Was It Green? EarthFest 2008

On Saturday, May 24 2008 I attended Boston’s 15th annual EarthFest at the Hatch Shell on the Charles River Esplanade along with 50,000 to 100,000 other Bostonians.

This annual event was presented by Whole Foods Market and Radio 92.9 and it was, as always, free to the public. The main artists: Cake, Cracker, The English Beat, and BoDeans all preformed on a solar-powered stage this year. And Cake, a band from Sacramento, California, pledged to record its next album entirely with solar power. Cake also gave away a tree to a volunteer and as a contingent asked her to take a photo with the tree every few years and send it to their website – “no matter how old she got.”

In addition to the music there were many vendors giving out freebees like organic energy drinks, granola, coffee drinks, yogurt, reusable bags, energy bars, raffle stubs for LCD televisions - and even hugs were free.

Local companies and non-profits staffed booths showcasing their ideas for a more sustainable community and environment. I took a picture with the IzzItGreen mascot, picture to right. IzzItGreen is a ratings and review site that asks, "Is it good?" and "IzzItGreen?" about a businesses products and actions. IzzItGreen believes “the answers aren't always in a book, or on the internet, or buried under a pile of dirty laundry (although sometimes they are). Answers often sprout from curious folks and their communities, connections, and conversations.”

I wonder if IzzItGreen reviewed EarthFest how would it score. Speaking anonymously a local government official said: “There was rampant consumption taking place [at EarthFest] without really any thought to it. The recycling containers were poorly marked and poorly distributed. There should have been separate containers for all sorts of recycling not just plastics and paper, but also food waste and packaging - if you took a look at the lawn after the last show [Cake] it was littered with crap - how easily people forget they were actually at EarthFest.”

You’re not green just by attending EarthFest, you’re not green if you just blog about it. Being green means seriously taking a look at what you do and how your actions will have an effect on the environment. EarthFest 2008 was an opportunity for individuals to enjoy the great weather, listen to live music, get a few freebees, but it also served as a reminder that environmentalism, conservation and “going green” are significant issues that affect all of us.

Find the original article published here: Volunteer-Boston, OYFP’s Blog.

Truth or Consequences

By THOMAS L. FRIEDMAN
Imagine for a minute, just a minute, that someone running for president was able to actually tell the truth, the real truth, to the American people about what would be the best — I mean really the best — energy policy for the long-term economic health and security of our country. I realize this is a fantasy, but play along with me for a minute. What would this mythical, totally imaginary, truth-telling candidate say?

For starters, he or she would explain that there is no short-term fix for gasoline prices. Prices are what they are as a result of rising global oil demand from India, China and a rapidly growing Middle East on top of our own increasing consumption, a shortage of “sweet” crude that is used for the diesel fuel that Europe is highly dependent upon and our own neglect of effective energy policy for 30 years.

Cynical ideas, like the McCain-Clinton summertime gas-tax holiday, would only make the problem worse, and reckless initiatives like the Chrysler-Dodge-Jeep offer to subsidize gasoline for three years for people who buy its gas guzzlers are the moral equivalent of tobacco companies offering discounted cigarettes to teenagers.

I can’t say it better than my friend Tim Shriver, the chairman of Special Olympics, did in a Memorial Day essay in The Washington Post: “So Dodge wants to sell you a car you don’t really want to buy, that is not fuel-efficient, will further damage our environment, and will further subsidize oil states, some of which are on the other side of the wars we’re currently fighting. ... The planet be damned, the troops be forgotten, the economy be ignored: buy a Dodge.”

No, our mythical candidate would say the long-term answer is to go exactly the other way: guarantee people a high price of gasoline — forever.

This candidate would note that $4-a-gallon gasoline is really starting to impact driving behavior and buying behavior in way that $3-a-gallon gas did not. The first time we got such a strong price signal, after the 1973 oil shock, we responded as a country by demanding and producing more fuel-efficient cars. But as soon as oil prices started falling in the late 1980s and early 1990s, we let Detroit get us readdicted to gas guzzlers, and the price steadily crept back up to where it is today.

