"Invisible Children" Rally Raises Awareness of Child Soldier Kidnappings in Uganda

On April 25 an abduction and rescue event will take place in more than 100 cities around the world, according to a press release from the California-based sponsoring organization Invisible Children Inc.

Protesters will voluntarily kidnap themselves to raise awareness about "child soldier" kidnappings taking place in Uganda.

Invisible Children Inc. was born in in the spring of 2003, when three young filmmakers traveled to Africa in search of a story. As their story reads "what started out as a filmmaking adventure transformed into much more when these boys from Southern California discovered a tragedy that disgusted and inspired them, a tragedy where children are both the weapons and the victims."

After returning to the States, they created the documentary "Invisible Children: Rough Cut," a film that exposes the tragic realities of northern Uganda's night commuters and child soldiers.

Homeboy Industries Turns Ex-Gang Members Into Solar Posse

"We don't want people to think that you have to come out of MIT to be able to install solar power. A well-trained individual can make as good a worker as a lifelong electrician."
-Phillippe Hartley, general manager of a solar installation company, Phat Energy-

How neat is this? As Caitlan Carroll of NPR reports, the organization Homeboy Industries, the largest gang-prevention program in the country, offers a job-training program that takes ex-gang members off the streets and teaches them how to install solar panels.

Listen to the full story at PublicRadio.org.

Activist Artists Document Housing Crisis in Providence

"We want to take beautiful photos but don’t want to aestheticize a real problem. This is not about urban exploration, lonely chairs, and peeling paint."
-Josh Oakhurst, Forgotten Providence-

Artist Oakhurst, along with artists Sam Holland and Myles Dumas recently launched "Forgotten Providence," an interactive web site where visitors will find images of abandoned homes as well as information telling that home's story: links to property data, user submissions and discussion in the comments, and an open forum to discuss the issues surrounding these abandoned homes. Think of it as crowdsourcing how the American housing crisis has affected one city.

Here is the narrative for the house captured in the image above:

"Over four sales between 2000 and its eventual foreclosure in 2007, the “value” of this duplex rose 500%. No significant repairs were made during that time period.

It’s now boarded, vacant, rotting, and vandalized"

The group intends to engage in more civic engagement. As Oakhurst told Poptech, he hopes to “pursue engagement on a political level; using the expertise learned (in putting together this site) to go after political campaign projects or governmental/municipal interaction displays on screen media, be it the web, mobile, or interactive touch screen displays.”

Check out Forgotton Providence online.

EPA Releases Most Wanted List

The EPA has just released its list of "fugitives," people who have been charged with violating environmental laws or regulations.

As the New York Times reports, crimes include smuggling ozone-destroying coolants, building a secret pipeline to funnel pollutants into a tributary of the Mississippi River, and dumping contaminated grain into the ocean.

The idea to release a fugitives list was born after the capture, in Mexico in March 2008, of a man, David A. Phillips, who the agency says walked away from a federal prison in Oregon. The list says that Phillips was serving time in connection with a series of offenses that began with violations of the Clean Water Act.

While I applaud the EPA for tracking down environmental criminals, I wonder when more positive policies will be put into place to regulate business and corporations who have likely committed a few environmental crimes of their own. What do you think?

Check out the list here.

Michelle Obama: Fist-Bumping Radical to Mom-in-Chief in One Year

"A supersmart black woman who's also fashionable and fit -- terrifying."
-Kate Pollitt, The Nation--

Today, Michelle Obama was again the topic of conversation in media outlets globally. Her successful trip abroad and her fantastic style have made the media experience what Pollitt classifies as major whiplash ("from fist-bumping to mom-in-chief"). Though she celebrates Obama's reception as the epitome of the twentieth-century woman, comprised of massive style and equal (I'd argue surpassing) substance, she wonders:

"Still, there's something depressing about the joy and relief with which the high-end media have greeted Michelle's makeover from accomplished professional and outspoken social critic to new-traditionalist homebody. They're not only not ready for Hillary Clinton, they're apparently not even ready for Eleanor Roosevelt."

Read more here and let us know what you think in our new "Comments" section.

Aspen Institute's Initiative on Financial Security

A colleague recently sent me a publication from the Aspen Institute's Initiative on Financial Security, which "is the nation's leading policy program that uses a business-driven approach to create smart solutions that help Americans save, invest and own."

One of the Institute's publications that seemed worth a read: Why Not a “Super Simple” Saving Plan for the United States? (pdf)

Michael Moore: 'We the People' to 'King of the World': You're Fired!

As expected, Roger & Me's Michael Moore has a thing or two to say about Obama's firing of GM's head honcho, including this gut reaction: "Did Obama really fire the chairman of General Motors? The wealthiest and most powerful corporation of the 20th century? Can he do that? Really? Well, damn! What else can he do?!"

Read the rest of Moore's piece at Common Dreams.