10 women making positive strides worldwide.

It is clear that the more power women have, the more positive change we will see on a global level.

“If you empower women, you can change the world,” said actress-activist Meg Ryan while trekking across northern India on a third world humanitarian mission with representatives from the international aid organization CARE. The goal is to break through barriers keeping so many women in poverty and without rights.  Like Ryan, the women on our list tap their armories to confront, protest and articulate what it takes to improve lives and the planet at large.

1. Kavita Ramdas

Leader of The Global Fund for Women, Ramdas has garnered unprecedented support for international human rights for her sisters by tripling grant assets during her tenure from $6 million to $21 million. Fluent in Hindi/Urdu, English, German and conversational Tamil, Spanish and French, she speaks the language most activists care about today: The wide ranging exportation of good will. The Fund’s grants have ranged from several hundred to kick start a business to $800,000 to halt human trafficking of females and sexual  abuse. In an interview with journalist Lynn Sherr, Ramdas says this is the moment for women in making a difference and an impact on poverty, ongoing war and militarization, which perpetuates a culture of violence against women: “Violence against women continues to be condoned on some level,” she shared. “Why is it that you have statistics like a woman being raped every six minutes in this country, in the United States?”

 2. Hillary Clinton

“Obviously, we and many other nations are quite hopeful that these ‘flickers of progress’ as President Obama called them will be ignited into a movement for change that will benefit the people of the country,” the 67th Secretary of State Clinton articulated upon arriving in reform-ready Burma as the first senior American diplomat to visit in 50 years. Taking the high road in standing by her man-boss, Clinton’s brilliance and measurable experience makes many wonder what if she had been elected president? Hillary-speak ranges from talking gay rights at the UN to gauging parliamentary elections in Russia and passionately seeking an end to the horrendous treatment of women in post-revolution Egypt. The always eloquent and former first lady proves resourcefulness and resiliency are DNA advantages which allow women like her to lead, shine and earn their very own spots in history.

3. Rachel Maddow

Demonstrating the growing popularity of the MSNBC talk show host was her edging out Michael Moore in an Alternet poll of the Most Influential Progressive Media Figures of the year. A charismatic, somewhat androgynous counterpart to the neo-conservative women of Fox News, Maddow clearly holds her own sans the biting wit and sarcasm of John Stewart or shameless flirtatious fluttering of a Piers Morgan. She’s real – the Christiane Amanpour of her time who doesn’t need to risk life and limb in wartime to gain worldwide attention. The Rachel Maddow Show is the second highest-rated program in its time slot ahead of Larry King Live, behind only Fox News Channel’s Sean Hannity Show. Whether or not they dig the liberal pundit, viewers who tune in certainly are enlightened on why crucial change in jobs, healthcare, housing and hunger are occurring so slowly – with a mirror held up to the GOP.

4. Asmaa Mahfouz

Call it the vlog that sparked a revolution – and it was delivered by one Egyptian woman who had had enough. Thousands fled to Tahrir Square, the Egyptian government tried to block Facebook and you know the rest. One of  five recipients awarded the Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thought in 2011, Asmaa Mahfouz went from relative obscurity to overnight becoming a hero, credited with spurring on that mass uprising. So many who watched her on YouTube were moved by her bravery. As one wrote: “Asmaa, you have inspired the whole world with your strength of spirit and courage. As you know, governments don’t speak for the people; Governments usually speak only for the rich and powerful. ” Hopefully, she can lend the same courage to combating the systematic violence against women in post-revolution Egypt – where journalists and protesters are stripped and brutalized in the same streets where women risked their lives to effect change.

5. Maude Barlow

“Do not listen to those who say there is nothing you can do to the very real and large social and environmental issues of our time,” warns Maude Barlow, a charismatic Canadian who serves as national chairperson of the Council of Canadians and the Washington-based Food and Water Watch. She also founded the San Francisco-based International Forum on Globalization and a Councilor with the Hamburg-based World Future Council. Barlow practices what she preaches when it comes to water woes and climate change issues – earning 11 honorary doctorates and countless awards including the 2005 Right Livelihood Award (alternative Nobel) and the 2009 Earth Day Canada Outstanding Environmental Achievement Award. More recently, she was named the U.N Senior Advisor on Water Issues – the ideal person to convince governments that clean water is a fundamental legal human right that must be preserved through laws and immediate action.

6. Meg Ryan

It would be cliche to describe this former “Sally” as the quintessential girl next door (since it has been done repeatedly) as now she is a full fledged woman, who seeks to empower the disadvantaged – exporting good will to the third world. Ryan’s four-day trip across northern India with CARE signaled she has entered another phase of stardom, getting comfortable in her own skin to “hold hands” with some of the world’s most disadvantaged women. Ryan, like other Hollywood do-gooders (Oprah, Sandra Bullock, Angelina Jolie, Christina Applegate, Isabella Rossellini) has the gift of visibility; wherever she goes the cameras follow and that leads to public awareness.

7. Michelle Goldberg
 

Former Senior writer for Salon and current author and Senior Contributing Writer for The Daily Beast and Newsweek, Goldberg counters the radical extremism of the Michelle Bachmann’s of the world in pushing for reproductive freedom for women and affordable healthcare for all – in addition to other progressive platforms. Her first book, Kingdom Coming: The Rise of Christian Nationalism was a New York Times bestseller and a finalist for the 2007 New York Public Library Helen Bernstein Award for Excellence in Journalism. More recently she made a solid platform in her Feminist Case for Flawed Reform - penning a manifesto of sorts  which puts forth the inequities of the health-insurance system and how legislation will further erode abortion coverage for women – a major step backward for reproductive rights. Yet feminists should support it anyway, she argues: “More than 17 million women are uninsured, and millions more are under-insured. Women are more likely to rely on their spouse’s insurance coverage leaving them vulnerable if they’re divorced or widowed, if their husband becomes old enough to qualify for Medicare or if their partner’s employer decides to drop dependent coverage, which is happening with increasing frequency.”

8. Kate Stohr

Grassroots design for the greater good is what Architecture For Humanity envisions. So with that, Stohr and co-founder, Cameron Sinclair, endeavored to direct $4 million in disaster relief and rebuilding in post-Katrina New Orleans and tsunami ravaged Southeast Asia. What started as a humanitarian non-profit has expanded into an international force with 40 chapters on five continents which networks with local partners to develop innovative models in sustainable and humanitarian design solutions. No wonder she was named one of the great green giants by Tree Hugger as well as being honored as the recipient of Wired magazine’s 2006 Rave Award for Architecture. A former journalist, she has tapped her background in project management, website development and deep understanding of urban planning issues as managing director of AFH. Smart urban planning might be the very thing that saves cities, as well as denizens who will be facing increasing shortages in resources as the U.S. continues to be late to the plate when it comes to taking action.

9. Anita Acevedo

Warm healing hands as insight into the body over western meds and cutting? Acevedo is booked months in advance as word has spread that this rolfer and former family therapist offers the integrated alternative approach to modern medicine with a track record of healing patients with herniated disks, pinched nerves, drop foot injuries, and all other debilitating neurological and physical impairments brought on by activity or age. She also has aided infants suffering from chronic earaches and colic and children with ADD, scoliosis and autism as well as teens dealing with anxiety and hormonal shifts. The fact the southerner practices in Marin County is further testament to her positioning herself in the hub of the naturopathic and homeopathic revolution in health care – teaming with psychotherapists and other well known practitioners like Dr. Todd Maderis to take away acute pain. It all was born of her own healing when she was an endurance athlete in Alaska competing in 100 mile adventure races that took a toll. “My body was compressed, achy, tight and off balance with chronic pain in my low back and my jaw was so tight I was experiencing migraines,” she recalls. “Through Dr. Rolf’s life study of manipulating and organizing connective tissue, I became taller, more flexible and graceful. Many of the unresolved childhood traumas I had been processing began to be uncovered as my body unfolded and opened.”