We must not make that mistake again. Therefore, what our mythical candidate would be proposing, argues the energy economist Philip Verleger Jr., is a “price floor” for gasoline: $4 a gallon for regular unleaded, which is still half the going rate in Europe today. Washington would declare that it would never let the price fall below that level. If it does, it would increase the federal gasoline tax on a monthly basis to make up the difference between the pump price and the market price.

To ease the burden on the less well-off, “anyone earning under $80,000 a year would be compensated with a reduction in the payroll taxes,” said Verleger. Or, he suggested, the government could use the gasoline tax to buy back gas guzzlers from the public and “crush them.”

But the message going forward to every car buyer and carmaker would be this: The price of gasoline is never going back down. Therefore, if you buy a big gas guzzler today, you are locking yourself into perpetually high gasoline bills. You are buying a pig that will eat you out of house and home. At the same time, if you, a manufacturer, continue building fleets of nonhybrid gas guzzlers, you are condemning yourself, your employees and shareholders to oblivion.

What a cruel thing for a candidate to say? I disagree. Every decade we look back and say: “If only we had done the right thing then, we would be in a different position today.”

But no politician dared to do so. When gasoline was $2 a gallon, the government never would have imposed a $2 tax. Now that it is $4 a gallon, the government should at least keep it there, since it is really having the right effect.

I was visiting my local Toyota dealer in Bethesda, Md., last week to trade in one hybrid car for another. There is now a two-month wait to buy a Prius, which gets close to 50 miles per gallon. The dealer told me I was lucky. My hybrid was going up in value every day, so I didn’t have to worry about waiting a while for my new car. But if it were not a hybrid, he said, he would deduct each day $200 from the trade-in price for every $1-a-barrel increase in the OPEC price of crude oil. When I saw the rows and rows of unsold S.U.V.’s parked in his lot, I understood why.

We need to make a structural shift in our energy economy. Ultimately, we need to move our entire fleet to plug-in electric cars. The only way to get from here to there is to start now with a price signal that will force the change.

Barack Obama had the courage to tell voters that the McCain-Clinton summer gas-giveaway plan was a fraud. Wouldn’t it be amazing if he took the next step and put the right plan before the American people? Wouldn’t that just be amazing?

Memorial Day 2008

Memorial Day is a day of remembrance for those who have died in our nation's service.

Memorial Day 2008 also marked a rise in the number of U.S. troops killed in Iraq, after two soldiers were killed and four wounded in two separate roadside bombings in the country earlier today. The latest death toll rose to 4,082 U.S. troops killed in Iraq since the March 2003 invasion.

Memorial Day is a day to remember, reflect and honor those who have given their life service to our country.

We cherish too, the Poppy red
That grows on fields where valor led,
It seems to signal to the skies
That blood of heroes never dies.

-Moina Michael 1915

New Addition

I now have 189-square-inches of portable grilling goodness. Yes, I bought a new baby grill. His name is Web. That’s all I have to say about that.

CELTICS WIN, A Road Playoff Game!

The Celtics won their first road game of the playoffs last night. Lets hear it for the boys. It was a 94-80 victory over the Pistons in Game 3 of the Eastern Conference finals at The Palace of Auburn Hills, Detroits home turff. Boston has a 2-1 lead in the best-of-seven series, with Game 4 on Monday May 26 at 8:30 PM on ESPN in Detroit. The Celtics are 1-6 on the road this postseason.

The Alpha Geeks

By DAVID BROOKS
In 1950, Dr. Seuss published a book called “If I Ran the Zoo.” It contained the sentence: “I’ll sail to Ka-Troo, and bring back an IT-KUTCH, a PREEP, and a PROO, a NERKLE, a NERD, and a SEERSUCKER, too!” According to the psychologist David Anderegg, that’s believed to be the first printed use of the word “nerd” in modern English.

The next year, Newsweek noticed that nerd was being used in Detroit as a substitute for “square.” But, as Ander-egg writes in his book, “Nerds,” the term didn’t really blossom onto mass consciousness until The Fonz used it in “Happy Days” in the mid- to late-1970s. And thus began what you might call the ascent of nerdism in modern America.

