American Patriotism is about Self-Government & Fundamental Rights…not flag waving.

As for those who wear the USA flag on shirts and hats, however innocently, traditionally the Boy Scouts and military would consider such to be disrespectful. You don’t treat the flag like fashion. You raise it solemnly, silently acknowledging all that it symbolizes.

Our flag symbolizes our freedoms, not our uncritical support of whatever Administration happens to be in power; and so when I see liberals wear tee-shirts with upside-down American flags it makes me sad. When I see Neoconvervatives who never served in the military criticize Senator Obama for not wearing a (Made in China) American lapel pin at all times, it reminds me that we are confused. Patriotism in other countries might be like rooting for a football or baseball or basketball or soccer team: you’re either for ‘em or against ‘em, no matter what they do.

But America is and always has been first and foremost an idea, an ideal. Thomas Jefferson wrote a long criticism of slavery into the first draft of the Declaration of Independence. Neo Nazis, or any ideology we might disagree with, have the same Freedom of Expression that we do. The media, however bought and paid for, has the right to speak truth to power without fear of retribution (in an age of blogging, this right is newly powerful, as it is newly independent). I love America like a brother or sister who might, and often, veer left or right of the razor’s edge of truth and integrity. So I criticize America, because America is by, for and of the people, and we have retained the right to criticize our self-government. But I do not disrespect America. I am a liberal. I am a American patriot. I am just another liberal American patriot, and I say here that the flag is as much mine as it is yours, and I say that the wisdom to vote for a lesser evil, for an imperfect man or woman is my most sacred of duties.

And so, tonight, this being Independence day, I’ll raise a microbrew and I’ll say—as an American Buddhist, free to worship in one of the rare governments that separates church and state—”God Bless America.” 

Tags: Barack Obama, Edward R. Murrow, God Bless America, Independence Day, July 4th, liberal patriot, stars and stripes, Thomas Jefferson

Click here for the reveal.

Tags: eco, Ecologic Designs, Green Guru Gear, messenger bag, reuse

My childhood Buddhist buddy Jonathan McKeever cut this silly vid with his daughter and her lil’GF.

An art form. A study showed the average car in NYC goes about 5 mph or something…bikes can beat that, easy (as long as you ride like this guy, going from Midtown to Chelsea). A little harder than my commute in Boulder from my lil’eco Victorian to elephant’s lil’eco office or the Trident Café.

Tags: bicycle, bike, commuter bikem, fixed gear, fixie, NYC

With millions of hits, this Ogden: the Inappropriate Yoga Guy video is funny three or four times. I’ve watched it five.

Tags: gooooji berries, innappopriate yoga guy, ojai, om, yoga, yoga teacher training

Tags: Allen Ginsberg, Beat, Beck, Bob Dylan, Bono, Hunter S. Thomposon, Hunter S. Thompson, Jack Johnson, Jonny Depp, Paul McCartney, poetry, Warhold

The first few seconds aside (I actually know Ravenna, the American Buddhist songstress), this talk (from Bob’s book tour launch event at Tibet House in New York City approx two weeks ago) offers a preview of our upcomin’ elevision: Free Tibet, and a glimpse into why Columbia Prof. Robert Thurman chose to write “Why the Dalai Lama Matters His Act of Truth As the Solution for China, Tibet and the World.” The book, or rather the author, was just featured in the NY Times Sunday Magazine—elephant journal’s Official Favorite Sunday Morning Bathtub Reading.

Tags: Bob Thurman, China, Dalai Lama, elephant journal, elevision: Free Tibet, Free Tibet, olympics, Ravenna Michelson, Robert Thurman, Tibet, Tibet House, videos, Why the Dalai Lama Matters

Wow. I’m a lifelong reader of Kerouac—like so many 17 year old boys, I read ON THE ROAD and was electrified, transformed…but until God invented Youtube, I’d never seen him “live.”

Tags: kerouac, On the Road, youtube

World Tibet Day, a day set aside to celebrate Tibetan culture and to observe the birthday of the Dalai Lama, is this weekend.

Boulder’s celebration is tomorrow in Central Park (Broadway & Canyon) from 10:00 a.m. – 5:00 p.m. There will be Tibetan Arts & Crafts, delicious food, cultural exhibits, children’s activities and musical performances by Tibetan Folk Dancers, Yangchen Lhamo, Boulder Taiko HIBIKI, and others. It’s even free to the public!