10. Laura Kimpton

Her mammoth Burning Man installations  go beyond her highly collected montages and encaustic works to spread messages such as “MOM” and “LOVE” and “OINK.” Her book Who Gave Birth that came out in 2010 was described by the Northern California artist as “a celebration of all MOMS and the feminine energy that comprises the true understanding that the original MOM is the earth.” Kimpton salvages recycled objects for her mixed media – found objects, bird skulls, original photos, picture frames, books and resin to let her creativity take flight. If you consider art to be effective communication, then you can see how one persuasive Kimpton picture is worth a thousand words.

Image: Perfecto Insecto, Lilianwagdy, Laura Kimpton, CARE, Architect, Council of Canadians, Paulagordon, RolfingMarin, NYDailyNews

They’re out there competing for dollars and attention and making a big difference.

As the troops prepare to come back home we face the daunting task of absorbing their return. Housing, health care, jobs and schooling – not to mention how to treat PTSD which we now know plagues scads of combat units when settling into civilian life. It brings to mind non profits – the other army of good soldiers – with countless missions. The staffer and volunteers running these organizations deal with these hard  issues and so much more in aiding people daily while often relying on deeper souls than pockets.

Lagging behind in the economic recovery and tapping social networking opportunities like Facebook to garner desperately needed support, nonprofits deal in everyday drama that disrupts everyday lives. And some of our favorites are designed to motivate the nation’s youth to pitch in with incentives that go beyond community service credits at school.

The frigid winds of December bring even more disruption, upping the demand for shelter from the cold, provisions for soup kitchens, and support for those finding it challenging to get through holiday cheer emotionally unscathed. With all this in mind, here are ten nonprofits to put on your radar – ones covering urgent needs as well as going to bat for long range ideals.

San Francisco Child Abuse Prevention

Mural artist Susan Mack decks the halls of the Talk Line treatment center in the Haight where this agency’s approach is to stop the cycle of violence by treating the entire family. This resource which sets a national standard, treats the entire family to a holiday party every year while also packaging toys and necessities on the wish list. As a testament to director/attorney Katie Albright – daughter of former secretary of state Madeline – and the other staffers at this welcoming hub – the decorative murals are usually kept up the rest of the year or as long as possible to lift spirits.

Does art heal what is hurting these children? It’s all part of the entire package, one that relies on charitable gifts and volunteerism to break the cycle while teaching struggling families how to cope with stress, poverty, drugs and challenges that can put us over the edge.

 Spark

Spark seeks to ignite global change by building a community of young, global citizens invested in changing inequality towards women throughout the world. The strategy – as described in its mission statement – is to cultivate a community of young professionals actively involved in women’s issues on a grassroots level and to educate through forums, volunteer opportunities and international delegation trips to countries where women and girls are prevented to lead the lives they deserve. What ignited Spark? In 2004 Maya Garcia read an article about Sanaa Abu Bhkeet, a young Palestinian runner who overcame great adversities  for the Olympics. She joined forces with the co-founders and in five years, raised over $350,000 for grassroots women organizations in Rwanda, Mexico, Bangladesh, Jordan, Kenya, Zimbabwe, Afghanistan and the U.S.

Peer Health Exchange

Since students living at or below the poverty line experience more than their share of serious health risks from teenage pregnancy to obesity, this agency recruits, selects and trains college student volunteers to go into high school classrooms and teach a comprehensive health curriculum that ranges from sexual health to substance abuse and nutrition. The key? PHE takes the cue from research showing teens process and absorb health info better when delivered by educators of a similar age. Workshops conducted by these volunteer “role models” help students practice skills such as effective communication, risk evaluation and prevention, setting limits and making important decisions in role-play scenarios that resemble difficult, real-life crises. Anyone who has had sex ed taught by a 60-something teacher can appreciate how teenagers feel less awkward discussing this stuff with peers.

Environmental Career Center

The Environmental Career Center with an active job board is considered one of the most experienced recruiting and resource firms for matching the public with green jobs in environmental, building and energy sectors. Seeking to connect leading employers with top candidates for a sustainable future, the staff boasts one of the largest environmental databases around containing 34,000 resumes and over 60,000 hungry visitors to its web site per month. The focus is on green building (LEED®), energy efficiency and environmental compliance, renewable energy and sustainable businesses. Its services cover PASE Corps (training and staffing program), contract staffing for its clients, recruitment/outsourcing and contingency searches (finding the best option for filling  mid-level management, sales and tech positions).

National Suicide Prevention Lifeline

Throwing out a line to bullied or stressed out teens, veterans and victims of holiday blues, the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline networks with 132 crisis centers in the U.S., offering a 24-hour toll-free hotline to anyone in suicidal crisis or emotional distress. Callers are routed to the nearest crisis center for immediate counseling and local mental health referrals. In addition, it provides preventative educational tools at an online library for schools in helping to train teachers and other employees to recognize kids in pain and how to treat them. The nonprofit recognizes suicide often effects an entire community so it takes the community approach to prevention.

Medical Teams International

The goal of Medical Teams International is to export international good will and services to aid people stricken by disaster, conflict and poverty through effective programs meeting guidelines of the global health community. Volunteers bring their expertise to Africa, East Asia, Eurasia, Latin America and the U.S. with cores set up to address community health issues (including HIV, child survival, water and sanitation and clinic construction and rehab), dental programs, disaster response, emergency medical services, medical services and training and medical supply distribution.

Trust for Public Land

Mapping land worth conserving nationwide, the Trust helps agencies and communities to set aside precious property as well as lending a hand in the design and development of parks and playgrounds. Posting their lively photos on Facebook to spur involvement, it’s all about open spaces for play, relaxation, good health and connection with nature. “Our goal is to ensure that every American has access to a park within a ten-minute walk from home,” says the agency, adding the need for more parks has never been greater. The group has set a $250,000 goal to meet that need for humans as well as their four legged friends.

Reading Partners

If you ask friends about their favorite nonprofits, chances are they will cite some type of literacy program such as Reading Partners, which strives for all the nation’s children to acquire the skills they need to reach full potential – and of course that involves becoming lifelong readers. Focusing on individualized instruction with measurable results, the group reaches out to children from low-income communities with fewer opportunities. Partnering with schools (hence the name), the agency offers one-on-one tutoring with a caring volunteer. Once enrolled, English-speaking students in grades K-5 who have fallen behind six months to two years in reading receive two 45-minute tutoring sessions a week. As educators know, reading is the gateway skill tied to succeeding in every subject in school.

Philly Friendship Circle: Friends for a Caring World

Pairing teen volunteers with special needs children, this caring organization based in Philadelphia schedules excellent activities from weekly play dates at home to structured weekend programs and holiday blow outs. Established a little over six years ago, the eye is on fun and recreation as well as building bridges of community spirit. Teen volunteers find personal satisfaction from giving and are trained by staff therapists to be friendly, giving and attentive to the children partaking in the programs that reach the Jewish community and beyond: Among them: Sunday Circle Respite Sessions to celebrate culture and customs; Sports and Cooking Circles; Sibling Support and Drop Off programs (kids dropped at Saturday Night Parties or Sunday Afternoon Carnivals).

National Coalition for Homeless Veterans

It’s almost inconceivable that those who have fought to protect homelands have no place to call home, yet the Veteran’s Administration estimates one-third of the homeless population are veterans – 107,000 homeless on any given night. Most are male and single and come from urban areas and suffer from mental illness, alcohol/substance abuse or co-occurring disorders. Nearly half served during the Vietnam era while others served in Grenada, Panama, Lebanon, Afghanistan and Iraq. Among them, 56 percent are said to be African American or Hispanic and reasons for being on the street are linked to poverty, lack of support networks and overcrowded or substandard housing. How does the NCHV help? The most comprehensive source for restoring lives, it is governed by a 17-member board and serves as the resource and tech assistance center for a national network of community based service providers and local, state and federal agencies. The group also provides emergency and supportive housing, food, health services,job training, placement assistance, legal aid and case management support for hundreds of thousands of homeless vets each year.

