environment

• Ezra Klein has "One Flowchart to Rule Them All" - a simple chart effectively explaining health care reform.
• Planet Green has simple directions for making your dorm room green.
• Textbook rentals may finally break the publishing industry's expensive monopoly on text book sales.
• Incredible explanation of how Twitter works in theory.
• Campus Progress says it's time for the internet generation to save itself.
• At Sinclair Community College, the focus is on jobs.
• CIRCLE notes that non-college youth are less likely to volunteer.

Special Advisor for Green Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation at the White House Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ) stops by the 80MS conference to talk about greening our future.

His hilarious speech followed with great questions and answers the most amusing answer being

Green technology can't solve all of our problems, I'm not that guy saying "Ya got acne? Here's a solar panel!"

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

• Social Media and the New Model of Civic Engagement.
• Facebook Causes breaks the $10 million barrier. What an amazing feat!
• Check out this piece on the new GOP 'racist' headache'.
• Obama student loan plan wins support in the House.
• Energy Action Coalition gets quoted in this NY Times piece on Obama and the climate bill
• Kudos to @80MS: College Grads Face IOUs, Worst Job Market in Years.

What is it with Thomas Friedman and his insults? First, he wrote that Millennials were too quiet, too wrapped up in the internet to care about the country's direction. He then came back last December and tried to argue again that because we're not chaining ourselves to bulldozers, we're not doing anything and thus don't care about the trajectory of the country.

Yesterday, Friedman again assailed millennials, equating Facebook and other social network sites with laziness and apathy. The offending passage is in the last paragraph:

And then there is We the People. Attention all young Americans: your climate future is being decided right now in the cloakrooms of the Capitol, where the coal lobby holds huge sway. You want to make a difference? Then get out of Facebook and into somebody’s face. Get a million people on the Washington Mall calling for a price on carbon. That will get the Senate’s attention. Play hardball or don’t play at all.

Emphasis added.

The Energy Action Coalition pieced together a response it blasted to its e-mail list. I've provided it below:

As a young person, you care about global warming. You know that a clean energy economy will create millions of jobs and pathways out of poverty, reduce pollution, and save the planet. And you are willing to do whatever it takes to make that happen. Right?

Well, Thomas L. Friedman, the popular New York Times columnist, isn't convinced. In fact, Friedman concludes his latest column* by calling us out! He writes:

"Attention all young Americans: your climate future is being decided right now in the cloakrooms of the Capitol, where the coal lobby holds huge sway…. Play hardball or don't play at all."

Does Friedman have a point? Do we need to be bigger and louder?

I think the answer is yes.

Don't get me wrong -- I know that thousands of young people across this country are working tirelessly to usher in a clean and just energy future for us all. But if we want to truly achieve our goals, we need our elected officials to know that we are watching closely as they debate the climate policy that will shape the rest of our lives.

Take the first step. Let President Obama and your Senators know that you demand bold, just, and science-based climate solutions, and ask your friends and family to do the same.

Let's send a strong message to our President and Senators that we're here, we're watching, and we're ready for action. And let's ask our friends and families to do the same. It's going to take big numbers to fight back against the thousands of letters and calls generated by the dirty energy industry (not to mention their well-paid lobbyists).

Send a message to the President and your Senators, and forward this email to everyone you know.

But we know that sending email isn't enough. In order to drown out the voice of the dirty energy industry, we're going to need to mobilize in unprecedented numbers. Tom Friedman isn't kidding when he suggests we should have a million people marching in the streets.

Ready to take a bigger step? Sign up to be a leader in your community, and to help get millions of feet in the streets for climate solutions.

We've gone big before, but now we need to go bigger. And the only way we will get there is if people like you do more. Ready to take a bigger step? Sign up today to get active in your community, to get in the faces of our elected officials, and to recruit the huge movement it will take to win.

