Aug 28, 2011

INDEPENDENT MEDIA by Steve Anderson It’s time to re-imagine the role of both citizens and government. It’s past time for governments to become more permeable and to encourage and empower citizens to govern themselves. In many ways, the process to re-imagine citizenship and governance seems to be well underway. Citizens are newly empowered by online...

Aug 28, 2011

NUTRISPEAK by Vesanto Melina Would you like your kids to have fun in the kitchen while learning to make nutritious foods for themselves? The ideal way for children to learn about good nutrition is if they become our little kitchen helpers starting from the time they can hold a plastic spoon. Youngsters learn to like veggies when they can grasp and gnaw on a...

Aug 28, 2011

ON THE GARDEN PATH by Carolyn Herriot I became a vegetarian in 1975 when I landed in Vancouver from London, UK and found myself sharing a cooperative house with five other people who were all vegetarians. The deal was we each took turns making dinner and because I loved cooking, instead of being daunted, I dashed out to buy a vegetarian cookbook that would...

Aug 28, 2011

UNIVERSE WITHIN by Gwen Randall-Young If we are not happy with our lives, we tend to attribute our current state to bad luck, other people or to simply not having been blessed as much as others. We might feel bitter, disappointed, angry or depressed and it is easy to keep our focus on what is missing rather than on what is present. If happiness were a...

Aug 28, 2011

FILMS WORTH WATCHING by Robert Alstead   We all like something for free, don’t we? So what’s not to like about Fresh Air Cinema, a free, outdoor series of movie screenings offered around the Lower Mainland this summer? This mobile cinema company has been setting up its giant, inflatable movie screens, sound systems and generators in parks and...

Aug 28, 2011

SCIENCE MATTERS by David Suzuki In their desperation to find even a tiny shred of peer-reviewed science to challenge the volumes of research from around the world about human-caused climate change, deniers have often held up Willie Soon’s work. Dr. Soon, an astrophysicist at the Harvard-Smithsonian Centre for Astrophysics, is known for studies that...

Aug 28, 2011

by Drs. Eldred and Ava Bell Taylor Emotion: The stressful thoughts that swirl around our heads all day. Environment: Could be the city you’re in, extreme heat, a stressful office. Dietary: Not just eating the wrong foods, but worrying about your diet. Health: Chronic illness, chronic pain, chronic inflammation. Lack of...

Aug 28, 2011

A feat of natural and sustainable energies by Adam Siddhartha Sealey On the weekend of July 22-24, at the foot of the mountain just outside of Boston Bar, BC, on the traditional lands of the Nahatlatch peoples, a group of about 250 people came together for Towards Eden, a music festival that was, according to festival visionaries and organizers Ash Bigdeli and...

Aug 28, 2011

by Bruce Cox In early July, a Sumatran tiger, one of fewer than 400 left on Earth, died after being trapped in a steel snare. The tiger was found on an acacia plantation owned by Sinar Mas, a notorious rainforest destroyer. In 1930, there were three subspecies of unique, majestic tigers found in Indonesia. Today, two of them are extinct and the last one is in...

Aug 27, 2011

A benefit for the Canadian Tibetan Resettlement Project by Paulette Marchetti In 2007, His Holiness the Dalai Lama asked Prime Minister Stephen Harper if Canada would offer Tibetans living in Arunachal Pradesh the opportunity to immigrate to Canada. His Holiness had a very specific reason for requesting that all the potential immigrants under this program be...

Aug 18, 2011

by Lucy Sharratt This year, we are eating from the first harvest of Monsanto’s eight-trait “SmartStax” genetically modified (GM) corn. Approved in 2009 and grown for the first time in North America last year, the new GM corn appears as processed food ingredients and feed for dairy and meat animals. Canada’s approval of SmartStax corn...

Aug 17, 2011

DRUG BUST by Alan Cassels Sometimes, you see someone and you can’t help think, “Now there goes a walking time bomb.” The person is overweight and wheezing, his doctor probably calls him a ”borderline diabetic” and he’s likely taking prescription drugs for blood pressure and high cholesterol. These people, along with my friend...

Aug 5, 2011

Experts weigh in on the health benefits of mind-altering plants Article and illustration by Geoff Olson Plants don’t do much compared to animals. They’re sedentary sorts, even with time-lapse photography. We’re talking about vegetative, botanical bores. Right? Wrong, according to Dennis McKenna, who argues against the standard take on plants. The droll...