Kids Against Hunger

Founded in 1999, the organization’s mission is to reduce the number of hungry children in the USA while feeding starving children throughout the world. This huge endeavor is done by packaging nutritious, vitamin-fortified, soy-rice casserole by volunteers at locations within the U.S. and Canada. The meals are distributed to over 60 countries through partnerships with humanitarian organizations worldwide. Volunteers boast packing over 48 million meals for children and their families in 2009 alone. Does the food get in the right hands? The organization does not look to governments to ensure people are getting fed.

“We rely on the expertise of trustworthy feeding partners whom we have long-standing relations with and whom we can count on for getting food safely to its destination,” they say.

ALSO CHECK OUT:

Image: Ed Yourdon

Finding the green in print publications.

You’d be surprised by which magazines use recycled paper these days. While it’s expected from from publications like Plenty and Ode (and many on our list below), there are plenty of others using recycled content in addition to publishing articles on conscious and environmental topics. Here are nine magazines worth plunking down cash for in the age of online media. 

1. Mother Jones

Never the mother of convention, Mother Jones seeks not just to expose but to move to action, as witnessed in its recycled pages and commitment to pressing planet-worthy issues. Environmental coverage ranges from asking how green your Thanksgiving menu is to the next frontier in natural gas wars.

2. Audubon

Audubon Magazine stays off the endangered list by staying current when it comes to fish and fowl play, tracking stewards of the planet who are protecting forests and swamps from urban encroachment, serving up responsible seafood guides and measuring solar power in the southwestern deserts.

3. Shape

Once limited to hot yoga bodies and the best bob cut, Shape is not ready to ship out yet, discovering glossy is sustainable on recycled paper. Being attached to the health and fitness network for the publication has come to mean both pumping iron and peddling good green gift guides, organic and local eating, non-toxic cosmetics and and stress-free tips for going green.

4. Ms. Magazine

The feminist movement has been a slippery slope for women yet Steinem’s Ms. Magazine has grown up to be an unflagging feminist-environmentalist platform that speaks out about green jobs, oil policies, the link between toxins and breast cancer, and LEED progress in our cities. This commitment to issues that concern us all reflect the movement’s global view that what is good for women of the planet is good for humanity.

5. Inc.

Inc. Magazine, a business journal has introduced The Green 50 – a collection of entrepreneurial companies that are profiting the new-fashioned way – prioritizing sustainability and responsibility over the bad boy behavior which led to the occupation of Wall Street. This sort of content keeps Inc. afloat and admirable in the sea of boring financial chronicles.

6. Outside

The hike to high ground lets Outside do its business on recycled paper while National Geographic comes up disappointingly short in this department despite its worldly title. (According to the Daily Green,the excuse is that recycled paper doesn’t fit into the overall plan to cut carbon emissions?) We also applaud Outside‘s green coverage which steps outside of its usual range in fresh topical features – ranging from Hollywood glam to curbing the excesses of football stadiums.

7.  Adbusters

Busting capitalism-driven affluenza is just part of the picture when it comes to Adbusters which goes one step further than Alternet to also bust the powers that be in new articles like Suppressing Nonviolent Dissent which exposing the crimes we are witnessing on our home turf but failing to see broadcast as crimes by conventional media. One of the first to switch to recycled paper, Adbusters is more timely than Time could ever be.

8. Sierra

Sierra magazine stays on the right path, giving us a big dose of natural habitat along with excellent content such as ranking the greenest colleges, gauging farmer’s carbon footprints and even rounding up the most sustainable soups. Counting more than a million active readers, the Sierra Club’s magazine reflects its readers passion to “explore, enjoy and protect the planet.”

9. Nylon

An unlikely publication to use recycled content paper for their magazine, especially with the name Nylon, but editors feature eco-focused stories lauding green makeup routines, healthier cosmetics and include accessories such as time pieces that run on solar power. 

Images: Robert Couse-Baker;  Mother Jones; Audubonmagazine; Vegetarianstar; wonkette; Inc. Magazine; Outside; Rachel Ray; Adbusters; Sierraclub; Nylon, Joel Bedford

A look at 10 powerful men who have grown to become better people who in turn, better our lives.

We continue to seek leaders among movers and shakers capable of making a difference. Who is out there, we ask, in these bleak times to govern, protect and prosper? Here is a look at some men who have proven able to rise to challenging tasks, become better people with stances of substance, and capable of changing our world in a myriad number of positive ways.

1. Steve Jobs

We can’t help but think of Apple founder Steve Jobs, the single most important figure to date to spring from Silicon Valley, who leaves behind an enormous legacy after losing his battle with pancreatic cancer at 56. Likened to titans Ford and Edison by The Globe and Mail, he lives on in downloaded songs, finger swipes and sleek white headphones – “a man whose vision ended up disrupting almost every creative and commercial industry on Earth” thereby changing the earth as we know it. While cynics have said there is a special place in hell for technology peddlers who insure gadgets are readily replaced, Jobs gave us the convenience factor which made it easier to do what we do most: cyber speak.

It appeared everything he touched turned to gold, from the Macintosh and mouse to the iPad and Pixar. True, he changed the world with his visionary acumen but also the world changed him as he confronted his mortality, telling a graduating class of Stanford University grads that the notion of dying was the biggest catapult in following his heart. “It made an impression on me, and since then, for the past 33 years, I have looked in the mirror every morning and asked myself: ‘If today were the last day of my life, would I want to do what I am about to do today?’ And whenever the answer has been ‘No’ for too many days in a row, I know I need to change something.”

He also cited his firing from Apple at age 30 after taking the company from a fledgling computer brainstorm built in a garage to a $2 billion giant with over 4,000 employees as the best thing that ever happened to him. “The heaviness of being successful was replaced by the lightness of being a beginner again, less sure about everything. It freed me to enter one of the most creative periods of my life. ”

2. Louis Rossetto

The co-founder of  Wired Magazine  has been called a Fair Trade Willie Wonka for his success of adapting Silicon Valley start up tools to the chocolate industry. Rossetto became the first investor and then CEO of TCHO, launched in 2005 on the premise that chocolate should be measured by flavor and not percentage of cacao content, using the Flavor Wheel approach established by NASA contractor Timothy Childs and chocolate industry veteran Karl Bittong.

Shifting the focus to taste and flavor labs and cutting out notorious slave labor practices on plantations in the Ivory Coast and elsewhere, TCHO collaborates with growers and co-ops in cacao-producing countries like Peru, Ecuador and the Dominican Republic, teaching growers how to improve methods and secure better prices. “It’s the lowest-cost, most-efficient technology to get the job done,” Rossetto says about the labs, adding it’s not unlike grape growing in Napa Valley where growers can either sell commodity table grapes or get top dollar for premium wine grapes for really good wineries.

The producers now sell from 75 cents up to $8 and margins, boasting big customers like Whole Foods and Starbucks. Across the globe, the chocolate is sold at famous restaurants like Mario Batali’s chain and at Paul Young in London and Fresh and Fresh in Japan. It’s also sold on its website. In 2010, sales were up eight percent across the spectrum and expected to reach double-digit millions and beyond by 2012. First revenues for TCHO started below $1 million in 2009 and tripled last year – demonstrating that fair trade and organic is viable if well supported by believers. Rossetto got friends and family to invest. Today, TCHO produces 10 to 20 tons of chocolate every few weeks from its factory in the heart of San Francisco.

3. Blake Mycoskie

Blake Mycoskie, founder of TOMS Shoes was a kid kicking around in Argentina when the light went off – footwear is a basic need like water and air, and many are without the coverage to protect their feet from harsh environs. He not only launched a fashion movement (the new must-have uniform of school girls) but a charitable movement – distributing over 600,000 pairs of new shoes in 2010 to kids in need through giving partners around the globe.