For more, click here.

Tags: Dalai Lama, Free Tibet, Tibet, World Tibet Day, Yangchen Lhamo

It’s Independence Day, of course—a day when we remember to remember why this country is an idea worth keeping alive. 

It’s also the birthday of Heather Mueller, elephant journal’s editor. She’s 24 years old, today.

For her integrity under the unceasing, and sometimes-depressing financial pressure that weighs upon elephant; for her independence of thought, a quality too rare among men and women; for her openness to the ever-expanding understanding of ‘the mindful life’ to which we are dedicated, we owe her a debt of gratitude. I would likely have given up and certainly have lost the fight without her vajra-like precision and gentleness.

It’s also Senator Barack Obama’s daughter’s birthday. Reuters: “Obama, concluding a week-long campaign tour focused on values and patriotism, was cheered by crowds as he watched a holiday parade and threw a picnic for supporters in Butte—a Democratic bastion in a state that normally votes Republican in White House races. Obama was joined by his wife Michelle and daughters Sasha and Malia, who was celebrating her 10th birthday. ”I finally told her the truth that all these fireworks and stuff are not just for her,” Obama said of Malia, who was serenaded with “Happy Birthday” by crowds at the parade and the picnic.”

Tags: Barack, editor, Heather Mueller, Independence Day, July 4th, Obama, Thomas Jefferson

Here’s an excerpt from yesterday’s article in the Times that mentions ele:idol Shiva Rea re: Kripalu, the “largest retreat center in America.”

“To figure out who, or what, the next big thing will be, Kripalu programmers go on scouting trips, to professional conferences, to other retreat centers. They keep an ear out for cross-promotional opportunities.

“Shiva Rea” — a marquee yoga teacher — “will say, ‘That Simon Park, he’s really up and coming,’ and sure enough he is,” Ms. Barack said. “We want to catch them on the edge. By the time they hit our catalog, he’s going to be on the cover of Yoga Journal.”

Here’s the article.

Tags: Kripalu, New Age, New York Times, retreat, Shiva Rea, Simon Park, spirituality, yoga

One of the last times I saw Allen Ginsberg must been in about 1997; it was at the BU Bookstore on Com Ave in Boston. He was giving a reading. Someone asked his thoughts on the nearly-mythical nearly always nearly-in-production casting of Jack Kerouac in the movie version of ON THE ROAD—which Francis Ford Coppola was rumored to be involved in, at the time. Ginsberg said, “I think Jonny Depp would make a great Kerouac.”

Now, it’s 10 years later and still no ON THE ROAD movie’s been made. It’s a Great American Novel, and it’s gotta be one of the more easily translatable books of mad prose, it fairly leaps of the page and into technicolor with it’s dope, broads and existential wonderings and wanderings.

Well, folks, I’m crashing after a long short week—watching AMC’s MAD MEN—and I found our Kerouac. So get set, producers and directors and Hollywood types—the next time you find a jawbone with blue eyes and jet black hair on it that looks any more Kerouac-esque’ll be…never. Jon Hamm, better known perhaps as Don Draper, is your man.

Hollywood, you can’t Beat him with a stick, and you shouldn’t try: now go make my gaddamned movie, and don’t come back ’til you do.

Tags: Allen Ginsberg, AMC, Beat, Boston University, Jack Kerouac, Jon Hamm, Mad Men, On the Road

Readallaaboudit.

Tags: Buddha, buddhism, China, Dalai Lama, Deborah Solomon, Free Tibet, New York Times, New York Times Sunday Magazine, NY Times, Robert Thurman, Tibet, Uma Thurman

The Sun has long been one of my favorite independent magazines. Not only have they remained independent for over 35 years, but they’ve done so based solely on contributions and subscription sales—they stopped printing advertisements in 1990. 

Their feature interview with farmer, poet, activist and ele-idol Wendell Berry gets to the root of why “local” and “independent” matter. Though his message can’t help but lean in an environmental direction, it starts in a place that everyone (hippie, conservative, grad student or blue collar worker) can respect: a deep appreciation for people. For Berry, “local” means paying attention to and supporting the details and idiosyncrasies of a place, a combination of nostalgia and ever-present attention to the quirks that make a community come alive. 

