Climate Pledge of Resistance » support needed

What would you risk to save the planet?

deadlyvine — Mon, 21 Feb 2011 23:05:36 +0000

Ten years in prison? Your career? Or just your permanent record?

A little over two years ago, our friend and comrade Tim DeChristopher put it all on the line when he entered a federal auction and derailed it so that oil and gas companies could not destroy the planet.

Tim is now facing ten years in prison on two felony charges for stopping that illegal sale of public land. Furthermore, federal prosecutors have decided to make an example of Tim, so that anyone speaking out or taking effective action to save their community or the planet will be intimidated into staying home.

Rising Tide North America is proudly standing with Tim DeChristopher, and anyone else who takes bold action in the defense of the planet. At his trial on Feb. 28, we’re joining Tim’s group and Rising Tide affiliate, Peaceful Uprising as they mobilize outside the courthouse in solidarity with Tim.

If you able to join us, please come to Salt Lake City for the Uprising Summit on Feb 25-27 and Tim’s trial on Feb 28. If you can’t join us, consider organizing a solidarity action in support of Tim in your home town.

Thanks for all your support.

When you donate to Peaceful Uprising, your money is funding creative, hard-hitting, dynamic actions.

Action is Our New Year’s Resolution!

deadlyvine — Mon, 24 Jan 2011 03:18:54 +0000

Dear Friends,

While many environmental groups have spent the past year bumbling over climate legislation and devising better list-building and branding strategies, Rising Tide has been building the climate justice movement and challenging the root causes of climate change. Nowhere is this more evident than in the northern Rockies.

Over the past year, climate activists in Montana and Idaho, led by Northern Rockies Rising Tide have organized to stop mining equipment shipments bound for Canada’s oil sands.

Sign up for the April 20 Day of Action Against Extraction

Oregon, Idaho and Montana have fast become a hub of resistance to tar sands oil expansion. Companies like Exxon and Conoco Phillips have spent millions in hauling this equipment from Korea, up the Columbia and Snake Rivers to Lewiston, ID where they are awaiting transport on big rigs to Alberta. Once in Alberta they will continue the expansion of tar sands to feed pipelines with oil to the United States and Asia.

Local activists from the region have fought these “heavy haul” shipments in the courts, the regulatory hearings, the media and the community. They’ve organized teach-ins and action camps, but each day the oil barons get closer and closer to beginning the shipments. This spring, the campaign will only escalate as residents will use people powered to slow the flow of climate-destroying earth-wrecking tar sands oil.

Northern Rockies Rising Tide is one chapter in Rising Tide’s network. On April 20th, the anniversary of the BP oil spill, Rising Tide groups all over North America will be taking action against extractive industry. It’s time we began to push back whether it’s in the mountains of Appalachia, the streets of San Francisco, New York or Chicago or on the oil drenched shores of the Gulf of Mexico. Get involved now!

Thanks for all you do.

For Mother Earth,
Rising Tide North America
http://risingtidenorthamerica.org

A Tar Sands Pledge of Resistance

deadlyvine — Sun, 05 Sep 2010 16:26:01 +0000

Engagement à la Résistance contre les Sables Bitumineux [En français ici]

At a recent climate camp in North America, activists began collecting signatures for a tar sands pledge of resistance. We invite you to sign on to commit to action against a fossil fuel pipeline and pumping project (”Trailbreaker”) that may bring tar sands bitumen through infrastructure across several American states and Canadian provinces. If we cannot overturn these industry plans, tar sands bitumen will be sent through Alberta, Saskatchewan, Manitoba, North Dakota, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Illinois, Michigan, Ontario, Quebec, Vermont, and Maine — before tankers bring this sludge to the Gulf Coast of Texas!

These and other tar sands operations amount to the single-most destructive and unsustainable project on earth. (See this brief H2oil segment for an excellent introduction.)

Just north of Vermont, over 200 people recently joined the resistance as they passed through the Quebec Climate Action Camp in Dunham. The camp was erected to strengthen growing resistance toward the construction of a pumping station, which would be part of the Enbridge Trailbreaker project, cutting across the community. At the end of the climate camp, activists and community members launched the next step in the campaign against dirty oil’s eastward expansion: a Pledge of Resistance. Activists in the region around the climate camp will continue creating a broad network of community members and supporters to educate about the dangers of the Trailbreaker project, and take action to stop it.

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The Quebec Climate Camp Pledge of Resistance

Enbridge and the Portland Montreal Pipeline’s proposed pumping station threatens the health, water, environment and lands of the people of Dunham and the region.

The pumping station, part of Enbridge’s Trailbreaker pipeline project, is intended to carry dirty oil from the most environmentally destructive enterprise in human history, the Alberta tar sands.

The companies and government-backers behind this proposed pumping station are ignoring community wishes and concerns, including demands for an independent environmental assessment.

