Activism

As the final rounds on the climate bill approach, environmentalists seem to be coming late, disunited, and outgunned to a battle they had years to prepare for.

A "Flash Mob" of environmental activists in Salt Lake City staged a demonstration to declare: "Climate Change Kills." It was just one of dozens of events around the country staged by both sides in the climate debate.

Pablo Fajardo is the David to the oil Goliath Chevron Texaco. He represents about 30,000 Ecuadorians in a class action suit trying to clean up the oily mess in their part of the Amazon. The case, filed in 1993, goes back as far as 1964, when the U.S. company Texaco began oil exploration there. The suit alleges that Texaco dumped 18.5 billion gallons of 'produced water' -- which can contain dissolved inorganic salts, dispersed oil droplets and dissolved oil; treatment and workover chemicals; dissolved gases, particularly hydrogen sulfide and carbon dioxide; and bacteria and other living organisms.

The NAACP last week adopted a resolution supporting clean energy development, curbs on greenhouse gas emissions, and policies to foster green collar jobs.

After Peruvian police opened fire June 5, 2009, on indigenous Amazonian people protesting the taking of their land for oil drilling, killing at least 34, some laws have been repealed and some ministers have lost thier jobs.

Environmental activists who campaigned hard to elect Barack Obama president feel cheated and disillusioned by what they see as a lack of leadership and readiness to compromise on environmental issues like climate change.

"Greenpeace activists were arrested Wednesday for scaling Mount Rushmore and hanging a banner next to the carved face of Abraham Lincoln urging President Barack Obama to get tough on climate change."

Conservative Christians -- the Republican party's "base" -- are trying to galvanize opposition to the House-passed climate bill.

"More than 30 people -- including actress Daryl Hannah and NASA climate scientist James Hansen -- were arrested Tuesday in the latest protest in a growing civil disobedience campaign against mountaintop removal in Southern West Virginia."