At first, a nerd was a geek with better grades. The word described a high-school or college outcast who was persecuted by the jocks, preps, frat boys and sorority sisters. Nerds had their own heroes (Stan Lee of comic book fame), their own vocations (Dungeons & Dragons), their own religion (supplied by George Lucas and “Star Wars”) and their own skill sets (tech support). But even as “Revenge of the Nerds” was gracing the nation’s movie screens, a different version of nerd-dom was percolating through popular culture. Elvis Costello and The Talking Heads’s David Byrne popularized a cool geek style that’s led to Moby, Weezer, Vampire Weekend and even self-styled “nerdcore” rock and geeksta rappers.

The future historians of the nerd ascendancy will likely note that the great empowerment phase began in the 1980s with the rise of Microsoft and the digital economy. Nerds began making large amounts of money and acquired economic credibility, the seedbed of social prestige. The information revolution produced a parade of highly confident nerd moguls — Bill Gates and Paul Allen, Larry Page and Sergey Brin and so on.

Among adults, the words “geek” and “nerd” exchanged status positions. A nerd was still socially tainted, but geekdom acquired its own cool counterculture. A geek possessed a certain passion for specialized knowledge, but also a high degree of cultural awareness and poise that a nerd lacked.

Geeks not only rebelled against jocks, but they distinguished themselves from alienated and self-pitying outsiders who wept with recognition when they read “Catcher in the Rye.” If Holden Caulfield was the sensitive loner from the age of nerd oppression, then Harry Potter was the magical leader in the age of geek empowerment.

But the biggest change was not Silicon Valley itself. Rather, the new technology created a range of mental playgrounds where the new geeks could display their cultural capital. The jock can shine on the football field, but the geeks can display their supple sensibilities and well-modulated emotions on their Facebook pages, blogs, text messages and Twitter feeds. Now there are armies of designers, researchers, media mavens and other cultural producers with a talent for whimsical self-mockery, arcane social references and late-night analysis.

They can visit eclectic sites like Kottke.org and Cool Hunting, experiment with fonts, admire Stewart Brand and Lawrence Lessig and join social-networking communities with ironical names. They’ve created a new definition of what it means to be cool, a definition that leaves out the talents of the jocks, the M.B.A.-types and the less educated. In “The Laws of Cool,” Alan Liu writes: “Cool is a feeling for information.” When someone has that dexterity, you know it.

Tina Fey, who once was on the cover of Geek Monthly magazine, has emerged as a symbol of the geek who grows into a swan. There is now a cool geek fashion style, which can be found on shopping sites all over the Web (think Japanese sneakers and text-laden T-shirts). Schwinn now makes a retro-looking Sid/Nancy bicycle, which is sweet and clunky even though it has a faux-angry name. There are now millions of educated-class types guided by geek manners and status rules.

The news that being a geek is cool has apparently not permeated either junior high schools or the Republican Party. George Bush plays an interesting role in the tale of nerd ascent. With his professed disdain for intellectual things, he’s energized and alienated the entire geek cohort, and with it most college-educated Americans under 30. Newly militant, geeks are more coherent and active than they might otherwise be.

Barack Obama has become the Prince Caspian of the iPhone hordes. They honor him with videos and posters that combine aesthetic mastery with unabashed hero-worship. People in the 1950s used to earnestly debate the role of the intellectual in modern politics. But the Lionel Trilling authority-figure has been displaced by the mass class of blog-writing culture producers.

So, in a relatively short period of time, the social structure has flipped. For as it is written, the last shall be first and the geek shall inherit the earth.

Partners With Non-Profits Boston

The City of Boston has funding support available for local non-profits like healthcare centers, homeless shelters, youth organizations, senior centers, and cultural and educational institutions throughout Boston.

Partners with Non-Profits (PNP) “provides matching grants up to a maximum of $25,000 per project per fiscal year for capital improvements to non-profit facilities located in Boston. In a given fiscal year the program leverages $3 million of construction projects. PNP believes that by helping to maintain strong neighborhood institutions we promote the sustainability of strong neighborhoods.”

“The strength of Boston's neighborhoods lies in the rich blend of the people that live in them, the businesses that operate there, and the non-profit organizations that open their doors to the public to create common ground.”

All quoted sections are from the Partners with Non-Profits website. Please contact them to learn more.

