Even the MSM is catching on!

by don mikulecky

So many times in my diaries about the nature of technology someone claims we can find a fix for anything.  Now even the MSM questions such arrogance.  In the NYT we have this:Our Fix-It Faith and the Oil Spill  A growing number of reductionist trained scientists and engineers are beginning to understand the limits to the Cartesian reductionism that serves as the philosophical basis for their understanding of the real complex world.  Physics supplied them with a good model of reality for dealing with machines and mechanisms, but not for  most complex systems that make up the real world.  The surrogate model we worshipped does not do it.  Read on below for more.

continued at Daily Kos....

Cuba Diaries: My Trip to Peak Oil

by Jill Richardson

With oil filling up the Gulf, I figured a diary about a country that got itself (mostly) off oil is a good idea. When the USSR collapsed, Cuba ran out of most of its oil nearly overnight. For the first four years, Cubans starved. Without agrochemicals and imports, they couldn't feed themselves. Then, out of necessity, they developed a system of agroecology and urban agriculture. Today, Cuba's one of the world's meccas of sustainable agriculture. I've just returned from spending 10 days there, visiting urban farms and gardens. The U.S. has a lot we could learn from Cuba. Travel to Cuba is restricted, although my trip was legal. The trip was ridiculously expensive - double or triple what a trip to elsewhere in Latin America would cost for the same thing - partially due to the requirements to get there legally. I urge you to please write your Congresscritters and Obama to end the blockade and embargo on Cuba. The Cuban people are unfairly its victims and the policies are outdated, silly, and cruel. Here's some info on how Cuba got off oil.

continued at Daily Kos....

Environment and Food in Haiti: Two Crises, One Solution

by Bev Bell

In part II of an interview, Chavannes Jean-Baptiste discusses the role that agriculture can play in Haiti in addressing both the environmental and food crises. (See “The Clock is Set to Zero” for the first part.) Jean-Baptiste is the Executive Director of the Peasant Movement of Papay (MPP by its Creole acronym) and the spokesperson for the National Peasant Movement of the Congress of Papay (MPNKP). Until this year, he also sat on the international coordinating committee of Vía Campesina, a confederation of organizations of peasant, family, indigenous, and landless farmers from more than sixty countries.

continued at Daily Kos....