating watch!

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Food Democracy Now! http://www.fooddemocracynow.org

The First 100 Days - Thank YOU! Together WE Made History!

Here at Food Democracy Now!, we’d like to thank everyone who signed the original petition and helped make Sustainable Change at the USDA possible. So far more than 94,000 Americans have signed up at Food Democracy Now! to send a unified voice that America must create a truly sustainable food system for the 21st century.

Because of your remarkable involvement, for the first time in our nation’s history we have a Secretary of Agriculture, former Iowa governor Tom Vilsack, speaking about the importance of organics, local foods and nutritious school lunches.

Not only does Secretary Vilsack speak about these important issues, he understands the role that sustainable practices will have in helping family farmers meet the challenges of 21st century agriculture. With looming water and energy shortages and the possibility of feeding a world population estimated to reach 9 billion by 2050, the only logical solution that our nation can embrace is sustainability.

Fortunately, this Administration has allowed the voice of reason back into the USDA.

With the naming of Kathleen Merrigan as Deputy Secretary, President Obama has heard the voice of the people. Not only was Deputy Secretary Merrigan one of our Sustainable Dozen, but she has also had a long and distinguished career in guiding positive change in agriculture, crafting the national organic standards and serving as the director of the Agriculture, Food and Environment Program at Tufts University. We are encouraged by her depth of knowledge and experience and committment to increasing opportunities for farmers. 

During the cold winter months of December, January and February, when many thought that the future of agriculture was going to continue down the same old trodden path, members of the sustainable ag, farm and food community rallied at Food Democracy Now! to call for significant changes in U.S. agricultural policies that would benefit independent family farmers, protect the environment and return the right of safe and healthy food to America’s citizens

Because of your united efforts we have gained some significant changes at the USDA and beyond. Not only was Merrigan named as the USDA Deputy Secretary, but Iowa native Doug O’Brien, also a member of the Sustainable Dozen, was chosen to serve as Merrigan’s Chief of Staff.

In addition, another member of the Sustainable Dozen, Drake University professor Neil Hamilton, a fellow Iowan, was named as an informal advisor to Secretary Vilsack.

While we’d love to take credit for their selection, really it's a testament to your commitment in helping create an atmosphere where more sustainable choices were encouraged at the USDA. By coming together and presenting a united voice to the Administration, our community has shown what we can do when we work together towards a common goal.

Changing the Future of Agriculure

These selections will have a positive influence on the future of agriculture in the U.S., helping end the revolving door between government and corporations and returning the USDA to “The People’s Department” as originally envisioned by President Lincoln.

Now more than ever, it’s important that we continue to work together to help this Administration create positive change. And while we may sometimes disagree, it’s vital that we stay involved to educate leaders and citizens on how important sustainable solutions will be for our collective future.

Now is the time to plant the seeds for a truly sustainable food system for the 21st century. There will be trials ahead, but like all the great challenges in the history of our nation, these challenges will be met with enthusiasm and a spirit of cooperation to achieve a common goal.

At Food Democracy Now!, we firmly believe that a nation that can put a man on the moon will be able to meet the challenges of implementing sustainable practices in agriculture and other endeavors.

Sustainability is the future… It is ours to make together.

Let's put our shoulder to the wheel.

Many Thanks,
Food Democracy Now!

If you’d like to see Food Democracy Now!’s grassroots work continue, please consider donating as little as $10 or $25.
http://www.fooddemocracynow.org/donate/

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TakePart and Grist.org got together at the Slow Food Nation Convention in San Francisco recently to talk to leaders in the Food Movement. Listen to what they have to say and let them know your thoughts.