Boston’s 15th Annual EarthFest

Boston’s 15th annual Earth Fest will be held on Saturday, May 24 2008 at the Charles River Esplanade.

This annual event is presented by Whole Foods Market and Radio 92.9 and is free to the public. “EarthFest is a celebration for the Earth featuring great music, family-friendly activities and showcase a host of environmentally friendly products and non-profit organizations. Produced in conjunction with the Massachusetts Department of Conservation and Recreation, the event draws more than 100,000 along the banks of the Charles at The DCR Hatch Shell.”The Main Stage artists this year include Cake, Cracker, The English Beat, and BoDeans.

Bring a blanket, bring a chair, see you there!

Boston’s Run to Remember 2008

On Saturday May 24th and Sunday May 25th The Boston Police Department and Boston Police Runner's Club will hold the fourth running of Boston's Run to Remember.

The “Run to Remember” is held in honor of Massachusetts law enforcement officers killed in the line of duty. This event is a two day run (one 5 mile road race and one half marathon) in celebration of the fallen officer’s lives as well as a show of respect for their ultimate sacrifice.

The net proceeds benefit Kids At Risk Programs throughout the City of Boston. “Kids At Risk Programs provide safe and nurturing environments encouraging inner city youths to make healthy choices and an alternative to gangs and acts leading to incarceration.” Since 1994, over $500,000 has been raised funding two primary programs for youths:

- Boys and Girls Club Memberships, YMCAs and other after school programs.
- Summer programs and camps for over 600 youths annually.

Join thousands of runners for the fourth annual Run to Remember. This 5-mile road race and half marathon runs through historic downtown Boston will be held in honor of the men and women killed in the line of duty. The event will not only will celebrate their lives, all proceeds from the run will go to benefit Kids at Risk programs in the city. All inquiries into this event can be directed to info@bostonsruntoremember.org

AnswerTips

AnswerTips is a very useful tool that is integrated into this web page and allows readers look up any word or phrase for the best explanation or definition on the web. When a user double-clicks any word a small pop-up window appears with an AnswerTip, which is simply an explanation of the word or phrase. Go ahead, double click: Boston.

For bloggers, this is great because its keeps your visitors (read: you) from wandering your page onto outbound links when looking for information. To learn how to use AnswerTips and to enable it for your blog check out their Blogger Portal.

designgive - creativity is a gift

designgive is an apparel retail web site created by designers who donate a portion of every sale to charity. They sell mostly t-shirts, long-sleeve shirts and hoodies. One dollar of every shirt sold is donated to charity. “As artists we were given a talent to create, it's up to you to use those talents to try and make a difference in the world.” The buyer can choose where their donation will go from some of the largest and most far-reaching charitable organizations in the world. These groups include:

- American Diabetes Association - diabetes affects an estimated 20 million men, women and children in the United States. Out of each dollar spent by the ADA, 78 cents support research, advocacy and services for people affected by the disease.

- American Cancer Society – invests nearly $3 billion annually in cancer research since 1946. Cancer kills more than a half a million Americans each year, equaling more than 1,500 deaths per day. In the United States, cancer accounts for one of every four deaths.

- UNICEF - or the United Nations Children's Fund, provides humanitarian aid to children and mothers in developing countries. With staff in over 150 countries and territories, UNICEF is the world's leading children's organization. Contributions also support humanitarian support in the Sudan, where a $3 donation can buy a large wool blanket to protect children from the cold during an emergency.

- American Red Cross - provides relief to victims of disasters and provides respond to emergencies. The organization responds to more than 70,000 disasters each year.

- Make-a-Wish Foundation - is the country's largest wish-granting organization for children suffering from life-threatening medical conditions. The foundation has granted almost 150,000 wishes since it was founded in 1980.

- American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals - is the oldest humane organization in the United States. It has worked for over 140 years to eliminate injustices toward animals.

- Children with AIDS Charity – supports children diagnosed with pediatric HIV and AIDS. The group uses donations to fund its three-pronged approach of education, transport assistance and financial support to children and families affected by the disease.

designgive encourages designers who would like to participate in this project to contact them. Each design appearing on the designgive site will feature the artists name as well as a brief "About the Artist" section. To contact designgive check out their contact page.