In it to win it,

Whit Jones
Acting Field Director
Energy Action Coalition

While the e-mail was inspirational enough, the problem with Friedman's column is that he once again lacks the understanding that change can be accomplished through a variety of means. Friedman (and there are many more who think just like him) discounts activism through institutions as nothing. In doing so, he insults those youth already busting their ass for this legislation and movement. For instance did Friedman say anything when Powershift '09 brought 11,000 youth activists to DC urging the government to act? Who was quiet then?

Granted, Whit's right -- we all can be a little louder on the issue, but it doesn't have to be limited to getting in the streets. We can continue our own brand of activism by using our technological proficiency and collaborative skills to push for the bill's passage. Yes, the bill's important (even if it has been watered down); but the 1960s are over. Youth have a plethora of tools at their disposal to create the change they wish to see. Unfortunately, Friedman either doesn't understand that, or doesn't want to.

I've written many times about HeadCount, the voter registration organization that originated within the jam band scene (disclosure: I'm on the advisory board). I think they've put together an amazing, national organization that accomplishes real political work without sacrificing the vibe of a small, tight-knit community. If you've ever been to a HeadCount show, you know there's a real connection between the fans, the music and the politics.

Over the last four years, they've built this community with far fewer resources than other political nonprofits, and they've expanded beyond their roots in the jam band scene. Now, they're morphing once again.

Yesterday, HeadCount relaunched their website and announced that they're expanding beyond their core work - voter registration - and into the realm of issue advocacy:

Building on the momentum of registering more than 100,000 voters last year, HeadCount has launched a new campaign called “What’s Your Issue?” that encourages fans of live music to take the next steps beyond voting to become more informed, active citizens. Anyone who answers a brief issue survey – either at a concert or online at www.HeadCount.org – will be entered in a drawing to win two free VIP tickets to Outside Lands Music Festival, held in San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park August 28-30, 2009, plus round-trip airfare for two on Southwest Airlines from anywhere in the U.S.

The campaign will visit concert tour stops this summer by Dave Matthews Band, Phish, The Fray and NINJA (Nine Inch Nails and Janes Addiction). Festivals such as Bonnaroo, ROTHBURY, High Sierra Music Festival, All Good Music Festival, Camp Bisco and Gathering of the Vibes will also host the “What’s Your Issue?” campaign. [...]

HeadCount continues to offer voter information and registration services at its concert tables and at www.HeadCount.org. The organization also provides a wide range of resources that facilitate civic participation. The HeadCount blog (www.HeadCount.org/blog) is a one-stop online community updated daily with news on “Music, Politics and Everything In Between.” HeadCount street teams are partnering with local nonprofit organizations, such as Save the Bay, and creating joint volunteer outings. HeadCount makes it easy to write to members of Congress, with pre-printed letters available at concerts and online at www.HeadCount.org. It’s all part of an effort to give music fans the tools to be involved, active citizens, while creating a real community of fans who are bound by shared ideals.

The “What’s Your Issue?” survey serves as the gateway to the HeadCount community. It lists six issues that, according to a recent online poll, are particularly important to fans of live music. They are:

• Food and Farm Policy
• Health Care Reform
• Personal Liberty
• Gulf Coast Recovery
• Human Rights
• Sustainability and Conservation

Once someone identifies the issue most important to them, they are sent a link to an area of HeadCount.org devoted to that issue. Users will find a blog, background information, artist interviews and links to related websites. Most important, they’ll also find a “Take Action” area that enables them to volunteer for a related organization or email their Congressional representatives.

This is a great organization and a great campaign. And their new website is super clean and a cut well above their previous site. As usual, I can't recommend HeadCount highly enough. Go check them out.

GOP duckspeakers continue to allude to the heart of this country being center-right, when in fact this country is neither center-right nor center-left. I say that because right-left notions are tied-up with political rhetoric, not always governing philosophies. The left has got into the game, as well, citing surveys that today's youth are the most progressive generation in modern American history. Regardless if there are facts or not, both are trying to mainstream their ideas on the center/moderate public. The political reality may be that the center-left coalitions are winning today, but as with many things when you take the long view, there are cycles.

