Whole Life Times: Dairy Debate Sours

Women Say No To War
On International Women’s Day (3/12), 500 LA women gathered at Arlington West—a cemetery created on Santa Monica Beach to commemorate the American soldiers fallen in Iraq—to stage a dramatic message of peace. Gold Star Mom Cindy Sheehan and Iraqi civil engineer and blogger Faiza Al-Araji were among those participating in the anti-war human art installation, which was organized by aerial artist John Quigley and photographed by David Crane. For more shots of the event, visit codepinkla.org

Mother’s Day Mania

Although the ancient Greeks used to celebrate a Mother’s Day of sorts—they honored Rhea (the mother of gods) with honey cakes— Mother’s Day didn’t become an official US holiday until 1914. President Woodrow Wilson signed the order, thanks to a woman named Anna Jarvis. Anna’s own mother had died and Anna wanted a day where all mothers were remembered through reflection and prayer. Nine years later, Anna filed a lawsuit in an attempt to stop the over-commercialization of Mother’s Day. She lost.

• On Mother’s Day or Materice in Yugoslavia, children tie up their mothers and only release them when the mothers pay their children with sweets.

• In France, Fete des Meres is treated like a birthday, complete with a dinner celebration and lots of gifts.

• In Sweden, the Red Cross sells plastic flowers on the days leading up to Mother’s Day to raise money for mothers and children in need.

• There are about 82.5 million mothers in the US, 9.6 of whom are single mothers.

• The California Cryobank is the largest sperm bank in the country. Specimens are Fed-Exed to prospective moms in liquid nitrogen dry shipment tanks.

• These days, nearly 3 in 10 US mothers are giving birth by Caesarean section, even when there isn’t a medical need.

“Making the decision to have a child—it’s momentous. It is to decide forever to have your heart go walking around outside your body.” (origin unknown)
—Jenny Rough

WORTH REPEATING

“Our present leaders… bombard us with phrases like ‘national interest,’ ‘national security,’ and ‘national defense’ as if these concepts applied equally to all of us, colored or white, rich or poor, as if General Motors and Halliburton have the same interests as the rest of us, as if George Bush has the same interest as the young man or woman he sends to war. Surely, in the history of lies told to the population, this is the biggest lie. In the history of secrets withheld from the American people, this is the biggest secret: that there are classes with different interests in this country.”
—Historian Howard Zinn in The Progressive, 3/21, in a piece on why so many Americans were easily fooled into supporting war in Iraq.

“What we have now is what I call ‘Pimp and Ho chic,’ with all aspects of the sex industry presented as hip and cool. Pole dancing as exercise, lap dancing clubs as places to see celebrities, Pimp of the Year Award, Pimp and Ho fancy dress Balls, websites promoting ‘pimp’ culture, and the every day use of the words ‘bitch’ and ‘ho’ to refer to women, including girlfriends, are just some of the examples I have come across. How did porn get to be hip, pimps to be cool and feminism become a dirty word?”
—Body Shop founder Anita Roddick in her 2/06 newsletter, anitaroddick.com

“There is some good news out of Washington. It’s been about a month and the vice president hasn’t shot anybody.”
—Sen. John Kerry on the Al Franken Show, KTLK, 3/30/06.

“Knight Ridder has been squeezing [its newspapers] hard for years in a vain effort to convince Wall Street that profits could continue to grow forever. Knight Ridder will now disappear, a monument to wrongheaded management and the perils of entrusting public institutions to quixotic investors.”
—Writer Robert Kaiser in the Houston Chronicle, 4/1, encouraging investors to buy 11 hometown newspapers—all profitable—available as a result of Knight Ridder’s forced sale.

May 2006 | Mindful Living

Dairy Debate Sours

Last October, WLT reported on the “dairy debate”—the controversy swirling around so-called “organic” milk. The argument stems from whether dairy products labeled organic do indeed come from cows that are raised according to organic standards.

It seems not, according to a recent study done by watchdog group Cornucopia Institute. Even though consumers are paying premium prices for what they believe to be certified organic dairy, some of the biggest organic dairy brands—such as Horizon Organic and Aurora Organic—allegedly purchase the bulk of their milk from feedlots where cows have little or no access to pasture, according to the report. In addition, many of these feedlots import calves from conventional farms that use genetically engineered grains and antibiotics.

Unfortunately, the USDA and the Organic Trade Association seem to be turning a blind eye to the issue. Sign a petition to encourage the National Organics Standards Board to stop factory farm organics at organicconsumers.org/nosb2.htm and visit cornucopia.org to see how your favorite dairy products and outlets measure up. —Jessica Ridenour

Free To Be You and Tea

Chalk one up for religious freedom. In a time where citizens’ rights seem to be granted or revoked arbitrarily by the powers that be, the Supreme Court ruled in favor of New Mexico-based church O Centro Espirita Beneficiente Uniao do Vegetal and their fight to use Hoasca tea in their devotional ceremonies (WLT first reported on the court case back in December).