“Creativity was a gift to you, now is your chance to give something back. Contribute to designgive, and realize your cause for design.”

http://www.designgive.com/

The Greenest Generation

I know this dog. I don't know her name. I call her The Recycling Dog.

The Recycling Dog lives on my street, somewhere. The Recycling Dog is a German Shorthaired Pointer, I think. The Recycling Dog recycles, it’s awesome.

Every few days I see The Recycling Dog heading out for a walk. When I see The Recycling Dog returning from a walk, with a plastic bottle in her mouth, it’s a real prize.

I know it’s her natural instinct to retrieve but sometimes I imagine, if only for a second, that she knows what she’s doing. As she trots along, with a bottle in her mouth and her tail in full wag, I imagine her saying: “Hey, look at me. If I can do it, you can too.”

Traditionally, German Shorthaired Pointers are hunting dogs, they are bred to retrieve game. It's easy to understand how a dog with such a strong natural instinct adapts this instinct to focus on retrieving other things. Adapting her desire for retrieval fulfills an internal need and coincidentally, it helps the environment. It just happens that her desire involves retrieving the plastic bottles that litter the streets of Brookline and Allston.

When I see The Recycling Dog in action the one thing that stands out in my mind is the idea that adapting to a changing environment can be a win-win situation. More importantly, adapting the way we view energy efficiency can be a win-win situation too. The Green Movement isn’t an idea that we can afford to brush off as something only liberals or tree huggers support, not anymore. Reducing our dependence on oil will make our country stronger in the long run, not to mention reduce the transfer of our wealth to the Middle East. Thomas Friedman, in his essay The Power of Green, notes: “Being green, focusing the nation on greater energy efficiency and conservation, is actually the most tough-minded, geostrategic, pro-growth and patriotic thing we can do.”

As gas prices climb to all-time highs people are changing many things including the ways they commute. In an effort to offset transportation costs some people are deciding to ride their bike to work. The benefits are twofold; it’s a win-win situation. The first benefit is the decreased carbon emissions from the burning of fossil fuels and the second is a healthier lifestyle for the biker.

Driving less and biking more can make you live longer. Recycling makes the world more sustainable. Thinking green is patriotic. And, even retrieving bottles can be rewarding. What does this all mean? It means green is the new red, white and blue.

Look, I know everyone can’t ride their bike to work and I know that a dog isn’t going reverse global warming. But, as the world becomes Hot, Flat, and Crowded we need to encourage new, renewable energy technologies not support backwards thinking ideas like a gas tax holiday. We need to renew the Clean Energy Tax Stimulus Act that is set to expire in December 2008, to stimulate investment in solar energy and the production of wind energy.

We need to adapt to a changing environment, just like The Recycling Dog, we need to start thinking differently. Once we set in motion these small changes we can become the change that we want to encourage. When future generations look back on this era they will judge us for how we responded to this crisis. I hope they judge us The Greenest Generation.

The Power of Green

In January 2006, NYT Op-Ed Columnist Thomas Friedman wrote The New Red, White and Blue where he asserted “living green is not just a "personal virtue," it's a national security imperative.” He went on to argue: “we need a president and a Congress with the guts not just to invade Iraq, but to also impose a gasoline tax and inspire conservation at home. That takes a real energy policy with long-term incentives for renewable energy - wind, solar, biofuels - rather than the welfare-for-oil-companies-and-special-interests that masqueraded last year as an energy bill.”

Near two and a half years later Mr. Friedman is still pushing on. Here is an excerpt from his article The Power of Green:

“One day Iraq, our post-9/11 trauma and the divisiveness of the Bush years will all be behind us — and America will need, and want, to get its groove back. We will need to find a way to reknit America at home, reconnect America abroad and restore America to its natural place in the global order — as the beacon of progress, hope and inspiration. I have an idea how. It’s called “green.”

In the world of ideas, to name something is to own it. If you can name an issue, you can own the issue. One thing that always struck me about the term “green” was the degree to which, for so many years, it was defined by its opponents — by the people who wanted to disparage it. And they defined it as “liberal,” “tree-hugging,” “sissy,” “girlie-man,” “unpatriotic,” “vaguely French.”