The choice isn't between having a left or right cycle, but instead industrialism versus nature and tradition. We are finding out that the actuary systems that govern a lot of our fiscal choices are not all together accurate. And, in fact, given so much weight, in order to maximize profits, that it discounts the human factor. But that's what we're bring back!

In Peter Levine's post, a darker As You Like It, he conjures up Polanyi and overlays what we know about the transformation to a market economy:

In As You Like It, Celia and Rosalind are disinherited. So is Orlando, forced to flee by his rapacious landowning brother Oliver. Oliver also dismisses the old retainer Adam, treating his labor as a commodity and ignoring his family tie. The Old Duke is in Arden because he has been cast off his land. Even Corin the shepherd has lost his ancestral rights. He succinctly describes Karl Polanyi's "Great Tansformation" from the old economy based on family bonds, inherited status, and gifts, to the new one based on private property, contracts, profits, and exchange...

I don't think we can or necessarily would want to return to the "old economy", but that doesn't mean we have to accept the status quo of the modern industrial economy. For one, I think we need to elevate the status of other factors so that they are equally, and sometimes given precedence over other values.

We could put the earth first; a crazy concept I know, but let's think about how King County in the state of Washington puts this into practice. Their motto says it all, "Providing efficient, effective and innovative service." King Country is smart about city planning; in a way, they give nature ultimate rights over country property, because they need to protect their communities' watersheds, which all need to survive. This isn't anything new, however. Other countries, such as Sweden, have been developing new city planning models, which rely heavily on living within the means that nature provides for them. It's as if your mother told you to turn off the lights when you exited a room, it's not so much that it wastes money as it wastes energy.

On the other side of the Pacific ocean, Japanese anime has started to spread to young audiences worldwide. Some of the most popular animes include a theme about the conflicts between the old ways of doing things and the new ways. Many times, this theme is played out theatrically as nature versus industrialization in various fighting sequences. And what a fight it is.

Back in the U.S., we let the cowboy, frontier mindset carry us up into the dizzying heights of the economic stratosphere, only to let us fall plunging back down, without a plan to protect our fall and in complete dissary as to what has just happened. At the individual level the culprit is reckless self-interest. But what happened on a larger level is even more sinister and very correctable; we put more value on financial stocks and bonds and manufacturing products, than we did on raising healthy families and communities and managing our finite resources. Traditional values such as these are back on the rise among America's youth, which should translate into another great transformation. Remember, nothing lasts forever, and that includes our current economic assumptions.

(Then again, energy seems to always be part any human endeavor and perhaps the new economy could value energy, both for efficiency and quality, as the tangible commodity we can use to barter and trade. Just a thought.)

JWT's February AnxietyIndex quantitative study examined attitudes around current events with a sample of both 18-29 year olds as well as a small sample of teens.

Young people are certainly feeling the effects of the recession, 77% are feeling nervous or anxious as a result of the economic conditions. Its nearly even with the overall 18 and over sample.

Teens, however, are a little less anxious but still 64% are. The difficult stat is the 46% of parents who don't think their teens are worried about the economic conditions. Unfortunatly, 71% of teens surveyed are more likely to have increased anxiety as a result of talking to their parents (the ones who don't think their kids are worried). Sixty percent draw anxiety from conversations with teachers about the economy.

When looking at the issues that concern most Americans and comparing it to youth, the economy is overwhelmingly the number one issue with cost of living following behind, and health care in a near third place. Where young people are even with the overall electorate is with their concerns about job security and our current military hostilities. Interestingly, few Americans have fears about the political leadership which probably accounts for the high job approval ratings for the President.

