grljduplisea's blog

So George Bush made a surprise visit to Iraq this week to check up on things. Specifically he visited Anbar province in the west, which is symbolically significant because it was a Sunni stronghold for Saddam Hussein.  Read More »

In the Italian town of Loreto, the Catholic Church recently hosted Save Creation Day, a youth festival attended by 300,000 people. The pope himself gave Mass, wearing green and delivering a homily urging everyone to take care of our planet. In particular he highlighted the necessity of sharing water sources in an "equitable and peaceful" manner.  Read More »

On the NBC Nightly News a few evenings ago, there was a story on how the Kurds in Iraq have turned their ethnographic region into a safe, economically prosperous area in contrast to the violence elsewhere in the country. The US military does not patrol here; instead, the Kurds have their own military patrolling and monitoring checkpoints.  Read More »

Buying carbon offsets--paying a company to plant a tree to make up for the carbon dioxide you produce--has been likened to the selling of indulgences by the Catholic Church centuries ago; a feel-good ploy (not to mention a market destined to grow) with no effect. I think to some extent that this is true. People, especially the wealthy, can continue to drive their Hummers, leave all their lights on, and be wasteful, but then pay a company to plant some trees for them. This doesn't work. Carbon offsets need to be a part of a bigger solution.  Read More »

Please take a minute to do this. Go to LifeNets.Net and answer the three questions about your feelings on the genocide in the Darfur. Pour your heart out. Today is the last day LifeNets is collecting these e-letters to send to Congress to push for action. Their goal is 10,000 letters but they are still thousands short. But it's not too late for YOU to do something. It only takes a couple minutes of your time--you can spare that, can't you? Writing to Congress has never been this easy.  Read More »

After two failed wind farm projects in Maine, we finally have one up in Mars Hill. I've only seen pictures, but I recognize the stately wind turbines as graceful and benevolent structures reducing our collective carbon footprint. Unfortunately, a lot of people in the surrounding area are raising a big stink about it. A recent article in Down East magazine depicted a picture presumably on someone's front lawn that read, "Honk If You Hate Windmills."

The article also mentioned a gathering of people, one of whom said something to the effect of, "We all support clean energy, but you can't go putting these things up in people's front yards." First of all, this isn't in anyone's front yard. Mars Hill has ski slopes on one side; it's not virgin territory.  Read More »

Yes, I bought Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows at midnight (well, closer to 2 a.m.) on July 21st--even though I had to work at 8 that morning--and yes, I read it within 24 hours. I would have waited and actually tried to do something constructive with my Saturday, but I was terrified of the book being spoiled for me. After all, I started reading the books when I was twelve, and now I'm twenty; like millions of other people, I have become very attached to these characters and didn't want their fates revealed to me before I read them myself.  Read More »

So I had to work today. Yes, on Independence Day. This isn't uncommon, but I worked last Independence Day, too. The extent of my patriotic activities was thus limited to reading the Declaration of Independence in the newspaper and going to see the fireworks.  Read More »