What changed in him in 2006? Prior to that he demonstrated an entrepreneurial spirit starting five businesses before TOMS including a national campus laundry service. Most visionaries see a  hole needing filling, but with TOMS, he changed the way much of the industry sees its role – the ability not to just churn out profits but also to help children around the world. As a result, others are following suit with programs like the Good Shoe Project introduced by Payless ShoeSource and World Vision and the Shoes2Spare project.

The bottom line for the man behind the little shoe that could? Stuff doesn’t make you happy. “When I started distributing shoes in Ethiopia, South Africa, and South America, I saw that the people had so little, yet seemed to worry so much less than my friends and family back home,” he says. “Instead of stressing over gadgets, they were talking around the campfire.”

 4. Michael Moore

Clearly not everyone’s cup of tea -  Michael Moore can rub audiences and subjects the wrong way with his overwrought hubris, and that is entirely the point. But as he ages, he is learning to be a less obnoxious man of the people, something that has overshadowed supporters and detractors alike as his provocations drew attention away from the filmmaker with a focus on the film character. As one of his fellow filmmakers sees it: “Moore is a genius, who created an entire genre of documentary film making using the reflexive mode, and I view him as a pamphleteer, say a modern Thomas Paine, who says provocative things that aren’t always meant to be taken literally.”

Not the academic ilk of a Kevin Burns nor the inconspicuous diplomacy of Michael Apted, Moore has changed in the way he doesn’t so much get in your face and slap it silly but continues to rock the boat like no other documentary film maker, not exposing tainted meat and animal cruelty as much as exposing our inexcusable apathy in accepting corporate crime, insurance fraud, imperialism via drummed up invasions and tolerance of school bullies.

Is it any wonder he joined protesters staging Occupy Wall Street? Coming to their aid, he said “What you see here, and what you’re seeing across the country, are millions of people who’ve had it.” Moore promised to donate proceeds from his book, Here Comes Trouble, to their effort and to deliver wi-fi to the park and to other demonstrations being held across the nation. “I’ll do what I can do,” he offered, “because these bankers overplayed their hand. They were already rich, but filthy rich wasn’t enough. They are trying to turn our democracy from a democracy into a kleptocracy.”

The Flint native and so-called poster boy for the working class does boast nearly 900,000 Twitter followers who have been stirred and shaken by his bawdy cocktails like Stupid White Men and Fahrenheit 911. And while critics have tried to expose Moore as a hypocrite for owning a million-dollar apartment or sending his child to private school,  Moore remains a bigger than life figure who gets us to think.

 5. Dr. Mehmet Oz

“Who is the new great and powerful Oz?” asked the New York Post about the heart surgeon in scrubs who has taken over Oprah’s time slot and the health-bound viewing audience by storm. Described as a genuine medical folk hero in the making by turning genital warts and controversial diets like HCG into entertainment, the TV doc goes further than Dr. Phil by bypassing tabloid tactics in favor of a bare bones anatomy lecture. Like most successful physicians, he started out wanting a good career without fame, but has become the ear for a world obsessed with dieting, aging, longevity and stress, spending 40 minutes answering studio audience questions which many other arrogant doctors would dismiss out of hand or tell patients they don’t need to know the answers.

“Folks are desperate to have a relationship with their healer,” he says. “Marcus Welby is dead today, and they want a regular doctor who they can have a dialogue with and get truthful answers from. I reach a whole lot of people this way.”

As close to a regular guy as a rock star TV celeb can get, he lives in New Jersey with his wife and four kids and considers himself a hermit who shaves rarely, plays basketball with friends and meditates.  One of his assets is his listening skills – which shouldn’t be undermined as most of us are starved for listeners to our complaints and concerns. A big sign of his ability to change us – patients quoting his advice when visiting their own internists. If Dr. Oz thinks something is kosher, then it probably is kosher.

6. Douglas Holtz-Eakins

Who doesn’t love a conservative who changes his course when needed? Among the new directions in the sails of the conservative economist, praising the once debunked American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 as a stimulus that operated exactly as intended, growing the economy and spawning millions of jobs. The former Congressional Budget Office director and former chief economic advisor to Sen John McCain’s 2008 presidential campaign, pledged in August to throw support behind the bill.

Meantime, while the Tea Party elements insist global warming is a science fiction concept, Holtz-Eakin is now working with the New Hampshire-based Clean Air-Cool planet, addressing the economic benefits of addressing the very real issue. One proposal that entices him is tax-swapping, imposing a levy on carbon emissions while eliminating the payroll tax.

“We have watched with foreboding as powerful forces in the Republican Party want to close down this debate and reject the idea that this is a problem that needs to be solved,” says Brooks Yeager of the climate policy advocacy group. “Our interest in working with someone like Douglas, who has enormous credibility in conservative ranks and economists and agrees with our fundamental position that needs to be solved, is that he is exceptionally well positioned to reopen this debate.”

7. John Stewart

First, he changed his name from John Leibowitz, then he changed his game from his breakthrough comedy role on The Larry Sanders show to the serious business of changing mainstream media. The Daily Show with John Stewart is highly respected for its moxie in telling it like it is while everyone else tiptoes through the tulips and kisses the backsides of corporate sponsors. Or, as aptly put by Hub Brown of the Newhouse School of Public Communications at Syracuse University: “The stock-in-trade of The Daily Show is hypocrisy exposing hypocrisy and nobody else has the guts to do it. They really know how to crystallize an issue on all sides, see the silliness everywhere.” A prime example was second guessing the war in Iraq while mainstream press was towing the line of national leaders. Stewart decided to take them to task, lampooning Bush policies.

The Comedy Central staple has scored nine consecutive Emmy awards  validating that yes, perhaps the industry has a liberal slant, but also that the truth hurts less than we think when it comes to bashing the Tea Party or even criticizing our leaders, including President Obama’s failure to make inroads with a ridiculously stubborn congress. “Conditions are what they are and Obama is president,” says the host. “You are judged by how well you negotiate those conditions, not by how excusable the shitty end result is based on that it’s difficult.”

 8. Brad Pitt

While some of our moms refuse to forgive him for what he did to Jen, Pitt has revamped his image from willing victim of a home wrecker to determined home repairer in New Orleans. There has been much banter of him there switching to politics, as he rubs shoulders with Nancy Pelosi and the Chief on the New Orleans Housing Project while his better half works for UNICEF.

It’s an accepted fact no one wields more clout than celebs like Pitt who have huge followings among all age groups and tremendous visibility. While Dave Eggers’ poignant prose draws attention to the flood aftermath in Zeitoun, Pitt is allegedly considered a great mayoral candidate of the city – but it is one of many causes he embraces which led Newsweek Magazine to list him as one of 15 People Who Make America Great. Among his contributions is shedding light on neglected causes in Africa as cameras follow him wherever he and his extended family travel. This was the thinking when he and Jolie say they sold the first picture of their daughter, Shiloh, to People magazine for a reported $4million saying all proceeds would go to charity.

“Knowing that someone was going to hound us for that first photo — and was going to profit immensely for doing it — I just couldn’t live with it,” Pitt told the magazine. “We were able to turn that around and collect millions for people who are really going to need it.” Now as he makes the round to plug his film Moneyball, interviews on NPR and elsewhere highlight the intellectual Pitt – whose sensitivity emerges in the film, just as it did in Benjamin Button illustrating old dogs can learn new tricks at any time.

9. Warren Buffett

Read his lips: Yes, new taxes!!! And please let my rich friends step up to the plate. Billionaire Buffett- who inspired Obama’s millionaires’ tax – challenged owner of Fox News Rupert Murdoch to make his own federal tax returns public, after admitting he pays a lower rate than his secretary and the government should stop coddling the super rich “as if we were spotted owls or some other endangered species.” A recent CBS news poll showed most Americans agree with Buffett including many who have taken to those Wall Street protests. Militant conservatives are up in arms about it – no doubt viewing Buffett more of a trader than hero, but hero he is for more ways than one.

