Showing posts with label
Green Party of the United States.
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Showing posts with label
Green Party of the United States.
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Apache Junction, Ariz., Sept. 8, 2011 -
Today the Pinal County Greens passed a resolution calling for a nationwide ban on hydraulic fracturing (hydrofracking). This action was spurred by the Green Party of New York State, which earlier denounced a report by that state's Department of Environmental Conservation clearing the way "for the petrochemical industry to reap enormous profits, cloaked in the language of the potential economic benefit to workers."
Richard Grayson, co-chair of the Pinal County Greens, members of the Arizona Green Party in the nation's second-fastest-growing county, said the group wanted to express solidarity with the New York Greens and Greens in other states who have been actively involved from the beginning in resisting and fighting the gas and oil industry, promoting legislation to ban hydrofracing and, in the words of Green Party of New York co-chair and 2010 gubernatorial candidate Howie Hawkins, "educating the public about this very ungreen process."
Grayson urged people to educate themselves on the health and environmental problems of hydrofracking, such as this livestream of a Green Party of the United States interview on the topic
and this panel discussion from Green Party's 2011 Annual National Meeting in Alfred, NY last month:
Grayson said that members of the Pinal County Greens saw filmmaker John Fox’s award-winning, Oscar-nominated documentary Gasland at the Community Movie Night in Tempe's Changing Hands Bookstore last May 27 and felt that the film exposed the aftermath of hydrofracking: groundwater contamination, permanent brain damage, air pollution, cancer and other detrimental effects to the health and environment of Americans.
"We stand with Greens and other activists around the nation in condemning this practice," said Grayson. "To protect our health, safety and homes, the Pinal County Greens favor a nationwide ban on hydraulic fracturing."
Minna, left, and Amal, with pro-Mubarak forces in Tahrir Square.
WASHINGTON, DC -- Green Party leaders in the US announced the party's support and encouragement for nonviolent protesters in Tunisia, Egypt, Jordan, Algeria, and other nations in the region who have taken to the streets in demand for an end to corrupt and oppressive regimes.
"The Green Party of the United States supports democracy, here and throughout the world. We hope that the protesters in Egypt succeed in deposing President Mubarak, and we're thrilled to see so many young people stand up against dictators. The best outcome would be for Tunisia, Jordan, Egypt, and Saudi Arabia to improve economic conditions for their populations and embrace democracy, equal rights and protections for women and for ethnic, religious, and sexual minorities, and freedom of the press. We condemn the brutal responses to the protests, including police violence and the shutdown of the Internet," said Dr. Anthony Gronowicz, 2010 Green candidate for Congress in New York's 7th District and a member of the party's International Committee.
Greens noted that the threatened regimes, especially Egyptian President Mubarak's administration, were propped up by the US for the purpose of serving US interests such as access to oil and other resources, the maintenance of military bases on foreign soil, and unequivocal support for Israel's brutal occupation and apartheid system.
"While the Obama Administration has offered some restrained rhetorical support for the demonstrations, the US continues to send the Egyptian government billions of dollars in military aid, some of it now being used by security forces to beat and teargas protesters," said David Doonan, Mayor of Greenwich, New York, and a member of the Green Party. "For true stability in the region, North African and Middle Eastern governments must serve the interests of their own people instead of the demands of the US State Department and western business."
Egypt is the second largest recipient of US military and economic aid ($1.55 billion in 2010), after Israel ($3.175 billion).
"The young people marching for democracy and freedom in these nations are a model for people in the US. We need a mass opposition movement in the US against the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the gross violations of our Constitution in the name of 'homeland security,' and the reckless greed of Wall Street, the insurance industry, oil companies, and other corporations. Let's learn something from the Tunisian protesters: our outrage should not be directed at Wikileaks but at our own government's secret policies and actions that were exposed by the Wikileaks cables, such as the US bombing of Yemen and the attempts to undermine the Copenhagen talks on global warming," said Farheen Hakeem, co-chair of the Green Party of the United States.
Retired General Abdel Moneim Al Aasar, current head of Egypt's Green Party
