The Georgist News for March, 2012
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Frank de Jong
Mar 1, 2012, 3:41:24 PM3/1/12
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THE GEORGIST NEWS
Volume Fourteen, Number Eight, March 1, 2012
This month saw the publication of Common Sense by Tom Paine (physiocrat). Last month saw so much support in the British press, wow! Let's hope it wasn't a peak. Enjoy the read, and if you know anyone else who'd enjoy the News, put them in touch. Thanks.
---------------------------------------------------------------
CONTENTS:
1. Good Press: BBC - Democracy Live
2. News: US land speculators see lucre in solar projects
3. Numbers: In 2011 Investors' Bids on US Land Up 128%
4. Movement Progress: Africa Pipeline Summit; PLRG links with OMEGA
5. Letters: Last issue; Groups Support Monetary Reform Bill
6. Obituaries: Richard Douthwaite
7. Likable link: School of Cooperative Individualism; LVTfan Blog
8. What You Can Do: Edit the LVTfan Blog
9. At the Margin: Quips and Quotes
10. Publication affairs: Contributors, About the Georgist News
----------------------------------------------------------------
The 32nd North American Conference of the Council of Georgist Organizations
July 30 - August 6, 2012, Next to Harrisburg, Pennsylvania at the Camp Hill Radisson
Tentative Program
Land value tax in Pennsylvania
Land and race, from Thaddeus Stevens to Martin Luther King
Sessions to make us more effective
New Methods in Georgist Education
Toastmaster-Style Speeches. Open Mike.
Two public outreach sessions:
A panel on the hot Marcellus Shale controversy, focusing on collecting a royalty or severance tax and on including mineral rights in the property tax
A debate on whether to replace property tax with a non-real-estate tax
Sue Walton, conference administrator, sns at swwalton.com
----------------------------------------------------------------
Biannual IU in Buenos Aires, Argentina, May 15-18
Chief organizer Hector Sandler has recruited the ASAP, an NGO with over 300 members who all are graduates of public economy a major institution to affiliate with the International Union. Plus, other social NGOs will attend our conference.
INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE
BUENOS AIRES, 15 TO 18 MAY 2012
AT THE SCHOOL OF LAW (UBA)
The International Union for Land Value Taxation and Free Trade will hold its XXVIIIthInternational Biannual Conference, in the City of Buenos Aires, from 15 to 18 May 2012.
The IU has appointed the Institute of Economic Training (Instituto de Capacitación Económica (ICE)) and the Argentine Association of Budget and Public Financial Administration (ASAP) as organizers of the meeting. Besides, it will support the International Association of Public Budget (ASIP) formed by a network of organizers similar to the ASAP, existing in different countries.
The Conference will be held at the Main Hall of the School of Law, situated in Av. Pres. Figueroa Alcorta 2263, Autonomous City of Buenos Aires.
This International Conference is called to review topics corresponding to the content in the title:
HOUSING, LAND AND SOCIAL INCLUSION
A TAXATION SYSTEM TO ACHIEVE IT
The objective is to enrich and spread scientific knowledge about the relevant factors in the task of building up a fair and progressive economic order.
The participants will propose, based on their countries' experience, operative and realistic measures that enable to achieve social peace, individual freedom, economic growth, equitable wealth distribution, democracy, and social justice.
Due to its content, the Conference will be multisectoral and transdisciplinary, as the idea is to overcome the segmentation of knowledge and to be able to program socially shared and self-sustainable solutions.
For that purpose, institutions and different groups, although coincident, will be called to set a social order where the economic, political, legal and cultural aspects of life are consistent to one another.
HOW TO PARTICIPATE IN THE 2012 INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE:
Individuals interested in submitting lectures at the Conference must send, before 30 December 2011, an abstract of their paper, with a maximum of 2,000 characters in A4 paper sheet size, with electronic support in Spanish, and, if possible, its translation into English. In addition, in a separate sheet, they must send their personal information to keep in contact with us.
Those individuals only interested in attending the sessions of the International Conference, must send an email to the following email addresses, in order to receive the application forms and any other information needed:
- ASAP: asap at asap.org.ar
- ICE: ice_argentina at speedy.com.ar
All the Georgists of Argentina hope that a crowd of Georgists from around the world will join them in Buenos Aires. To register for the conference, please contact Hector Sandler <hsandler at speedy.com.ar> and copy the accountant Gonzalo Lecuona (Secretary General of the ASAP) gonzalo_lecuona at me.com. Also, please send Hector the email addresses of others whom you think may like to receive an invitation. Thank you.