His stock went way up when joining forces with Bill Gates to urge the wealthy to join the campaign Giving Pledge and to give away at least half of their fortunes during their lifetimes or after their deaths. The 80-year-old Berkshire Hathaway CEO who wants to work past age 100 is famous for maintaining a frugal lifestyle – living in the same home he bought in Omaha in 1958. But his change has come in the way of being much more bold and out there, so to speak, despite how he might be viewed by fellow rich guys and their heirs. As a philanthropist he has set the bar and in seeking more revenues to fund programs, he shows not all billionaires are out for personal gain.

 10. Van Jones

There were such high hopes when Jones became the top green man in the White House – only succumbing to a malicious Tea Party campaign and resigning. ”It has been a tough couple of years,” Jones  confessed. “We went from hope to heartbreak in about a minute…We have the wrong theory of the presidency.”

So he is a changed man for the better in terms of seeing bureaucracy only muddles progress. He is now the leading evangelist of the American Dream Movement in partnership with his own organization, Rebuild the Dream – something he told Alternet was for real progressives in 2012 with the goal to train a million new leaders.

“We’re just glad that the volcano is starting to erupt,” he shares. ” We just want to fight. And there are some pre-existing grassroots assets that need to be re-aligned or redeployed; we’re trying to do that here.” The plan calls for house meetings (with real leadership) as well as protests, networking leaders online and locating dream candidates.  Jones sees his new mission as a social battle like no other in history.

“This is thrilling stuff! The dream-killers on Wall Street — who are so disgusting and so despicable; they are ingrates who are sitting up there laughing at us. I mean, every other bloc of capital that has this much weight, they try to do something to make you like them. Even the polluters, they say, ‘We’ll get clean coal.’ They try to do something. But these people on Wall Street – they just don’t care. So it’s just going to be an epic battle now between the worst people in America, the most selfish people in America, and the most selfless. And that’s going to be amazing.”

Images: Acaben; TCHO; Kwaku Alston; Shankbone; Nayrb7; Atlantic; The jointsstaff; Giving; Tedizen; Americanprogressaction, gadgetdude

What came first, the depressing women’s book clubs or the morbid books?

Remember the trances and travels afforded by pleasure reading? You couldn’t wait to lose yourself in the next chapter of that murder mystery, royal court espionage or love tryst – you were a voracious reader who deeply mourned the loss of your new character friends once the final page was devoured and downloaded into your fiber.

But somehow, that pleasure has become elusive to the women’s book group, the reading less an armchair cruise than an academic grind. The inevitable prerequisite is the agreed-upon selections must be meaty enough to spark evocative feedback for eloquent sharing round the coffee table. As a result, our picks are highly wrought works of historic, political or cultural significance perpetually mired in sadness. Or, as a fellow member recently commiserated, “Can’t we move on from the holocaust and women in pain?”

“People going through misery, the good women and bad men dynamic – that was an Oprah thing,” observes Bill Dito, an employee of the popular Books Inc. shop in San Francisco, where staff specialists write their own book reviews for customers. He has a bird’s eye view of the victim trend in fiction the last decade, one that has forced us to endure an excruciating trip through a time machine or suffer female bondage of one brand or another – which only further marginalizes us as women.

Then there is the entire cottage industry one might call “victim books” from rape to exploitation to the toast of the Oprah Book Club, author Wally Lamb with big guns like Couldn’t Keep it to Myself: Wally Lamb and the Women of York Correctional Institution. In the collection described as both utterly depressing and a real page turner, inmates describe in their own words, tales of abuse, rejection, self-destructive impulses long before they entered the criminal justice system. This followed other works like She’s Come Undone and Drowning Ruth – bereft titles that speak for themselves.

When The Color Purple and Joy Luck Club came out, they were rare rather than part of a steady diet of underdog angst and could be easily digested. Now, the question remains: Are there any other stories being told?

“As someone who has written about ‘women in pain,’ women dealing with the death of a child, for example, I think that the premise of your question is problematic,” novelist Ayelet Waldman tells me. “All interesting stories are about someone in crisis – in ‘pain’ if you will. Who wants to read about happy people doing happy things? Story is conflict, conflict is story. The Corrections was about people in crisis. Does that fall into your category of ‘victim-literature?’ If it doesn’t, then I think you should take a good look at the question you’re asking, and consider whether it isn’t inherently sexist.”

When she puts it that way, I do feel I’m turning my back on the movement. Men deal in pain, too, as she aptly points out.  The Kite Runner was all about the pain.

The fact is I cherish my women’s book group and our time reviewing, catching up, sipping wine and grazing on grapes and cheese. But it is time to lighten up, or at least look around. Even read about happy things. So sue me. Can’t drama tinged with humor a la Capote, Sedaris and McInerney be book group material? We have even drifted from titillating historic fiction such as Phillipa Gregory’s The Other Boleyn Girl series.

I’d like to shirk my duty to remember and never forget (Sarah’s Key, The Invisible Bridge, The Book Thief, Jacob’s Courage, The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society). I’ve hit my saturation point for the empathy we must extend to our unfortunate, ill-fated sisters still under tutelage of warlords, meddling Indian parents or Southern patriarchs (Little Bee,  Sister of My Heart, Shanghai Girls, Secret Life of Bees, Reading Lolita in Tehran, Eat, Pray Love, Life of Venus, Cutting for Stone). 

How might it be different if men were members? I have no idea, since I have only belonged to all women book groups.

In my group, which focuses on contemporary fiction, it would appear the lists are stocked with Sophie’s choices – just as films have waves like the one witnessed in 2008 with an abundance of Third Reich themes: The Boy in the Striped Pajamas, The Reader, Valkyrie, Adam Resurrected. The onslaught had New York Times contributor A.O. Scott questioning the trend, as I have questioned my book group’s thematic selections:

“The near-simultaneous appearance of all these movies is to some degree a coincidence, but it throws into relief the curious fact that early 21st-century culture, in Europe and America, on screen and in books, is intensely, perhaps morbidly preoccupied with the great political trauma of the mid-20th century,” he wrote. “The number of Holocaust-related memoirs, novels, documentaries and feature films in the past decade or so seems to defy qualification, and their proliferation raises some uncomfortable questions: Why are there so many? Why now?”

I can’t say I don’t glean knowledge, picking up more details than what I acquired or remember as a history major in college or as an impressionable kid at Communist Jewish summer camp exposed to the soul-flogging images in films like, Let My People Go, the 1965 story of Israel containing graphic footage of the remains of my ancestors being scooped up from piles at the camps after liberation. It was important to watch. Nonetheless, I wanted to run back to the arts and crafts table and make another God’s Eye. 

Sarah’s Key informed me of the French betrayal and the Vichy collaboration and the wrenching view from the eyes of a child; The Invisible Bridge eloquently told the Hungarian artisan’s story of survival. And the highly literary, exquisite novel, The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society, allowed me to visit the British Isles during occupation where defiant members of a book group take great risks to meet and eat and break German curfews.

I benefited from all of these reads, but aren’t we ready for an expanded library, a richer experience?

“My in laws came from Poland and Hungary and they ask me about the books we read, but they can never read them and have no interest in going near them,” says another member of my group. I get it. While I didn’t live it, my grandmother was the only one of seven children in her family to escape and survive the Polish slaughter.

While I identified strongly with Jonathan Saffran Foer’s Everything is Illuminated – which recounted one man’s yearnings for his ancestors’ experience of being hidden from the Nazis in a uniquely entertaining voice – I struggle with each depiction of the hiding like animals in the woods, the mashing like cattle into jam-packed train cars, the starvation, the fear, the digging of their own graves before dropping into them. No wonder we found relief in the uber-violent Inglorious Bastards.