Tags: farm, Kentucky, local, The Sun, Wendell Berry

With the debate still racing (ohhhh metaphors, how I love thee!) over the real carbon-saving costs of the Prius, along comes a group of environmentalists in California who are converting classic cars into all-electric cars. It’s a move brimming with both nostalgia and frustration over car company’s neglect of offering a electric solution to consumers. This is where the Prius becomes a “gas guzzler”

Now, all I have to is convert ele’s 1967 Alfa Romeo to electric. But oh we will miss that Alfa noise!

Read the whole article here via the LA Times.

I recently read the Rolling Stone article about Obama, and the interviewer asked the next President of the United States why musicians, such as the Boss and Bob Dylan, throw their weight behind his campaign. Obama answered that he thought musicians were very open to change and were unlikely to “settle for what it is,” working towards “what might be” instead.

These were choice words to read on the night before I drive from Chicago to Michigan to attend Rothbury, which goes by the tagline of a “Sustainable Camping Festival Revolution Celebrating Music, Art and Action.” Music festivals are my idea of a good time, and they inevitably always involve some discussion of community, but it is always somewhat disconcerting at the end of a long weekend to see trash strewn concert grounds. (This months Rolling Stone also mentioned that the Bonnaroo festival generated 79 tons of garbage). So while festivals thrive on the idea of a community, literally creating small, or not so small, towns overnight, one also wonders what type of community is created.

Rothbury knows just what type of community it aims to create. Vendors must use compostable items and ticket prices included a fee to offset carbon emissions, In an incredibly ambitious move, the festival also aims to curb cigarette butt litter (one of my personal pet peeves) through personal portable ashtrays. So while I am excited to see some of my favorite artists such as Widespread Panic, Railroad Earth, and Sound Tribe Sector Nine (and Snoopp Dogg! For shizzle!), I am equally excited to see if Rothbury, and especially the attendees, walk the walk, rather than just talk the talk about sustainability. The festival promoters are certainly dedicated. They are raising money for solar panels for a local school, hosting think tanks all weekend, and taking action to fight hunger through a food drive and a Guinness book world record attempt for largest can sculpture.

I look forward to my 4th of July weekend listening to music, spending time with friends, and doing one the most patriotic things I can think of, working towards a sustainable future.

Tags: change, community, Rothbury, sustainable

…the Chico Bagwagon, that is (I’m sorry I couldn’t help myself). It also allows me to once again blog about something Waylon has already blogged about.

Back in March, my friend gave me a Chico bag for my birthday, and then a couple of days ago, I scored another one when I stopped by elephant’s downtown Boulder office (I’d told my parents internships have their perks!). I already knew these bags were durable, convenient and have a nifty little stuff sack, but I recently learned that the company’s genius started in a landfill. Chico Bag founder, Andy Keller, went to dispose of some waste and was overwhelmed by the amount of plastic bags he saw being unloaded. It was then and there that he decided to help Americans kick our single-use bag habit. A devoted yoga practioner, Andy likes it hot (i’m sorry I couldn’t help it…again). He credits much of his business success to the dedication and focus required in his yoga practice. He also brings the ideal of taking your practice off the mat (and in this case into his bussiness) by donating bags to low income families and the homeless.

However, what impressed me the most is the Recycle symbol on the outside of my bag stuff sack. It actually confused me the most at first (do I put Nylon is mixed paper or plastics?). However, in the event that your reusable bag becomes, for lack of a better term, unusable, you can send it to the company, who will send it to an organization called Grateful Threads. Volunteers at Grateful threads sew unique and beautiful rugs from the nylon material, which are then sold to raise money for victims of domestic violence.

Pretty impressive stuff. So shat did you do today that was so great? Well, if you’re using a Chico bag, it means you’re not contributing to the estimated 500 billion to 1 trillion single use bags that are thrown “away” each year.

Tags: 12 typos, Chico Bag, nevertheless great writing Rachel!, that I amended, your is not the same as you're

Coming out of a tunnel to cross the Tobin Bridge into Boston at rush hour, the sky is filled with operatic blackened clouds, impish lightning and, suddenly, an immense amount of rain. The whole city, with all its different people and stories, enclosed in one giant, thundering, subaquatic dream. ~Corey Kohn

Tags: Boston, dharma brat, photography, rain

e360, Yale’s new online journal of environmentalism (from the school of Forestry & Environmental Studies) is everything you’d expect: intelligent and in depth, choosing quality content and clear design over the flashy graphics and sensational headlines that lure readers to most other sites. Current highlights: Michael