----------------------------------------------------------------
1a. Good Press: BBC - Democracy Live
by columnist Samuel Brittan, 26 Jan 2012, via Carol Wilcox, Labour Land Campaign
A Land Value Tax for Wales?
news.bbc.co.uk
Labour AM Mark Drakeford led a short debate on LVT in the Welsh Assembly.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/democracylive/hi/wales/newsid_9690000/9690359.stm
And there's much more out of the UK, sent in by readers and collated from various Georgists lists and the LVT FaceBook group.
Macmillan Lecture 2012: Nick Boles sets out 'national mission' for improving Britain's competitiveness
http://tinyurl.com/72qjx5h
Progressive Conservatives should support a Land Value Tax
http://tinyurl.com/6mgqymv
Practical Politics No. 193 - December 2011
http://tinyurl.com/7q6gksl
Labour Can Enhance Economic Credibility With an Alternative Budget
http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/mike-morgangiles/miliband-labour-economy-credibilty-with-an-alternative-budget_b_1271859.html
OECD to Northern Europe: Raise Your Property Taxes!
http://www.ibtimes.com/articles/300101/20120216/oecd-property-taxes-germany-denmark-norway-britain.htm
Tax England's green and pleasant land
In the Financial Times, an article from Samuel Brittan
http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/1e98b4da-5d56-11e1-869d-00144feabdc0.html
Time to talk about land taxes
http://www.newstatesman.com/blogs/mehdi-hasan/2012/02/land-tax-income-brittan-case
There's been so much good press out of the UK lately that it's getting harder and harder to resist hoping for fundamental reform there real soon!
----------------------------------------------------------------
1b. Good Press: BBC - Ottawa Citizen, February 18, 2012
by Frank de Jong, President, Earthsharing Canada Toronto
Community's fair share
Re: Group decries land value plan, Feb. 12.
I applaud Ottawa city council's plan to capture some of the land value rise resulting from re-zoning and using it to improve community facilities. The proposed Section 37 guidelines will return to the community some of the wealth that results from new development or re-development. Quality new developments or warranted new infrastructure causes local land values to rise. Normally this "community-generated" wealth accrues to local land owners, but Section 37 will rightfully return some of it to the community. Collecting "unearned" land value rise (which economists call economic rent) is not "yet another form" of taxation - it is returning to the community what the community generated in the first place.
----------------------------------------------------------------
2. News: US land speculators see lucre in solar projects
The conventional media sometimes cover the reform of tapping natural values for public benefit while de-taxing our efforts. To keep up to date, visit The Progress Report daily. Here is one of the latest articles:
A new bubble on US rural land? A new reform of ownership from UK conservatives? Could the two trends converge?
"UK Progressive Conservatives support a Land Tax"
http://www.progress.org/2012/solarsit.htm
To establish a shared frame of reference for a discussion about how to solve economic issues with friends, family, neighbors, and co-workers, try sending them the progress.org link.
----------------------------------------------------------------
3. Numbers: In 2011 Investors' Bids on US Land Up 128%
Land in America has fewer owners but that might change as a new game catches on and subsidies shrink.
2013 Budget Could Cut Fossil Fuel Subsidies by $4B
http://www.progress.org/2012/co-opoly.htm
----------------------------------------------------------------
4a. Movement Progress: Africa Pipeline Summit
by Dave Wetzel, General Secretary, The International Union, February 14, 2012
I am speaking at the 2012 Africa Pipeline Summit in South Africa [ed. note: Dave's headlining!]
http://www.iqpc.com/Event.aspx?id=611716
. Reviewing how pipelines offer a viable and environmental alternative to the use of lorries and trucks for the transportation of oil & gas
. Increasing land values with productivity and environmental improvements arising from greater use of pipelines
. Understanding how an annual Land Value Tax would be an efficient way to harmonise social justice with economic efficiency
My first speech couldn't have been all bad as the organizers from Bahrein have invited to make a similar presentation at their Pipelines India Conference in June. I make my second contribution this afternoon.
In the evening, dinner with Stephen Meintjes, a Georgist member of the School of Economic Science, and his wife Simone. I'm speaking to students at the school on Saturday morning.
It's not all work - spent time yesterday to visit a lion park and play with lion cubs trying to eat my shoes and shirt! (The cubs were not interested in LVT.)