The same frustration is suffered in the downtrodden female tales, which produced two centuries after Jane Austen, rarely offer a happy mid-18th century way out via a beneficial marriage around the maypole or sudden death of a piggish heir. Instead, we find ourselves steeped in the relentless bellicosity of the neanderthals entrapping them, classic male withholders of the basic needs we women require to thrive: love, money, property, liberty, suffrage and great sex after 50.

Why now are we spending our free time moaning vicariously in wartime hellishness or flinching through a deranged arranged marriage when we could cuddle up in bed on a Sunday with a steamy romance epic, bone-chilling murder mystery or a young professional’s playful romp working at a style magazine or publishing house or paying dues in some hick town? Now that is chick-lit I can wrap my overloaded, burned-out brain around – reads that I won’t equate with the daily drudgery of paying bills and managing schedules.

If we must endure yet fresh pain, perhaps it might be framed not in 20th century Europe but, say, 21st century New Orleans, as in Dave Eggers’s Zeitoun. At least, as in The Help and Eat Pray Love, it is fresh stuff chronicling our own times. The Depression-era Water for Elephants, too, provided a historic perspective while still offering something totally new in the journey of a would-be vet who joins the circus. It certainly wasn’t free of struggling female characters, but the suffering didn’t dominate the theme and the redemption was a gift.

The same dearth of freshness clearly exists in in play writing, as well. How else can you explain the barrage of revivals in the last decade? If I see an ad for Annie Get Your Gun one more time, I’ll shoot myself and take Wild Bill with me. It’s the old Disney strategy of when in doubt, produce a remake or sequel. And novelists suffer from the same syndrome by focusing on what sells.

Perhaps one remedy would be to not rely solely on the New York Times lists and peruse book stores for the employee recommendations. Oftentimes, you will find sparkling little stories that didn’t cut the mustard with the corporate giant, but are worthwhile nonetheless.

“We pick and choose ones we want to read and then write it up if we like it and also accept customer reviews,” explains Dito. “You would be amazed how many people come in here to look at our reviews. That’s why there is a need for book stores. You can’t talk to someone from Amazon.”

Among the Books Inc. favorites: Destiny of the Republic by Candice Millard (author of  The River of Doubt ) which examines the the madness, medicine and murder of James A. Garfield; The Elegance of the Hedgehog a quirky French story by Muriel Barbery; The Thousand Autumns of Jacob De Zoet by David Mitchell, focusing on a war-ravaged Dutch East Indies company; and Norwegian Wood by Haruki Murakami,  a romantic Japanese woman’s coming of age.

Another staff reviewer, Chris Lutes, adds that there are certainly a plethora of Third Reich era reads such as Laura Hiderbrand’s World War II survivor dramas including the recently acclaimed Unbroken.  But there are plenty of alternatives worth book club consideration.

“It was a pretty trying time in history so it’s easy to revisit because even though we are removed from that drama there is such humanity to those stories and it’s easy for people to get into that mindset. Still it’s staggering how many books are published each month – so there’s a lot of other stuff out there,” he says.

Images: imdb; Skinny Chronicles, shutterhacks; Squidoo

 Why must everything come in packaging that’s seemingly ready-made for nuclear meltdown?

The clamshell isn’t finished, but perhaps it has met its match in the flesh-eating Pyranna, a wrap rage coping tool with teeth to cut ridiculously over-packaged goods. Evidently, manufacturers are more focused on anti-theft and cost saving plastic than consumer convenience. We are especially reminded of the wasteful abundance when seeing the hordes of back-to-school shoppers lining up at Office Depot with carts of protractors and mechanical pencils housed in impossible chambers of reconstituted petroleum – which includes anything related to a computer, music device or phone.

Instead of weapons for assaulting a plastic seal with the zeal of man eating fish, how about an industry wide replacement of wasteful packaging with containers that let us get to the goods without wrenching our necks, as I once did with an envelope of sliced turkey on a lunch break. Who knew fowl dangers lurked beyond the occasional Cargill Inc. bird?

I’m ashamed to admit I find myself at times relying on my teeth like some kind of primitive cave babe, emulating the piranha to no avail as the kid looks on with disdain.

We all curse those hermetically sealed ester-oysters that seem immune to ripping and stabbing, the ones that send well intentioned consumers to the emergency room for gashes, sliced fingertips and severed tendons. As we seek more responsible and sustainable packaging technology, it doesn’t appear to yet be a priority of the manufacturing world, which instead focuses on anti-theft measures at the lowest possible cost.

“History shows consumers will pay for convenience and if you eliminate difficulty opening packages at the same time you reduce the amount of package materials consumed in manufacturing, you’re winning on multiple fronts,” observes Bill Perell, whose company, PopPack, offers manufacturers an eco-friendly, Bubble-in-the-Seal® solution, a seal alternative engineered to give consumers, especially kids and seniors a break. Perell’s own father, a surgeon, resorts to a medical knife to cut his way through products.

His methodology of popping eliminates both challenging cartons, caps and wasteful tabs. “We did a study of Kellogg and General Mills and weighed the film tab on the cereal boxes and it is a third of an ounce and in the aggregate that creates a lot of waste,” he says.

The following is our list of the worst offenders.

Item: Audio CDs

Best Tool: Open Smart – One of several teethy tools on the market for slicing CD shrink wrap.

Solution: There are still people who have not learned about iTunes? Help these poor souls.

Item: Sauce Packets

Best Tool: Common, newly sharpened scissors  – which you may or may not have with you when eating sushi on the run.

One of the downsides to getting sushi to go is wrestling with those sauce packets which are torture unless you can find the sweet spot that may or may not indicate you should “tear here.”

Solution: Opt for sustainable sushi splurges prepared fresh at your nearest Japanese restaurant.

Item: Sliced Packaged Cheese

Those sealed 36-packs of cheddar are impossible without a pair of sharp scissors handy, so if you drag these to that family reunion picnic, better bring sharp scissors. This container is only rivaled by string cheese packets.

Best Tool: Sharp scissors

Solution: High quality cheeses from the local natural foods store or farmers’ market wrapped in wax paper or less plastic. It’s really not so hard to slice, is it? Certainly easier than getting those string cheese packs open.

Item: Oral B Electric Toothbrush

No one gets a charge out of trying desperately to crack open these packages to simply brush your teeth with that new dentist-recommended tool. Gillette opted for the ridiculously stiff plastic clamshells, but Procter &  Gamble has since created a cardboard box alternative. Arthritis sufferers must be overjoyed to be able to get to the product at last.

Best Tool: Sharp scissors

Solution: A standard tooth brush works just fine for most pearly whites. Go for a recycled plastic variety.

Item: Green Light Bulbs

It’s just so counterintuitive when you need to order a tool from Amazon to open your green light bulb. The light is on but nobody is home at the factory, as it were.

Best Tool: Zipit battery operated device from Amazon

Solution: How about simple recycled cardboard like the housing for the conventional bulbs?

Item: The Common Computer Mouse

Whether wireless or for the desktop PC, it shouldn’t be this hard to get to the mouse. The trap? The ubiquitous clamshell requiring tearing and cutting.

Best tool: Zipit battery operated device from Amazon or Pyranna

Solution: Bribe a child to open it.

Item: All Natural Frontier Sea Salt

So what could be so daunting about this little shaker of fine grind? The grinder is a nightmare, composed of a thick rim of impenetrable plastic with a small hole that must be punctured with anything but the human body. Jeez, I just wanted to flavor my chard.

Best tool: A sharp little knife, a steady hand and accurate eye

Solution: Luck.

Image: Pyranna; Amazon; Pink Moose; Peyri: Costco; Oral B: Zipitopener, dylancantwell, nioxxe, espensorvik

In two words? Canada executes.