Well, I want to rename “green.” I want to rename it geostrategic, geoeconomic, capitalistic and patriotic. I want to do that because I think that living, working, designing, manufacturing and projecting America in a green way can be the basis of a new unifying political movement for the 21st century. A redefined, broader and more muscular green ideology is not meant to trump the traditional Republican and Democratic agendas but rather to bridge them when it comes to addressing the three major issues facing every American today: jobs, temperature and terrorism.

How do our kids compete in a flatter world? How do they thrive in a warmer world? How do they survive in a more dangerous world? Those are, in a nutshell, the big questions facing America at the dawn of the 21st century. But these problems are so large in scale that they can only be effectively addressed by an America with 50 green states — not an America divided between red and blue states.

Because a new green ideology, properly defined, has the power to mobilize liberals and conservatives, evangelicals and atheists, big business and environmentalists around an agenda that can both pull us together and propel us forward. That’s why I say: We don’t just need the first black president. We need the first green president. We don’t just need the first woman president. We need the first environmental president. We don’t just need a president who has been toughened by years as a prisoner of war but a president who is tough enough to level with the American people about the profound economic, geopolitical and climate threats posed by our addiction to oil — and to offer a real plan to reduce our dependence on fossil fuels.”

As we enter 2009, we still find ourselves in trouble, at home and abroad. We are in trouble because we have had poor leadership. We have an opportunity to change the course and get our grove back. I’m with Tom: “real patriots, real advocates of spreading democracy around the world, live green. Green is the new red, white and blue.”

Thomas L. Friedman is a columnist for The New York Times specializing in foreign affairs. Picture: Ian Davenport

It's still the economy, stupid.

James Carville, former political strategist for Bill Clinton during the 1992 presidential campaign against George H.W. Bush, originally coined the term “The economy, stupid”. At that time, George H.W. was the strong favorite in the race for the White House until the (Bill) Clinton campaign adopted messaging that echoed the public’s fears of the economic slowdown caused by the stock market collapse on Black Monday in October 1987, and proven in the actual recessions in 1990 and 1991. Why was George H.W. Bush way ahead early in the polls? Because he was seen as having more experience with national security.

It's still the economy, stupid. "From concerns about the economy and the war in Iraq to the perennial topics of Social Security and the health care system, a range of issues are guiding this year's presidential race," CNN.com goes on to list the issues and show the poll results. Many of the polls suggest that the most important, if not the main, issue Americans care about is the economy.

So, we know the economy is a concern and we know the credit crisis is almost certainly the biggest concern lately. But, what exactly is the problem? The problem is that we don’t know where the problems are. As the Economist put it: “There is still vast uncertainty about how much toxic debt remains, and who owns it. This has led banks to hoard money and call in loans.” Until the bad investments are uncovered we don’t know of their existence and banks will remain very conservative. This unknown has created a panic on Wall Street and caused sever cutbacks, speculation and major stock fluctuations over the few months.

One thing is certain, confidence is key and the current uncertainty will certainly lead to further bumps in the road. Hold on and strap in because its still the economy, stupid.

Web-based microfinancing helps poor entrepreneurs get on their feet.

Kiva, which means “unity” in Swahili, a web-based non-profit incorporated in November 2005, lets anyone lend money directly to a specific needy person in a developing country.

Recipients of a Kiva Loan are referred to as "entrepreneurs" or "borrowers", contributors to a Kiva Loan are referred to as "Kiva Lenders". The key word here is: Lend. The loan allows the entrepreneur to boost themselves out of poverty. Lenders can loan as little as $25. Lenders also receive updates and get repaid when the business succeeds. Loan terms range from 4 months to 18 months. Currently, at repayment lenders receive no interest on their loan, this might change in the future. Astonishingly, the repayment success rate is 99.86%. This means that only 0.14% of all entrepreneurs default on their loan. Take a moment to let that success rate sink in. I will tell you how they are so effective in a second.

Funds. According Kiva’s website, since inception and as of January 30, 2008, Kiva has distributed $20,999,835 in loans from 239,127 lenders. A total of 31,864 entrepreneurs have been funded. The average loan size is $568.19.