Closer examination about attitudes and anxieties that young people have - its interesting to see that 60% of young people feel like they are being dealt with unfairly during this recession. This makes some of the work that 80 Million Strong is doing even more important. The 80M project, if you haven't heard, is working to develop support among young people to lobby Congress and the White House to look at the economic conditions and job market from the youth perspective as well as the middle aged perspective - because youth unemployment is actually greater than overall unemployment. This, of course, while we shoulder obscene debt from college or predatory credit card companies.

Further, only 34% say their friends have interesting "entrepreneurial" jobs to make money, and 70% say most of the people their age are worried about the recession.

Check this one out. Due to the difficulties we're facing more teens are being forced to think about things normally left up to adults. This can have an interesting effect on youth as they grow as well. Ideally, they'll be more likely to be aware of their own financial situation and more aware of predatory credit card companies. But those choosing whether or not to attend college might put off such a huge purchase because they fear for their own financial stability.

Most encouraging is that while the top three fears of youth have to do with jobs after graduation, giving up things because of financial hardships, and concerns about their parents, the forth major concern is that the condition of the planet being left to their generation will be less than they feel they deserve. On the chart of concerns, this is actually the only ideological concern for teens. The others consisted of typical ego issues and economic hardship questions.

I think this gives some interesting room for Congress and the White House to work in the upcoming years. Not only are 18-29 year olds deeply concerned about the environment, but up and coming voters very seriously care about the condition of the planet. I think this might even put to bed any concerns about our environmental progress over the next several years. As Global Warming Deniers die off they'll be quickly replaced with strong environmentalists.

Finally, when looking at what things both young people and teens are willing to give up in tough economic times an overwhelming number said they couldn't give up their internet connection or cell phones, because they use it for social connectivity. Ninety percent of teens said they had to have an internet connection, and only 11% of 18-29 year olds said they'd be willing to give it up. Seventy-three percent of teens wouldn't give up their phones, and 89% of 18-29 year olds wouldn't. This also gives us a pretty strong picture of the best way to communicate with young people probably won't change for a long time. Online and cell phones were a major connection from campaigns and orgs this election, they'll only become more powerful with attitudes like this.

JWT is coming at this from a product and marketing perspective so ideas about anxiety among groups are important to them. Here's why they say things like fear is important:

"Fear is rising fast amid a worldwide recession that has corporations slashing jobs around the globe and many consumers unsure about making the next credit card or mortgage payment. Add a 24-7 media environment in which bad news spreads fast and repeats endlessly, and you have a highly anxious world—and tens of millions of consumers seeking guidance and assurance.

That’s why we believe anxiety matters. Anxious consumers look for brands that can give them a sense of control over their lives, whether that means staying within their budget at the supermarket or finding cheap alternatives to going out. Navigating consumer anxieties is not about exploiting fear. It’s about finding better ways to connect with consumers looking for trust, credibility and answers."

Products are no different than candidates and politicians. Those who can give comfort and trust in a time of crisis and help create a sense of control will be the most successful.

The other day I stumbled upon an interesting piece by Ethan Porter and Elon Plotkin at Campus Progress arguing for a new National Youth Administration, a piece of Roosevelt's New Deal in the '30s and '40s.

In 1935, via Executive Order, President Roosevelt created the National Youth Administration to boost their economic prospects. Today, President Obama would be wise to dust off this oft-overlooked item in the New Deal toolbox, and restart the NYA. Under the auspices of the NYA in the 1930s, young people built ballparks and buildings; today, they should build wind turbines and solar panels.

Obviously, much has changed in 70 years, and a reconstituted NYA would have to differ dramatically from Roosevelt’s in order to be successful. But if it incorporated the lessons of the original NYA, and adapted to the contours of the twenty-first century economy, a new NYA could bring youth out of the doldrums and give the whole economy a shot in the arm. Moreover, a new NYA could be the incubator for a life-long productive relationship between government and the youngest generation of workers—who, as part of the “Millennial Generation,” are the largest age cohort in American history.

