Obama’s green plan must include Native Americans

I was skipping through my email this morning and this caught my attention. Winona La Duke is a great activist/writer/leader among so many. I hope Washington will hear the voices of our past, present & future in the words of native americans like Winona today.

Obama’s green plan must include Native Americans
By Winona LaDuke, January 31, 2009
To accomplish the green energy goals he talked about in his inaugural address, President Obama must work with Native Americans.
“Each day brings further evidence that the ways we use energy strengthen our adversaries and threaten our planet,” the president said, vowing that “we will harness the sun and the winds and the soil to fuel our cars and run our factories.”

You can read the full article at http://www.progressive.org/mag/mpladuke013109.html

Homelessness, heating oil, health care: Bad news just keeps on coming

Don't look at the Boston Globe this morning if you don't want to be depressed.

Heating oil: Citgo Petroleum Corp., a Venezuelan oil company, will no longer be making donations of oil to Citizens Energy Corp, a non-profit which has provided heating oil at reduced cost to low-income people and Native American communities in 23 states. Declining oil prices-- which means declining profit-- is cited as the chief reason.

Homelessness: The number of homeless families living in shelters or motels in Boston has jumped 22 percent in one year. (I imagine it's similar across the state.) Reason? "For families, it's really about insufficient income to afford a place to live," said Jim Greene, director of the city's Emergency Shelter Commission. "Family homelessness is caused by the divide between people's incomes and housing costs, and when the gap is too great the problem gets worse."

Health Care: Increasing health care costs around the state are jeopardizing the state's new mandated health insurance plan. Meanwhile, Tufts Medical Center in Boston has announced it will no longer accept Blue Cross/Blue Sheild health insurance because the reimbursement rates from the insurer are too low for the medical center to operate efficiantly. A sign of things to come?