How it works. The loan success rate is so high because every entrepreneur is interviewed and screened by a Kiva “Field Partner.” Kiva currently has 78 partners in 40 different countries. A partner can be a volunteer, an aid worker or anyone from an established community service institution. After the entrepreneur is interviewed and approved, the Field Partner posts a profile of the qualified entrepreneur on the Kiva website. Lenders browse and choose the entrepreneur they want to fund. Kiva then forwards the funds to the Field Partner who gives the money to the entrepreneur. The Field Partner also collects loan repayment funds and forwards the money upstream to the original lender. Often, when the original lender receives funds they re-contribute to another needy entrepreneur.

“Matt Flannery, the founder of Kiva, says philanthropy of this kind can become addictive, especially as lenders know they will see their money again. By choosing a business on Kiva.org, you can "sponsor a business" and help the world's working poor make great strides towards economic independence.”

Economic Recovery, One Cup at a Time.

Starbucks Corp., the world's largest chain of coffee shops has recently unveiled its economic recovery plan, further highlighting the compete inadequacy of our current leadership.

Acknowledging the fact that the Bush administration can’t independently handle the fiscal woes of our staggering economy, Starbucks throws its hat, or cup, into the ring. They hope that by offering the $1 Short Coffee they will help jump start the country's economic recovery. Those close to executive management said: “we would like to emphasize that our loyal customers can still enjoy grossly overpaying for our products if they choose."

I’m looking forward to the $1 coffee. And, as a side note, Starbucks has been great to OYFP! They’ve donated their great coffee and baked goods to a few of our past events.

Accountability Found.

After a recent call to wallets by the American Red Cross (donation ask here, story here) I wondered, where does my money go? Is my donation being used effectively?

I’m not the only one asking these questions. In 2007, Holden Karnofsky and Elie Hassenfeld, both in their late 20’s, discouraged by the lack of transparency in charitable giving founded GiveWell. GiveWell studies charities, evaluates them publicly, ranks them on their effectiveness, and provides grants to those they believe are doing the best jobs.

Mr. Karnofsky and Mr. Hassenfeld are former hedge fund analysts who are familiar with asking tough questions. Their research for GiveWell found that many of the charities they contacted were unable to provide reliable, neutral evidence that their programs actually worked. Surprisingly, Mr. Karnofsky and Mr. Hassenfeld have encountered some resistance while asking these tough questions.

In the age of information and with the clear lack of accountability in today’s markets, it’s amazing that the need for GiveWell hasn’t been heralded as the next big thing in the non-profit sector. Increasing accountability and transparency will increase donor confidence which will ultimately increase donor participation. You can read more about GiveWell on their website or blog.

I’ve personally reached out to Mr. Karnofsky and Mr. Hassenfeld and hope they comment back. Heck, I’ve even invited them to the Salsa event on Wednesday, February 13th, free of charge, I’ll be covering that.

Hillary, Barack, Experience

By NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF

With all the sniping from the Clinton camp about whether Barack Obama has enough experience to make a strong president, consider another presidential candidate who was far more of a novice. He had the gall to run for president even though he had served a single undistinguished term in the House of Representatives, before being hounded back to his district.

That was Abraham Lincoln.

Another successful president scorned any need for years of apprenticeship in Washington, declaring, “The same old experience is not relevant।” He suggested that the most useful training comes not from hanging around the White House and Congress but rather from experience “rooted in the real lives of real people” so that “it will bring real results if we have the courage to change.”

That was Bill Clinton running in 1992 against George H. W. Bush, who was then trumpeting his own experience over the callow youth of Mr. Clinton. That year Mr. Bush aired a television commercial urging voters to keep America “in the hands of experience.”

It might seem obvious that long service in Washington is the best preparation for the White House, but on the contrary, one lesson of American history is that length of experience in national politics is an extremely poor predictor of presidential success.

Looking at the 19 presidents since 1900, three of the greatest were among those with the fewest years in electoral politics. Teddy Roosevelt had been a governor for two years and vice president for six months; Woodrow Wilson, a governor for just two years; and Franklin Roosevelt, a governor for four years. None ever served in Congress.