The church, whose beliefs combine Christianity with native Brazilian teachings, says they use the ritually prepared tea to bring them closer to God. The only problem (according to the Feds) is that Hoasca is a mild hallucinogen containing DMT, a chemical component that happens to be regulated by the Controlled Substances Act.

Despite the Bush Administration’s claims that the tea is dangerous and illegal, the John Roberts-led court moved that the government should butt out of a church’s religious practices, citing the 1993 Religious Freedom Restoration Act. —JR

Fuel’s Gold

Even George Bush knows it—Americans are “addicted to oil.” And on March 29, Dubya’s administration took a baby step in weaning us off the petroleum teat by raising corporate average fuel economy standards for SUVs, minivans and some pickup trucks. The good news? It’s the most aggressive energy efficiency legislation to be applied to big vehicles in three decades. According to the Department of Transportation, the new standards could save close to 11 billion gallons of gasoline over the lifespan of light trucks from the 2008 to 2011 model years.

But before you celebrate by buying a Hummer, consider the numbers. Eleven billion gallons of gas may sound like a landslide, but it’s more like a drop in the bucket for serious users like us—Americans burn through that much about every four weeks. And while the new legislation is laudable for the sheer fact that it happened at all, “It’s a bit like telling a three-pack-a-day smoker to give up one cigarette a day,” said Dan Becker, director of the Sierra Club’s global-warming program, to environmental webzine Grist. Currently the Sierra Club is deciding whether or not to take legal action against the Bush administration for balking at issuing the maximum feasible upgrades.

Nonetheless, valiantly argue eco-optimists, when GW starts legislating in favor of oil temperance, no matter how feebly, we should all rejoice—if only because the move represents the type of public opinion shift that could render our addiction story a tale of recovery rather than defeat. For the details fueling both sides of the debate, visit grist.org. —WLT

The Politics of Personality

Remember the whiny, insecure kid in nursery school, the one who thought everyone was out to get him and was always running to the teacher with complaints? Chances are, he grew up to be a conservative.

At least, he did if he was one of 95 kids from the Berkeley area that social scientists have been tracking for the last 20 years. The confident, resilient, self-reliant kids mostly grew up to be liberals.

The study from the Journal of Research In Personality isn’t going to make the UC Berkeley professor who published it any friends on the right. But the new results are worth a look. In the 1960s, Jack Block and his wife and fellow professor Jeanne Block (now deceased) asked teachers to rate the personalities of more than 100 nursery school kids.

A few decades later, Block followed up with more surveys, this time looking at political attitudes, too. The whiny kids tended to grow up conservative, and turned into rigid young adults who hewed closely to traditional gender roles and were uncomfortable with ambiguity. The confident kids turned out liberal and were still hanging loose, turning into bright, non-conforming adults with wide interests. The girls were still outgoing, but the young men tended to turn a little introspective.

Block reasons that insecure kids look for the reassurance provided by tradition and authority—and find it in conservative politics. The more confident kids are eager to explore alternatives to the way things are and find liberal politics more congenial.

It’s a mostly flattering picture for liberals in a society that values self-confidence and outgoingness. It also runs contrary to the American stereotype of the wimpy liberals and the strong conservatives.

But the results raise some obvious questions. Are nursery school teachers in the conservative heartland cursed with classes filled with little proto-conservative whiners? Or does an insecure little boy raised in Idaho turn instead to liberalism? Or does he grow up conservative along with the majority of his more confident peers, while only the kids with poor impulse control turn liberal?

Part of the answer is that personality is not the only thing that determines political leanings. For instance, in the study self-reliance predicts statistically about 7 percent of the variance between kids who became liberal and those who became conservative. (If every self-reliant kid became a liberal and none became conservatives, it would predict 100 percent of the variance.) That still leaves an awful lot of room for other influences, such as friends, family, education, personal experience and plain old intellect.

The work suggests that personality and emotions play a bigger role in our political leanings than we think. We feel as though we’ve reached our political opinions by carefully weighing the evidence and exercising our best judgment. But it could be that all of that careful reasoning is just after-the-fact self-justification.

It could be that whom we vote for has less to do with our judgments about tax policy or free trade or health care, and more with the personalities we’ve been stuck with since we were kids. —Kurt Kleiner

Power to the People: Marcie Winograd’s First Victory

It’s no simple task to edge out a six-term Congressional incumbent who should have been a shoe-in for the Democratic party endorsement. In a surprising upset, Marcie Winograd, grassroots’ favorite from the 36th Congressional District, did just that, blocking opponent Jane Harman from an automatic thumbs-up.

The June 6 primary is crucial for the 36th. With 40-50,000 more registered Democrats than Republicans, and 62,000 undeclared, the Democratic candidate who wins the primary will likely prevail in November against the Republican opponent. Democrats from this district—San Pedro up through Torrance, beach cities and Venice—finally will have the opportunity for real representation in Washington.

