Category Archives: Tea Party

Sarah Palin, Sustainable Development, Localism, and Self-Reliance

Posted on October 28, 2011 by admin

Tea Party criticisms of sustainable development expose major fault-lines in the American political landscape.  Sarah Palin targets these issues in her Iowa Tea Party stump speech.  Palin points to the “permanent political class” that can and does ignore most Americans. … Continue reading →

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Tea Party is Wrong about Local Government

Posted on October 24, 2011 by admin

The national Tea Party movement is obsessed with big government.  Motivations behind this critique are tangled and confusing, but often echo Ronald Reagan’s “morning in America” mantra that “government is the problem.”  Distrust of government is furthered by the rise … Continue reading →

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Tea Party and Occupy Wall Street Agree?

Posted on October 23, 2011 by admin

Occupy Wall Street Where they Agree? Tea Party Government is corrupted, flawed but necessary Market externalizes costs, exploits labor for profit, the invisible hand needs a guide. Environmental science identifies real limits (climate) Agnostic or Creation Care.  Nature has inherent … Continue reading →

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Trumping Climate Science with Spin Endangers Democracy

Posted on September 9, 2011 by admin

Big Government is a blog that tends to be critical of government.  Echoing concerns of the Tea Party, it starts from the assumption that government is a problem, not a solution.   Social, environmental, or economic challenges (such as climate change) … Continue reading →

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Education, Propaganda, or Brain Washing?

Posted on September 1, 2011 by admin

Sustainable developers sometimes act like zealots.  They believe that past patterns of land development are deeply flawed and unsustainable.  They know climate change will place huge burdens on our industry and agriculture.  They are confident that the ecological systems providing … Continue reading →

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Is the Agenda Set?

Posted on August 30, 2011 by admin

An increasingly common complaint voiced at local planning meetings and repeated on Tea Party blogs is that sustainable development planning efforts have pre-determined outcomes: all the big decisions have been made before citizen engagement begins. Planners and their plans, according … Continue reading →

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The United Nations Agenda?

Posted on August 12, 2011 by admin

Since the earliest days of civilization, cities have been plagued by outbreaks of cholera and other illnesses that killed or disabled residents and workers.  In 1854, a London physician, John Snow, demonstrated that cholera was caused by sewage leaking into … Continue reading →

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Higher Ground in the Tea Party Sustainable Development Debate

Posted on August 10, 2011 by admin

The intense focus on sustainable development by the Tea Party creates a valuable learning opportunity.   It exposes core values and unstated assumptions, forcing us to be honest about our own motivations, hopes and dreams and to learn about the motivations, … Continue reading →

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We Need More Democracy, Not Less Government

Posted on August 9, 2011 by admin

The Tea Party is partly right.  Democracy is faltering.  But at this difficult juncture in America’s history we need more democracy, not less government.   Tea Party laser-like focus on the size of government and the taking of private property … Continue reading →

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Values and Assumptions Embedded in Sustainable Development

Posted on August 8, 2011 by admin

In the last few blogs I’ve focused attention on the assumptions and values hiding behind the Tea Party critique of sustainable development.  Here I focus attention on the assumptions and values hiding behind sustainable development.   I do this because I … Continue reading →

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