They all did have executive experience (as did Mr. Clinton), actually running something larger than a Senate office. Maybe that’s something voters should think about more: governors have often made better presidents than senators. But that’s not a good Democratic talking point, because the candidates with the greatest administrative experience by far are Mitt Romney, Rudy Giuliani and Mike Huckabee.

Alternatively, look at the five presidents since 1900 with perhaps the most political experience when taking office: William McKinley, Lyndon Johnson, Richard Nixon, Gerald Ford and George H. W. Bush. They had great technical skills — but not one was among our very greatest presidents.

The point is not that experience is pointless but that it needn’t be in politics to be useful. John McCain’s years as a P.O.W. gave him an understanding of torture and a moral authority to discuss it that no amount of Senate hearings ever could have conferred.

In the same way, Mr. Obama’s years as an antipoverty organizer give him insights into one of our greatest challenges: how to end cycles of poverty. That front-line experience is one reason Mr. Obama not only favors government spending programs, like early-childhood education, but also cultural initiatives like promoting responsible fatherhood.

Then there’s Mr. Obama’s grade-school years in Indonesia. Our most serious mistakes in foreign policy, from Vietnam to Iraq, have been a blindness to other people’s nationalism and an inability to see ourselves as others see us. Mr. Obama seems to have absorbed an intuitive sensitivity to that problem. For starters, he understood back in 2002 that American troops would not be greeted in Iraq with flowers.

In politics, Mr. Obama’s preparation is indeed thin, though it’s more than Hillary Rodham Clinton acknowledges. His seven years in the Illinois State Senate aren’t heavily scrutinized, but he scored significant achievements there: a law to videotape police interrogations in capital cases; an earned income tax credit to fight poverty; an expansion of early-childhood education.

Mrs. Clinton’s strength is her mastery of the details of domestic and foreign policy, unrivaled among the candidates; she speaks fluently about what to do in Pakistan, Iraq, Darfur. Mr. Obama’s strength is his vision and charisma and the possibility that his election would heal divisions at home and around the world. John Edwards’s strength is his common touch and his leadership among the candidates in establishing detailed positions on health care, poverty and foreign aid.

Those are the meaningful distinctions in the Democratic field, not Mrs. Clinton’s spurious claim to “35 years of experience.” The Democrats with the greatest Washington expertise — Joe Biden, Chris Dodd and Bill Richardson — have already been driven from the race. And the presidential candidate left standing with the greatest experience by far is Mr. McCain; if Mrs. Clinton believes that’s the criterion for selecting the next president, she might consider backing him.

To put it another way, think which politician is most experienced today in the classic sense, and thus — according to the “experience” camp — best qualified to become the next president.

That’s Dick Cheney. And I rest my case.

R-word

Recession. Yes, I said it. And, I just might be contributing towards it… with this blog. “An interesting indicator, the “R-word” index” -- the number of stories appearing in print that use the word “recession” -- has spiked in early 2008.” According to The Economist, this simple tool has forecasted the start of the recessions in 1981, 1990 and 2001.

A recession occurs when the gross domestic product (GDP) declines for two or more consecutive quarters। The GDP is the value of all the reported goods and services produced in a country. Some market indicators that signal the onset of a current recession include: a spike in oil prices, the news of major financial companies taking huge losses due to subprime mortgage defaults, slumping home values, and consumers' purchasing power being lowered by high energy and food prices.

There have been 11 recessions since 1945, and they are an expected part of the economic cycle. The National Bureau of Economic Research says that “the US economy follows a somewhat regular pattern of expansion and contraction. The economy will typically expand steadily for six to ten years and then enter a recession for six months to two years.”

Since it isn’t beneficial for a nation to be in recession, governments will normally take action to get the economy going again. Ben S. Bernanke, chairman of the Federal Reserve, recently stated that he supports tax cuts or other measures to stimulate the economy. It is widely anticipated that Federal Reserve will reduce interest rates at the Federal Open Market Committee meeting on Jan. 30. The New York Times reports that “on Wall Street, investors are betting that the central bank will reduce overnight lending rates to 3.75 percent from 4.25 percent.”

The R-word is here, Recession.