The community has never consented to the project. All along the trail of the pipeline, opposition is growing.

Between August 7 and 23, 2010, community members joined forces with supporters from across Quebec, Canada, and North America to hold a Climate Action Camp. to strengthen the campaign against the Trailbreaker. We gathered to educate, create new ties, and mobilize a diverse movement to stop oil companies from polluting our communities and contributing to climate catastrophe.

Because of the grave threat the Trailbreaker project poses to the climate, the community and all others in its path, we pledge to engage in non-violent direct action to stop the pumping station should they ever attempt to follow through with its construction without community consent.

Sign now!

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While this trail breaking pledge is local, the context and needed responses are global, with connections to your home. There are many points of intervention against tar sands infrastructure, but we also must form a united front!

Climate Change Activists: Join the Vancouver Convergence

deadlyvine — Thu, 11 Feb 2010 06:56:58 +0000

A coalition of environmental activists led by GatewaySucks.org is calling on climate change activists to join the convergence at the 2010 Olympic Games in Vancouver.

When the 2010 Winter Olympics start a couple of weeks from now in Vancouver, BC the athletes and spectators will be joined by organizations with some of the worst records on climate change.

General Motors is a national partner for the games, and one of the leading corporate opponents of effective action on climate change. Only two years ago, a vice-chairman of GM called global warming a “total crock of shit.” GM is supplying a large fleet of vehicles for the games, almost all of which are gas-guzzling SUVs.

Petro-Canada, another National Olympic Partner, is the retail arm of the largest extractor of Oil Sands bitumen. The Oil Sands are Canada’s biggest ghg emissions point source.

RBC (the Royal Bank of Canada) in addition to being a prominent Olympic sponsor is the largest commercial bank funder of the Oil Sands,. TransCanada pipelines, whose pipelines connect to the Oil Sands, is also an official supplier.

The government of British Columbia is the main funder and promoter of the games. They kicked off a massive plan to add over 1,000 km of new highway lanes (an increase of over 2,000,000 annual tonnes of CO2e emissions ) with the Sea-to-Sky Highway expansion for the Olympics. These plans include the controversial Gateway Program. It continues to heavily subsidize the oil and gas industry which resulted in it being the only Canadian province to see ghg emissions from industrial sources increase in 2008.

The Federal government of Canada which consistently earned “Fossil Awards” at the most recent international climate talks also is a major funder for the Olympics.

These corporations and governments want to fool the world with their claim that these are the “Greenest Games Ever” despite the links to climate change deniers, highway expansion and the Oil Sands.

If you would like to endorse this call-out and the welcoming committee event please contact info@gatewaysucks.org.

MORE INFORMATION:

Convergence Info: http://olympicresistance.net/

Welcoming Committee: http://2010welcoming.wordpress.com/

Green Olympic Watch: http://2010greenwatch.org/

GatewaySucks.org: http://www.gatewaysucks.org/

2010 Climate Crime Scene: http://2010climatecrime.org

Nine-Day Tree Sit Ends, Sitters Vow Not Over Until Blasting Stops

deadlyvine — Sun, 31 Jan 2010 06:46:54 +0000

Friday, January 29th, 2010

UPDATE – legal support needed! click here

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Contact: 304-854-7372, news@climategroundzero.org
Note: For more info, see : www.climategroundzero.org, www.mountainjustice.org

PETTUS, WVa—After blocking Massey Energy’s operations on the Bee Tree Permit for nine days, Amber Nitchman, 19, and Eric Blevins, 28 descended from their respective trees. They had occupied the two oak trees—originally accompanied by a third tree sitter, David Aaron Smith, 23—to protest mountaintop removal and the blasting of Coal River Mountain. Upon descent, they were immediately arrested by West Virginia State Troopers. The sitters’ decision to leave the trees was made in light of the recent drop in temperature.

After a week of Massey security harassing the sitters with deafening sirens and air horns, a call-in pressure campaign was launched by Climate Ground Zero, Mountain Justice and other anti-mountaintop removal groups. The receipt of hundreds of calls from around the country led to an emergency meeting with Climate Ground Zero volunteers, the Raleigh County prosecutor and Governor Manchin. The meeting resulted in the moratorium and a call for an investigation of the abuse.

The tree sit represents Climate Ground Zero’s most sustained intervention in mountaintop removal mining operations since its campaign of nonviolent direct action began last February. Volunteers know that the fight is far from over and expect work to commence on the Bee Tree site immediately. However, they see this tree sit as a victory. “It halted blasting for nine days. I think they’ve wildly succeeded with their goals,” said Climate Ground Zero volunteer Mike Bowersox. In a final communication from her perch, Nitchman captured the group’s resolve. “Its not over until the blasting is stopped,” she said.

photos and more available at www.climategroundzero.net