Having just returned from extraordinary Vancouver, I can appreciate how its greenness extends beyond the pristine meadows of Stanley Park to thrive in the souls of its dwellers who witness their slightly higher taxes at work in the form of a well-maintained, pothole-free environs. It’s not just bells and Whistler. It’s beauty that exists down deep, even in the success of enacted laws that put the U.S. and its stagnating bipartisan representatives to shame.

No wonder Vancouver’s goal of being the greenest city in the world by 2020 gives it yet another edge in livability. Sure, San Francisco and Portland are weaning off the foreign fuel nipple, but our neighbors to the north might outwit and out play us by focusing on the most winning survivor tactic of all: spawning green jobs like rabbits – some 10,400 in the next eight years.

According to the Vancouver Sun, the city is now moving ahead in 10 key areas that range from greening the economy by securing the city’s international reputation as a mecca of green enterprise, improving food production, cutting greenhouse gases and making walking, cycling and public transit the preferred transportation option for its citizens.

In terms of the jobs, some 300 are linked to expansion of the city’s district energy program, while another 900 comes from clean tech trade missions spurring the relocation of companies. Another 600 are predicted in the farming sector – urban growing, farmers’ markets, food processing and street food vendors. While Canadians agree being greener is a matter of conscience there is nothing like the promise of income to perk up commitment to conservation.

The good news is the green strides are not just limited to Vancouver. Throughout the country, progress is being made and used as a benchmark for what is possible if civic leaders go the distance. Here are some of the initiatives:

Switching Off the Coal

The province that has become a teenage girl destination because of Justin Bieber might now be better known for a reliance on green energy as it shuts down four coal-burning power plants even before its 2014 target date. It’s part of a 10-step transition to generate all of its electricity from fuel sources such as biomass to cut nasty carbon dioxide emissions. So far, coal production has dropped 5% while wind generation rose 80% – a reduction of pollution equal to the annual emissions of seven million autos.

Sparing the Trees

One of Canada’s largest media corporations, Quebecor, is making a sizable dent in its newspaper, magazine and book publishing distribution through its Concrete Actions initiative – the switch to printing on 100% recycled paper will spare more than 79,000 trees and 215 million liters of water. Meanwhile, it planted more than 210,000 trees as part of a program to plant roots for every Videotron customer who participates in online billing.

Victoria’s Dockside Green

While Vancouver sets out to lead the world in green building design and construction, Dockside Green in the heart of downtown Victoria, B.C. is setting records as a green development – earning its second residential LEED platinum ranking through the Canada Green Building Council (CaGBC) for two towers called Balance. Comprising 171 homes, it matched Phase I in earning a record 63 out of 70 points, serving as a model for sustainable community development. The high score was based on several key factors, including: biomass gasification using wood-waste to create heat and hot water; improved insulation, green roofs, exhaust air energy (heat) recovery, reduced lighting power densities with energy-efficient fixtures and occupancy sensors.

Boosting Subway Systems

Ottawa has coughed up $1 billion in funding to improving the public transit in the Greater Toronto Area to “cut the commute, clear the air and drive growth.” Prime Minister Stephen Harper said traffic congestion had become a top issue – blamed on a $2 billion a year loss in productivity. Across the country, refurbishing and improving public transit has become a cause célèbre according to HuffPo Canada. While leaders look for ways to get people off the streets and on nicer, roomier subways, they are netting results through simple, targeted incentives. Examples cited: The Toronto Transit saw sales go up 57% by giving monthly pass customers a small incentive for buying a year’s worth of passes in advance: Meantime, Montreal has a huge response when offering s small incentive if customers bought their monthly passes off-peak and off-line from a participating retailer rather than transit ticket booths.

Giving Edge to Organic Food Producers

Canada’s organic producers now can circumvent red tape to expand their products locally in grocery stores and to export to Europe through an international agreement giving the country an edge in the European Union, the single largest market for organic products in the world. A result of an extensive analysis of the Canadian and EU organic production and certification systems, The Canada-European Union Organic Equivalency Arrangement allows the healthy exchange of imports and exports of certified products without need for additional certification.

Embracing E-Waste Recycling

It appears everyone is getting into the act, including the annual Live Green Toronto Festival where visitors recycle nearly 3,300 media items in one day – swapping good DVDs, Blu-rays, CDs and records to keep them out of the landfills. Since 2004, Canada-based Sony, Panasonic, Bell and other companies have stepped up their own recycling programs, recognizing that while technology enhances our lives the downside is the short life cycle and ultimate disposal of products that can break down in landfills and poison the environment. As members of Product Stewardship Canada which implements recycling solutions for end-of-life electronic products, the companies participate in take-back programs in Saskatchewan, British Columbia and Nova Scotia, and will soon expand to other provinces.

Making Way For More Bikes

Not all commuters are thrilled about it, but Vancouver’s mayor, Gregor Robertson, who peddles to work each day, is making way for bike lanes in the bustling city. Gregor recognizes that a true commitment to being the greenest includes letting more bikers share the streets – yes, even those bikers who forget to wear helmets or signal when they change lanes. Does it make the city a better place to live? Well, according to the Globe and Mail newspaper, biking improves cardiovascular health which makes people happy, reduces gas and bills and makes the air cleaner – which pleases Fraser Valley, where Vancouver’s pollution blows.

Images: Coolin Sights; Mediamag; Lightrailnow; CBC;The Globe and Mail, alexindigo

A celebration of men’s urban street wear.

Fashion for the urban man’s newfangled eclecticism is defined by shortcut tailoring of preppy classics paired with offbeat hats, bespoke and on-trend sneakers, designer shades and the accessory fixture that has witnessed high speed travel from Paris this summer – the essential neck wrap.

If it first took its cue from the skater-sneaker culture and hipsters on New York’s Lower East Side, the more refined hybrid still harnesses youthful flair while appealing to the 30-something working man. Metro eco means pulling off fashion jewelry and solid perfume balm by adding the edgy factor to trump any preconceived girlish references.

“Skinny style bow ties, watches, and masculine bracelets are some of my personal favorite ways to deepen my own look right now, and walking the streets of New York every day, it seems others have come to the same realization,”  shares Dan Mims, founder of The Ethical Man site catering to the upscale working man. He adds that style for men is on the march.

“Men are so much more psychologically open to it now and also the economy is tight and men have realized they need to up their game in new ways to keep the job they like and to get the one they want. The urban working man is really going for looks that can be described as sophisticated, unique and confident. This means balancing universal tenets of style with personal tastes. ”

We’ve marched out a few looks to this end:

1. The Tightly Cut classic Suit

Skinny silhouetting tweaks the Brooks Brothers classics in new sexy tailoring for suits like designs by Topman – a  leader in color and fabrications in this category.

2. Hip Sunglasses

The Proof is in the bamboo and sustainably harvested woods in the break out shades by Proof, which has a mission to look good and do good. For every pair sold, a portion goes to causes such as aiding an eye clinic in India and replanting depleted forests in Haiti.

3. The Skinny Bow Tie

Bow ties are always a statement for young men, so make sure you’re ready for the heat that comes with them. These gingham checks are handcrafted from preppy Pierrepont Hicks.

4.  Canvas Slip-Ons

Nail nautical chic with these kickers from Generic Surplus.

5. The Unisex Wristband

Bracelets, I mean wrist bands by The Ethical Man are billed as less 80′s gym class and more gladiator contest. Each piece is comprised of both software and hardware like this gray faux suede and black accent wire with a worn brass chain and hook.

Tough and cool.

6. Vintage Chambray Scarf

This chambray scarf from by Steven Alan is our top pick for cool nights.

7. Military Watch

This classic military watch by Citizen called the Eco Drive is made from stainless steel, is water resistant and never needs a battery.

8. Sustainable Sneakers

Macbeth Matthews Vegan shoes in black and grey can suit up or denim down with thin soles that are more office ready than their boarder bound cousins.

