An intermittent wireless connection drove me from my room to the lobby for better service. Otherwise accommodations in Lloyd Hall at Canada’s Banff Centre were incredible. Nestled in a valley surrounded by the snow-covered Rockies of Alberta, you’d be hard pressed to find much fault with the home of the 34th annual Banff Mountain Film and Book Festival.
[youtube]vYGcIhNGSIY[/youtube]
This video appears on the Huffington Post accompanied by a story written by Sam Stein. In it monkey wrench prankster Andy Bichlbaum poses as an official of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce at a meeting of the National Press Club. Claiming the Chamber had reconsidered its views on climate change Bichlbaum compelled a room full of reporters to ask tough questions about why the corporate interests of the country continue to resist legislation that might reverse negative human impact on the environment.
It was all an elaborate hoax. The idea was to embarrass the U.S. Chamber of Commerce to do what many believe is the right thing: stop lobbying against The Clean Energy Jobs and American Power Act. This bill proposed by Senators John Kerry and Barbara Boxer aims to curb industrial pollution while creating green collar jobs in the production of renewable energy. Apparently Bichlbaum wanted to point out that the Chamber of Commerce is one of the bill's leading opponents.
[caption id="attachment_1480" align="alignright" width="354" caption="Andy Bichlbaum at the Telluride Mountain Film Festival"]
[/caption]
For more than 30 years documentary filmmaker Ken Burns has revealed many of the great mysteries of our uniquely American culture. Like an archaeologist he uncovers layers of time to show us through his films the artifacts of our not so distant past that shed light on the course events that has brought us to where we are today. In his latest film, The National Parks: America’s Best which airs on PBS stations nationwide on September 27th Burns demonstrates that the preservation and protection of our wild and scenic...
[/caption]
Out here on the Midwestern prairies of Wisconsin were surrounded by acres of farmland. This time of year as we ride road bikes along the creamy smooth highways of Dane County. From one township to the next it’s vast fields of tall green corn plants as far as the eye can see.
[caption id="attachment_616" align="alignright" width="300" caption="Photo by Michael Leland "]
[/caption]
[caption id="attachment_589" align="alignright" width="300" caption="photo by Jim Richardson National Geographic"]
[/caption]
Averaging between 14 and 17 mile per hour, we whiz past one corn field after the next. With ours heads tucked in the draft stream keeping pace with the summer training schedule the last thing anyone’s thinking about is the soil beneath our spinning tires.
It’s not just dirt you know. Earlier this summer during the Mountain Film Festival in Telluride Colorado I met a guy, a scientist who succeeded in changing how I’ll think about soil forever.
[caption id="attachment_382" align="alignleft" width="288" caption="Chef Ming Tsai"][/caption] Ming Tsai is the chef and owner of Blue Ginger Restaurant in Wellesley Massachusetts. He’s also the national spokesman for the Food Allergy and Anaphylaxis Network and works with the Obesity Center at Harvard University. You might have seen him on his PBS cooking show Simply Ming. Tsai understands better than most that it’s harder than ever for working families and individuals to prepare healthy meals. Tsai was the master of ceremonies during a day-long symposium on food during the Mountain Film Festival...
[caption id="attachment_302" align="alignleft" width="300" caption="Slow Food USA President Josh Viertel"][/caption] If we slow down long enough to think about our food we just might come to realize there’s more to it than filling that nagging void in our bellies. We’re so pressed for time that we fail to think about the nutritional value of what we eat. Racing through the drive-thru window of fast food restaurants we pack faces with hamburgers and tacos loaded with fat, salt and empty carbohydrates. And worse than that, we really have...
You must be logged in to post a comment.