WLT: Why would Democrats want to replace Jane Harman, a six-term incumbent with committee seniority?
Marcie Winograd: Because she hasn’t done her job [as the ranking member] in the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence. [Before the Iraq invasion] Jane Harman had the National Intelligence Estimate, a 90-page document that analyzed the evidence justifying an invasion. Included in this document were numerous objections by intelligence analysts saying that reports Iraq had been making weapons of mass destruction were highly dubious, and that reports Iraq was trying to procure uranium from Niger were also highly dubious. As a member of the Committee on Intelligence, you are responsible for scrutinizing the evidence justifying a pre-emptive war. War should be a last resort. To not raise questions about the lack of justification for this war is outrageous. You can have a zillion years of seniority but if you are negligent or complicit you are not serving the people.

Harman has a record of support for the Iraq war, her office cancelled three peace delegations the night before they were scheduled to meet with her, she voted to put nuclear weapons in space, she is opposed to the US becoming signatory to the International Criminal Court and has supported suspension of due process. She has effectively supported the shredding of the Constitution.

She was briefed by the Bush Administration for over a year on their illegal, warrantless wiretaps, [yet] she remained silent. Never once have we heard her question the legality of these wiretaps; instead she went on Meet the Press not to blast the Bush Administration, but to blast those who leaked the information.

Harman seems more like a Republican than a Democrat. Why are you her first real challenger?
At one point the district was more conservative. They re-carved the district in 2000 so she really does not represent the interests of the constituents any longer. She has a ton of money, over $550,000 in her war chest.

A lot of people are intimidated. How could the “exact match” standard hurt us?
This is a serious threat. If we don’t stop this, we may see the disenfranchisement of thousands, many of them Latino, many working poor and many new citizens. The exact voter ID match says that if I register to vote as “Marcie A. Winograd” but I register at the DMV as “Marcie Winograd” I do not have an “exact match,” so there is an almost 50 percent chance the state voter database will kick out my name and say there is no such voter.

When I go to the polls, if I know what my rights are, I may demand a provisional ballot. Or else I may simply not vote. If we continue to use something like this, we will turn this [blue] state red.

How does your stand on the environment differ from Harman’s?
A lot of people say, “Jane Harman has always been good on the environment.” And my response is, “Since when are war and nuclear proliferation good for the environment?” We need to embrace the new Apollo Project, which calls for corporate tax incentives so that companies will have a reason to develop alternative energy. We need to see massive peace conversion. As long as we are dependent on foreign fuel, we will never be secure.

What are your chances of winning?
Excellent. By and large our congressional leaders have let us down. They have failed to give voice to our opposition to the war on Iraq. It is time for the people to lead.

For more information, please go to winogradforcongress.com. —Interview by Abigail Lewis

Canary in a Cold Mine

For most Americans, Hurricane Katrina was the first big warning bell about global warming. Even now, although 58 percent of us are convinced that climate change as a result of global warming has begun, a recent Gallup Poll reports only one in three believe global warming will pose a serious threat in our lifetimes. One could say we’re responding to this crisis at glacial speed, but that would be a bad joke. In the Arctic Circle, the Inuit people are losing the ice on which they live at an alarming rate. Just as the people of New Orleans found themselves standing in water where once there were streets, so the Inuit have watched parts of their frozen homelands liquefy.

The Inuit aren’t alone. The World Glacier Monitoring Service in Zurich reports that the European Alps stand to lose three-quarters of their glaciers to climate change in this century. Melting peaks in the Andes that had been snowy year-round for centuries are changing the lives of indigenous Ecuadorians living in their shadow. The problem isn’t limited to one continent or country but studies suggest the impact of climate change will be most marked in the Arctic, with only a small zone of permanent ice remaining by 2050. The Inuit will bear a disproportionate burden, losing not only the ice on which they travel and hunt, and the habitat for animals they hunt, but also certain harvesting rights due to newly opened passages between continents.

Sheila Watt-Cloutier, a representative of the Inuit Circumpolar Conference, an international organization that represents Inuit struggling in four countries bordering the Arctic Circle, spoke urgently at Santa Monica-based Global Green’s 10th Annual Green Cross Millennium Awards at the Beverly Hills Hotel last month. Watt-Cloutier, an award recipient, pointed out that the Inuit are like the proverbial canary in the coalmine, warning us of dangers to come. In the “lower 48,” we spend approximately 90 percent of our time indoors, disconnected from the earth. By contrast, the Inuit spend many more of their waking hours outdoors where they witness the effects of climate change on a daily basis.

Global Green, the American wing of Mikhail Gorbachev’s Green Cross International, is actively involved in numerous eco projects from policy and advocacy to green affordable housing and green schools. Their Millennium Awards were established in 1996 to honor those who share Global Green USA’s mission of “fostering a global value shift toward a sustainable and secure world.” Other 2006 honorees included designer William McDonough, Bioneers’ founders Nina Simons & Kenny Ausubel, Thomas Leppert of the Turner Corporation and California Assemblymember Fran Pavley.

For more info about Global Green, go to globalgreen.org. For info about the Inuit, go to inuitcircumpolar.com or www.inuit.org. —Abigail Lewis

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