Waging Peace?

America is the aggressive global bully, and I think most of the world is aware of our hypocrisy. Just think about the obvious arrogant actions of our country.

• Jailing a journalist... torturing him in a maximum security prison for revealing US war crimes, as we criticize other countries for lack of press freedom.
• Declaring a new unelected president of Venezuela and stealing their national wealth, companies, and gold, as we install crippling sanctions because we don't like countries with governments who help their people more than our corporations.
• Constantly harassing Cuba over decades for daring to try socialism.
• Refusing to recognize our own agreements whether it is the Iran Treaty, our guarantee not to move NATO one inch East, or our endless broken treaties with our own first nations peoples.
• Promoting global war with Iran, China, Russia...and anyone who challenges US hegemony.

It is past time to try to wage peace. To be a global friend and neighbor assisting countries not raping their resources and peoples. The US political system has been captured by the oligarchs and their corporations, so how to promote peace? Perhaps we just need to practice as individuals and refuse to participate in the political farce. Let's look today at some successful practitioners.

Let's begin by hearing China's approach...

Now China critics might say that is just propaganda, and may be it is...but I sure wish we had some peace propaganda in the US if that is the case. I remember in my youth the US helped other nations.

So we can holler and scream all we want about US hostility, but that isn't effective. What about making peace with the earth and promoting our communities. I think there is nothing more revolutionary than growing and sharing food. This is my path to peace on a personal level. Here's an example of what I'm suggesting ...18 min

Master gardener Jim Kovaleski explains his suburban yard garden system
I think Pete does a better interview with Jim,
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CWbJFr6LNis (6 min)
but Justin gets a better over view of his operation.
Who wouldn't want a great grower like Jim in their neighborhood?

These urban producers are not as rare as you might think...
Here is yet another inspiring initiative that brings together the essentials for resilience: good healthy food and strong communities.

In the small town of Oxford, New Zealand, Kane and Fiona Hogan have transformed their urban 1/2-acre property into abundant veggie gardens. The aim of Urban Gardener is to build resilience and food security in their local community – both by growing food for people to purchase and by helping people to grow food in their own backyards.

and one more...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yNaFOji1VXA (7 min)
Liz Zorab has an incredible permaculture setup on a micro-smallholding, with the vegetable garden and food forest being a total of 0.5 acres! Liz produces 85% of her family's annual food needs, and on top of that runs a micro-CSA Veg Box scheme that feeds 20 local families. This is the perfect example of what can be done in a small space.

Jim works long hours with his annual crops. Tree based permaculture has its advantages.
Pete Kanaris gives us a tour of his nursery and tells us about the permaculture plants he ships to customers all over the USA. He uses more perennials and fruits in his system.

Here another suburban permaculture system
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rFFSBzsPn0k (14 min)
Family Transforms Tiny Suburban Backyard into Thriving Permaculture Gardens – Abdallah House Tour

I like integrated systems like this...(20 min)

Erik Knutzen and Kelly Coyne have been farming their yard in Los Angeles for over a decade. In addition to a mini orchard and extensive veggie garden, they have all the instruments of an urban homestead: chickens, bees, rainwater capture, DIY greywater, solar fruit preserver, humanure toilet, rocket stove, adobe oven. But they don't like to talk about sustainability of self-sufficiency, instead they prefer the term self-reliance.

"I don't like the goal of self-sufficiency, I think it's a fool's errand to chase that goal," explains Knutzen. "I think we live in communities, human beings are meant to live, and trade and work together. I think self-reliance is okay, in other words, knowing how to do things."

Knutzen and Coyne share their tinkering, DIY, and small scale urban agriculture experiments on their blog Root Simple and in their books "The Urban Homestead: Your Guide to Self-Sufficient Living in the Heart of the City" and "Making It: Radical Home Ec for a Post Consumer World". They believe in the value of shop classes and old-school home economics (back when you learned how to make things, not shop for things).

For the couple, their true goal with all of this self-reliance is freedom to live as they please. By growing their own and canning, pickling, preserving, freezing and baking their own breads and beans, they live frugally. They also only own one car (plus a cargo bike), one cellphone and no tv. "I think a lot of it has to do with our overdriving ambition to be free," explains Coyne, "makes being cheap fun, because it means you can be free".

Most animal production requires more land than a suburban lot, but the LA family demonstrate how some animals can be included.

Here's another thought for suburban fish production. (11 min)

Rob Torcellini bought a $700 greenhouse kit to grow more vegetables in his backyard. Then he added fish to get rid of a mosquito problem and before long he was a committed aquaponic gardener.