Eric Schlosser, Jennifer Fearing, Andrew Kimbrell, Deborah Koons Garcia, Wes Jackson, Raj Patel, Dan Barber, and Anna Lappé

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Battlestar Gallactica at the UN with Woopi Goldberg

Posted in on March 22, 2009 by thebrooklynsocialite

A Battlestar Galactica discussion, held at the United Nations Economic and Social Council Chamber, moderated by Whoopi Goldberg? It sounds like the premise of a fevered dream or a bad trip. It may well be the first time that the UN’s diligent sign makers had to dedicate their skills to crafting signs with the names of extra-terrestrial places like “Virgon” and “Sagittarion” for the assembled delegates.  It was definitely the first time The Brooklyn Socialite made a dent in the United Nation’s amazing seafood buffet, looking out over the Hudson while chugging industrial-sized whiskeys and thinking about the strangeness of being in a building which, as the wise Whoopi G put it, “is as much an idea as a place”. Which we agree with – especially as it’s an idea that incorporates waiters in tuxes and brings together diplomats, high school students and geeks in a building decorated with tapestry portraits of Secretary Generals past and present.

A team-effort between the UN Department of Public Information and the Sci Fi Channel, the evening was less trippy and more substantial than it sounds. Tying in themes from the science fiction series with the UN’s work, actors Mary McDonnell (who plays President Laura Roslin), Edward James Olmos (the battle-scarred Admiral Adama), producers Ronald Moore and David Eick were joined on the podium by a variety of UN representatives, touching on subjects such as human rights, children in armed conflict, terrorism and religious reconciliation.

Helping the non-Sci Fi geeks in the audience, each segment was introduced by a clip from the series...

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Check out this stunning interactive time-line from the NY Times...

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This report was written to shine a spotlight on the under-reported plight of America’s nonprofit organizations and to make recommendations for how the nation can respond. In the wake of the economic downturn, hospitals, nursing homes, nursery schools, senior centers, soup kitchens, and other nonprofit organizations have been hit by a triple whammy. The evaporation of wealth has decimated charitable donations; the state and local budget crunch is costing nonprofits their foremost paying clients; and the human need for nonprofit help is skyrocketing as nonprofit resources shrink.

Reversing the nonprofit plunge is a matter of jobs, not just charity. With 9.4 million employees and 4.7 million full-time volunteers nationwide, nonprofits constitute 11 percent of the American workforce—greater than the auto and financial industries combined. If the nonprofit sector were a country, it would have the seventh largest economy in the world. We cannot afford for it to go the way of Iceland, whose financial system collapsed.

So far, the economic debate has almost completely overlooked nonprofits. That is a mistake, because no sector offers more bang for the buck. For example, national service volunteers—individuals who spent one or more years of their lives in full-time or part-time civilian service to the country—cost less per hour than private-sector employees making the minimum wage. A report showed that such national service among disadvantaged youth led to successful post-service employment and higher earnings than their peers with no national service experience. Such citizen service, one of America’s finest and longstanding traditions, offers policymakers a hat trick: a way to create hundreds of thousands
of jobs at low cost to government, with great national purpose—meeting the country’s most challenging needs in education, poverty, health care, energy, and the environment—and with no new bureaucracy, since individuals work through existing nonprofit organizations.

This report makes several concrete recommendations on how our nation can spark a strong nonprofit recovery and permit more Americans to do good works in hard times.

Read the recommendations and the rest of the report here.

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...Some of the key elements of Obama's comprehensive policy:

* Charters: In the biggest concession to reformers, Obama said he supported every state lifting caps on the number of charter schools allowed to open in a year, provided that states also have accountability guidelines for assessing charters and closing down ineffective schools. [...]

* Curriculum: National standards are emerging as a consensus point between teachers' unions and free market education reformers. Obama also supported higher standards today, saying, "Our curriculum for eighth graders is two full years behind top performing countries. That is a prescription for economic decline." But his agenda stops short of pursuing national curriculum guidelines or tests, promising only "to promote efforts to enhance the rigor of state-level curriculum." [...]

* Early childhood: Obama's budget will include "incentive grants" for states to develop uniform quality standards and target care and education to the most disadvantaged children.

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