9. Skinny Neckties

Jaan J’s skinny neckties are vegan and versatile. Pluck from variety of patterns from wide stripe to tartan to a solid.

10.The Fedora

Boxcar Willy’s Fedora from Sturbanclothing has sustainability topped. The trend has no end in sight. Expect to see the fedora through to fall and flannel.

Images: The Ethical Man; Topman, iwant Proof, American Apparel, Citizen Watch, Amazon, Alternative Outfitters, Jaan J Culturata

Sure, tying the knot can be done responsibly with low carbon travel and free range fare, but what about severing the bonds?

Worst case divorce scenario? A dark comedy such as The War of the Roses portraying a couple caught up in the kind of ’80s opulence that got our planet in a heap of trouble. They wrangled fiendishly over their manse and Stanfordshire figurines in a turf tussle which ultimately led to their tragic deaths. Hey, their lawyer warned them to go more gently into the fight, but who knew from green back then?

The current climate begs us to seek a more civilized split and sustainable truce with the one we once chose as a life partner. To this end, don’t look to a family lawyer to get you to greener pastures unscathed. They will tend to prolong discoveries and disclosures and red tape to rack up legal bills. You will probably squander too much of your treasured nest egg or kids’ college funds, cling to objects that can’t keep you warm at night and internalize the kind of stress that kills cells and makes you too haggard to attract a date.

Instead, suck it up and take the high road to being free at last. You can’t recycle the romance but you can empower yourself to move past fury and pain to a peaceful resolution, using lawyers as your clerks to process the fair settlement and custody plan you devise. Here are some tips for making that divorce even eco-friendlier than the wedding.

1. Be as Efficient as a Prius

Fire up that sluggish engine and act quickly to devise a settlement plan, which is easier to do in states like California with community property laws. Arrange amicable meetings with your ex over lunch to talk over dividing his and hers. Decide if you need to sell your property or do a buy out and write up your own proposals. The quicker you move, the quicker you can move on.

2. Agree to Let Go of Superficial Attachments

Follow the way of the Buddha. If you aren’t married to the sofa (don’t confuse this with the couch potato glued to Weeds on the sofa), then let him have it. Toss in a couple of throw pillows with a smile. Don’t quibble over the accumulation by deciding there is no material object that supersedes your chance at a new and better life.

3. Chill Around the Children

Chances are your little eco babes Gore and Eartha have already been overexposed to the harmful rays of friction that are causing the split. Now that you are ironing out the details, refrain from bickering and talking about loaded issues around the kids. Instead, help them heal by showing them you still have that core of friendship and can laugh with one another. Don’t dis your ex when you are with the kids because they’re bound to internalize this and spend too much of their inheritance on shrinks.

4. Keep up the Heavy Petting

Share the pet care! Our dogs and cats are part of our families and they need time with both of their parents, providing pets are allowed in our dwellings. Devise a custody sharing plan for the dog too, since it isn’t fair to let one parent get all of the love – and the walks and the poop scooping.

5.  Choose Selling over Storing

When dividing your junk, agree to sell what you cannot use rather than storing the stuff and paying monthly rentals for a space – money that could be used more wisely on dinner dates and charitable donations. Hold a sale together and split the earnings. This includes unloading sentimental objects that force you to live in the past rather than marching to your present. Take out $100 and enjoy a nice meal together, perhaps homemade in the crock or at your favorite haunt for old time’s sake. You will sleep better at night knowing you are carrying a lighter load.

6.  Take Public Transit to the Mediator’s Office

Conserve on fuel – and stress – by riding to work out the grievances. You will feel more relaxed when you arrive at the table to do battle and feel better about yourself for doing your part to spare emissions. No searching for a downtown parking space. No texting your new hottie and risking a ticket while waiting at those long lights.

7. Create a New Picture

Clinging to the old picture is what typically keeps us in a dysfunctional dying marriage. The romantic courtship, the impressive wedding pageantry, the happy family holiday greeting mailed out on December 20th each year. While validating, they keep you living in the past. Visualize a new picture, one in which you are loving your body and treating it right with good, fresh organic food, exercise and massage, thriving at work and in your relationships and giving unselfishly of yourself to your community. You’ve learned the hard way you can’t control your partners or your outcomes, but you can work on being the best you.

8.  Have the Heart to Keep Out of Each Other’s Affairs

You no longer have to check in about personal issues and it can often hurt the one you once loved. You don’t need to hear about her foray into online dating or his enviable weekend getaways. Don’t share financial statements unless it affects your settlement and avoid any co-dependency that could drag you back into a caretaking role. He was never your child. She was never your mother. You made a stab at being lovers and equal partners but it didn’t work. Now it is time to separate it all out and keep it clean with set boundaries.

9. Don’t make Friends Take Sides

Your families will automatically side with each of you but your shared friends are another story. Don’t force a weird disconnect by trashing your ex or looking to double date with the couples in your community, save for your best women and male friends who also had issues with your spouse and supported you through the process. Otherwise, try to share and share alike. It’s a groovier, more evolved approach.

10. We Are Family

You have ended a marriage and set up two households but that doesn’t mean you are no longer a family. School kids are told the politically correct message that families are different – there are ones with two mommies and two daddies, ones like Brad and Angelina’s with ethnically mixed adopted babies or with grandparents raising children. Obviously there are families with moms and dads living apart, but you can soften the blows by getting together for family occasions and playing nice. Birthdays, Bat Mitzvahs, weddings, important holidays and occasional Sunday dinners are all good chances for family time. Does this mean you still have to have your irascible, cigar-puffing father-in-law as a house guest? Hell no! Divorce has its privileges.

Images:Listal; Amazon; Goldberg; Chaquetadepollo; Summeer Poquette; Shearforce; MGifford; Carolj1; Leo Jeje; Cali4beach; Fancy This, Zero Emission Resource Organization

Keep plastic out of the landfill with a clever gift card alternative.

Plastic gift cards: those little irresistible envelope stuffers are everywhere – markets, book shops, warehouse stores. Thousands are being printed up for Father’s Day, alone.

Add that batch to the 1.6 billion cards made and shipped across the country each year, prompting sites like Treehugger to question if these are the new bottled water.  Arguably the most convenient and least creative gift to pick up, this new currency is often coated with polyvinyl chloride (PVC), a known human carcinogen. After being swiped and spent they are usually tossed out, since few recipients are aware of online alternatives or take part in gift card recycling programs aimed at reducing our plastic jungles.

Among the forward-thinking alternatives: GiftRocket, an entirely digital email-based gift card recently launched as a start-up venture by three founders who decided it was time for the redemption process to go digital. You simply go to the site and purchase a customized and personalized gift for a friend, perhaps $50 for the coffee shop in their neighborhood. The recipient is notified of the gesture via email or Facebook. They stroll to the shop for breakfast, click a button on their phone to redeem, et voila, free scones and cappuccinos! The money is instantly transferred to spend as you like.

“A way that we are different is we send out reminder emails to make sure they are used, a feature you would never get with a physical gift card,” explains co-founder Kapil Kale. “At my college graduation, I received so many gift cards they ended up being lost. I’m sure I still have a drawer full of them at home.”

Kale argues going digital curbs the no-brainer physical act of grabbing a card on the run and instead adds some thought to the process, since another cool feature is the giver isn’t limited to businesses enrolled in a gift card program. They can choose any business they like and GiftRocket will manage the money in an escrow account until it is redeemed.

It’s a good way to go, consider just how wasteful some of those printed plastic cards are, such as the iTunes card which can be gifted and downloaded electronically. This way, there is nothing to lose. And nothing to get swiped by a sister or roommate. Best motivator: No wallet filing. It’s hard enough keeping track of those frozen yogurt cards that reward you with a freebie after buying a few dozen you probably don’t need.

Images: Apple; GiftRocket