'Eco-Terrorism' Advocate's Speech Sponsored with Taxpayer dollars

An Ohio taxpayers' group is appealing to the publicly funded Ohio University to repeal its sponsorship of an environmental activism conference that is hosting an outspoken supporter of "eco-terrorism." Two departments at the university are co-sponsoring the Buckeye Forest Council's conference, "Defending the Earth in Times of War." The keynote speaker on Saturday is Derrick Jensen, an author and activist who has advocated the tactics used by groups like the Earth Liberation Front (ELF) to disrupt industries that profit from the environment.


"Our problem is that Ohio University, which is funded with public dollars, taxpayer dollars, is a sponsor of this program," said Ohio Taxpayers Association director Scott Pullins. "We don't think our taxpayer dollars should be used to subsidize folks that advocate violence."


Connie Pollard, the administrator of the Department of Environmental and Plant Biology at Ohio University, told Cybercast News Service that her department made a "modest" contribution to the conference, but declined to give the exact amount. The university's Environmental Studies department is also listed as a co-sponsor. In exchange for the donation, Pollard said, the department sent a student to the conference free of charge. Ohio University students will also be able to attend Saturday's keynote address without registering for the conference, which normally costs $25. Buckeye Forest Council Executive Director Susan Heitker also declined to give the exact amount of the sponsorship, but told Cybercast News Service that sponsors must donate at least $250 in order to send a representative to the conference for free.


Jensen explained his feelings in a 1998 essay titled "Actions Speak Louder than Words." "Every morning when I awake, I ask myself whether I should write or blow up a dam. I tell myself I should keep writing, though I'm not sure that's right," Jensen wrote. He compared the unwillingness of environmentalists to act violently to the "striking blindness" of German resistance to Hitler from 1933 to 1945 and compared acts of violence to "the honeybee stinging to defend her hive; it's the mother grizzly charging a train to defend her cubs." In an undated interview with the militant animal liberation magazine, No Compromise, Jensen said his goal was "to bring down civilization." He said he "fully support[s]" groups like the ELF that blow up dams, set fire to SUV dealerships and hack computer systems.

The FBI's domestic terrorism section chief, James Jarboe, called the ELF "a serious terrorist threat" in 2002 congressional testimony. He told the House Resources Committee that ELF and its animal rights counterpart, the Animal Liberation Front, were responsible for more than 600 criminal acts since 1996, amounting to more than $43 million in damage.

"Free speech only extends until someone's hurt," Pullins said. "We can't yell 'fire' in a crowded theatre, we can't encourage crowds to beat and maim people and we can't advocate the blowing up of dams and other things." Pullins added that college campuses are "a hotbed of liberal activism and that's fine, but in cases of where they're supporting the advocacy of violence, we're going to try to prevent that." Pullins told Cybercast News Service that the university was aware of his group's concerns, but Pollard said she had not heard of any concerns and seemed to be unaware of Jensen's connections to eco-terrorists. "I will look into this," she said. "I don't feel comfortable saying anything more. I think I'll just look into it on my end because this is the first I've heard of it."

Heitker, of the Buckeye Forest Council, said she sees no problem with the university departments co-sponsoring the conference because it is "an educational event." She said taxpayers fund universities because they are educational institutions and "part of being an educational institution is about learning and discussion." She told Cybercast News Service that Jensen will be addressing how environmentalists can protect the environment when much of the nation's focus is on international affairs such as the war in Iraq. "That is what we presented to the university and that is what these departments at the university are co-sponsoring," Heitker said.

Jensen will not be talking about blowing up dams and setting fires to SUV dealerships, Heitker insisted. "As far as the Buckeye Forest Council, we don't condone violence but we do believe in free speech," she said. [Try saying that homosexuals are agents of the Devil and see how much free speech she believes in!]

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THE TRUTH IS SLOWLY SEEPING OUT

Increased output from the Sun might be to blame for 10 to 30 percent of global warming that has been measured in the past 20 years, according to a new report. Increased emissions of carbon dioxide and other heat-trapping gases still play a role, the scientists say. But climate models of global warming should be corrected [Heresy!] to better account for changes in solar activity, according to Nicola Scafetta and Bruce West of Duke University. The findings were published online this week by the journal Geophysical Research Letters. Scientists agree the planet is warming. Effects are evident in melting glaciers and reductions in the amount of frozen ground around the planet.

The new study is based in part on Columbia University research from 2003 in which scientists found errors in how data on solar brightness is interpreted. A gap in data, owing to satellites not being deployed after the Space Shuttle Columbia disaster, were filled by less accurate data from other satellites, Scafetta says. The Duke analyses examined solar changes over 22 years versus 11 years used in previous studies. The cooling effect of volcanoes and cyclical shifts in ocean currents can have a greater negative impact on the accuracy of shorter data periods. "The Sun may have minimally contributed about 10 to 30 percent of the 1980-2002 global surface warming," the researchers said in a statement today.

Many questions remain, however. For example, scientists do not have a good grasp [So who cares? It's ACTION that matters! Mussolini said the same in the 1920s] of how much Earth absorbs or reflects sunlight. "We don't know what the Sun will do in the future," Scafetta says. "For now, if our analysis is correct, I think it is important to correct the climate models so that they include reliable sensitivity to solar activity. Once that is done, then it will be possible to better understand what has happened during the past hundred years."

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MORE ECONOMIC DESTRUCTION FROM GREENIE NUTTINESS

This time in New Zealand. Apparently selling apples is bad. Yep. You've got it: Selling apples is bad

New Zealand apple growers say they are outraged over remarks made by Green co-leader Rod Donald on a recent visit to Australia. They say the remarks should eliminate the Greens as possible coalition partners in any government. According to the Apple Growers Action Group, on a visit to Australia before New Zealand’s election Mr Donald stated that he was opposed to apple and potato exports to Australia from New Zealand “on the basis that they should be consumed locally." He also said he wanted to see an end to products crossing the Tasman which can be grown locally, such as dairy foods, the growers association said.

The association has waged a long-standing battle, supported to at least some extent by the Labour government, to gain access to Austalian markets. Association spokesperson and grower Phil Alison said he was "staggered at the naivety of Mr Donald’s suggestion," pointing out that New Zealand is a primary producing nation that is dependant on export earnings. “The New Zealand Apple Industry generates about half a billion dollars of export earnings and produces too many apples for local consumption even though we have one of the highest consumption rates of apples in the world,” he said. “Under the Green’s policy how would New Zealand afford to pay for imported items that it does not grow or manufacture itself? “Mr Donald is a senior politician who has been in parliament for a number of years. To come out with this is astounding – particularly when he was in Australia at the time. “The Greens have never supported our Australian apple access campaign and are now undermining it. “I find it alarming that the Greens party and their policies may be associated with a new coalition government of New Zealand.

More here

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Many people would like to be kind to others so Leftists exploit that with their nonsense about equality. Most people want a clean, green environment so Greenies exploit that by inventing all sorts of far-fetched threats to the environment. But for both, the real motive is to promote themselves as wiser and better than everyone else, truth regardless.

Global warming has taken the place of Communism as an absurdity that "liberals" will defend to the death regardless of the evidence showing its folly. Evidence never has mattered to real Leftists

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