Now his 10 by 12-foot greenhouse is filled with not only vegetables but fish. And the best part is: the poo from that fish is what fertilizes his garden. Aquaponics combines fish farming (aquaculture) with the practice of raising plants in water (hydroponics).

It's organic by definition: instead of using chemical fertilizers, plants are fertilized by the fish poo (and pesticides/herbicides can't be introduced to kill pests because they could harm the fish). Since the plants don't need dirt, aquaponics allows gardeners to produce more food in less space. And in addition to the vegetables they can grow, most aquaponics gardeners cultivate edible fish as well.

In this video, Rob shows us the aquaponics greenhouse in his Connecticut backyard, that he built mostly from scavenged parts, as well as his DIY indoor system where he's growing lettuce under a grow light.

Lots more at the Happen Films channel
and Regenerative Films channel

While I'm on the topic of healing the planet I can't neglect the use of animals, scaling up the restoration we've looked at so far. Here he is this month moving his herd to a new paddock. Notice how eager the cows are to forage on new ground. (8.5 min)

Cattle stampede into new stockpiled forage paddock. It is always a joy to watch cattle that are excited to move onto a fresh new piece of stockpiled forage. Their whole disposition changes into one big happy event. You know your cows are doing well in health when they are bucking and running with their tails up in the air.

Pastured poultry can also be restorative...

Windy Meadows Hatchery tour, in it's 2nd generation. Windy Meadows is a Broiler Chick Hatchery, a Pastured Poultry Operation, and USDA certified poultry processor in East Texas

and even quail operations...(10 min)
Today we visit our friends at Wild Way Farm in Asheville, NC! They raise pastured quail!

I would think about redesigning the coops to make moving easier, but otherwise an interesting operation.

Pork is being pasture raised too. (7 min)

https://singingpastures.com/

So we can produce nutrient dense foods while we heal, restore, and improve our soils. That is what I call a peaceful occupation that I hope spreads far and wide.

Now to wrap it up just a few discussions of why we need to act for peace...

The US is pouring more weapons into Ukraine amid bellicose threats against Russia and the US-backed Saudi war on Yemen continues to massacre civilians. But not everyone sees a downside: “I fully expect we’re going to see some benefit from it,” Raytheon CEO Greg Hayes said this week of these and other flashpoints.

Andrew Cockburn, Washington editor of Harper’s Magazine and author of “The Spoils of War: Power, Profit and the American War Machine,” discusses the US arms industry’s role in promoting and profiting from today’s global conflicts, from Ukraine to Yemen to Syria.

Cockburn also looks back on his groundbreaking 1988 PBS documentary, made with his wife Leslie Cockburn, “Guns, Drugs, and the CIA,” about the agency’s role in the global drug trade.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t0DLNDAgAwU (51 min)

From earlier this week...
The US and UK are ramping up threats to Russia over Ukraine by sending more weapons, vowing more sanctions, and lodging evidence-free claims of a Russian plot to install a pro-Kremlin leader. But comments by Germany's navy chief that Russia "deserves respect" -- leading to his resignation -- underscore that not everyone is on board with Washington and London's war fever. Scholar and author Richard Sakwa discusses the latest in the Ukraine crisis.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lBMKhhdg4jk (45 min)
Guest: Richard Sakwa. Professor of Russian and European politics at the University of Kent. His books include “Frontline Ukraine: Crisis in the Borderlands” and his latest, “Deception: Russiagate and the New Cold War.”

Ukraine’s president urged calm, and its defense minister admitted “there are no grounds to believe” Russia is planning an invasion, while the US and Britain send weapons and troops, and Germany and France try to push for peace to save their economies.
https://multipolarista.com/2022/01/26/ukraine-russia-invasion-war-europe/

We started today looking at China's desire for peace. Here's another move toward peace which the US will oppose...
War-torn Syria has officially joined China’s Belt and Road Initiative.
The move revives an old role of Syria in the ancient Silk Road – coming at a time of deep economic turmoil and a country badly in need of reconstruction. Attacks on infrastructure, including markets, hospitals and schools, have led to estimates of more than 350,000 civilians killed and half of the pre-war population displaced.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cSBXlf8zwBg (28 min)
To discuss the potential impact of stronger economic ties between China and Syria:
Victor Gao is a current affairs commentator and chair professor at Soochow University.
Joshua Landis is a chair professor and the director of the University of Oklahoma’s Center for Middle East Studies.
Adnan Nasser is an independent Middle East analyst.
Bassam Abu Abdallah is a former Syrian government official. He currently heads the Baath Party Central School of Syria.

Perhaps we can't grow our way to peace....but I'm going to try. Here's hoping we can all have a productive path toward a peaceful future!