Porter and Plotkin point out in their introduction that when assessing the economic health of young people today, the situation is no better than it was in the Great Depression. Porter and Plotkin cite Bureau of Labor Statistics and Data from 2008, which shows young workers (16-24 years old) suffered through the largest increase in unemployment when compared with every other age bracket. Furthermore, young people, who make up about fourteen or fifteen percent of the work force, make up one-third of the total number of unemployed Americans -- the same proportion young workers reached during the Depression.

So something absolutely needs to be done. And we're on our way to some improvements. This week President Obama signed the Serve America bill into law, tripling the size of Americorps, and retooling the program to address heretofore unmet needs. By establishing the Healthy Futures Corps, the Veterans Corps, and the Education Corps, the Edward M. Kennedy Serve America Act establishes a new sense of pragmatism in the federal government's service efforts, teaches young Americans new skills, and assists them financially in their college search.

As Porter and Plotkin note though, more is needed. The National Youth Administration would provide more of an economic boon, creating secure jobs for a younger, and therefore more mobile, work force. If a future NYA were to be constructed similar to the way it was seventy years ago, student aid would also be connected to the new jobs. In fact, Porter and Plotkin argue for a program as a part of a new NYA that would "pay the top third of all graduating public high school classes." I'm not sure that this is the most effective way of solving the problem, as I don't trust our education system enough to base such a reward on grades and achievement. Nevertheless, the NYA would provide secure jobs to young people, significantly assist youth in receiving an education, and provide some muscle to spur the construction of important infrastructure, such as T. Boone Pickens' wind corridor in the Midwest, as Porter and Plotkin suggest.

Of course, with such a connection to the New Deal, conservatives would have a fit. This would just be one more sign of socialism seizing American capitalism. (You'd think their passion would prod them to produce their own vision for the country, but of course, they're content saying "no" and offering nothing but pettiness and division.) And so the legislative effort might be difficult. But it would be an opportunity for our organization to shine, and it would give us significant press. It'd serve as an issue that would link young people, the economy, possibly the environment, and education. It'd once again put the GOP on the defensive, forcing them to explain away their inability to support a policy that would be so beneficial to youth. But most importantly, such a program might bring the youth employment numbers out of Great Depression territory, allowing multitudes of young people to get their lives back on track.

Some Sunday reading for you.

• The Nation profiles a young immigrant rights activist fighting for the rights of Cambodian women facing deportation.
• A 29 year old Stanford grad and sports agent pushes her clients to reach out to the communities in which they work to give back; not for financial/PR reasons, but because it's the right thing to do.
• Andrew Revkin, at the New York Times blog "Dot Earth," labels the Millennial Generation -- already Generations Y, Q, and O -- Generation E.
• In addition to launching its Ideas for Change in America, change.org is expanding by seven blogs
• The Nation counts the victories of youth activism in 2008.

Yesterday, Mazhira Black -- Young People For Fellow and Living Liberally intern -- posted about starting off your school year on the left foot.

It got us thinking: it's not just the annual tradition of buying new gear, books and attire that deserves a how-to guide with a sustainable slant and lefty lean. There are dozens of events in the calendar year (holidays, Election Day) and in the human life (rites of passage) that would be well marked with a scoop of social consciousness.

So we're kicking off a Liberal Lifecycle Series...and we'd love your help. Whether it's bringing a baby into the world or wishing dearly departed farewell, we hope you'll send us suggestions for those life moments that could use a liberal lilt.

And here's the post that got us thinking this direction...(good luck back in Waco, Mazhira!):

Are you concerned that your free-thinking tyke will forget his liberal roots this fall in the classroom? Why not equip her with all of the essential back to school items that a liberal pupil needs? When you're bombarded with ads telling you what type of parent you are if you don't shop at Walmart to buy your kid the newest Hannah Montana threads or what sugary fruit drink you should pack in their lunch it can be easy to get lost in the crowd.