----------------------------------------------------------------
4b. Movement Progress: PLRG links with OMEGA Centre at UCL
by Tony Vickers, February 22, 2012
LandValueScape Update: The Professional Land Reform Group is pleased to announce that the OMEGA Centre at Bartlett School of Planning, University College London (UCL) has agreed to host its meetings.
http://www.landvaluescape.org/archives/2012/02/plrg-links-with-omega-centre-at-ucl.html PLRG links with OMEGA Centre at UCL
----------------------------------------------------------------
5a. Letter: Last issue
by Stewart Goldwater, January 31, 2012
[He] "eschews genuinely radical measures such as stopping official support for arms sales or instituting a land value tax" is a comment on the original article by one Steven Clarke. So maybe saying the original article was by Samuel Brittan and featured in the FT of January 26 would have been better.
----------------------------------------------------------------
5b. Letter: Groups Support Monetary Reform Bill
Stephen Zarlenga, Director, American Monetary Institute, January 29, 2012
The 29,000 member Chicago Teachers Union passed a resolution in strong support of Dennis Kucinich's HR 2990 NEED Act (National Employment Emergency Defense), and the Quakers in Ohio (Northeast Ohio American Friends Service Committee, AFSC) came out in support, too. Kucinich's HR 2990 dismantles the Federal Reserve System, ends "fractional reserve" banking, and provides for funding for infrastructure.
The Eighth Annual AMI Monetary Reform Conference will be held at University Center in Chicago, September 20-23, 2012.
http://www.monetary.org/2012-conference
----------------------------------------------------------------
6a. Obituary: Richard Douthwaite
via Stewart Goldwater, February 1, 2012
Foundation for the Economics of Sustainability (Feasta) In memoriam: Richard Douthwaite Richard Douthwaite, co-founder of Feasta and much-loved colleague and friend, died on November 14th 2011 after a long illness. We will miss his unique and far-ranging intellect, the clarity of his thought and writing, his warmth and his laughter. Tributes to him have come in from around the world.
www.feasta.org/2011/11/15/in-memorium-richard-douthwaite/
----------------------------------------------------------------
7a. Likable Links: School of Cooperative Individualism
by Ed Dodson, February 24, 2012
Highlighted in the attached newsletter is a just completed narrated presentation titled, "How the French Lost their Foothold in North America." For those who have an interest in this period in our history I hope you will find the story both entertaining and informative. This narrated version is available to view and listen or (or download) at Authorstream.com. Here is a direct link to the three-part PowerPoint:
http://www.authorstream.com/tag/how+the+french+lost+their+foothold+in+north+america
Note: In order to access the page by the above link, it must appear on your email page fully underlined. If the address is broken onto two lines and not underlined, you will need to copy/paste the full address into the address line on your browser.
I look forward to any comments you might care to share.
----------------------------------------------------------------
7b. Likable Links: the LVTfan Blog
by Wyn Achenbaum, February 22, 2012
I'm serializing Ernest H. Crosby's "The Earth-for-All Calendar," a circa 1900 "birthday book" with a quote or two, occasionally three, per day and room to write in the names of one's friends whose birthdays fall on each date. The book contained 365 days' worth, but I've found an extra month's worth published elsewhere, so this should run through next January. Some of the quotes are familiar to Georgists, but I've been introduced to many I didn't know.
And I continue to post other items to the blog as inspiration and time permit. If you see something you like, by all means share it with others!
http://lvtfan.typepad.com/
----------------------------------------------------------------
8. What You Can Do: Edit the LVTfan Blog
by Wyn Achenbaum, February 22, 2012
I've started a series called "The Land Questions" which I hope to put on a website of their own when they've been honed a bit. They're mostly multiple choice questions intended to encourage thought about land-related issues. At the moment, I think I've got about 70, though I may edit some out. To date, I've posted 22. There is no particular sequence to them. I'd be grateful for any editing or additions you might suggest, via the comments opportunity on the blog.
http://lvtfan.typepad.com/
----------------------------------------------------------------
8. What You Can Do: Equinox Earth Day Events
by Alanna Hartzok, Earth Rights Institute, alanna at earthrights.net, February 28, 2012
This is a Call to Action inviting you to create an event on or near the date of March 20 in celebration of Equinox Earth Day. Have a theme of "our rights to the earth as this relates to restoration and protection of the environment."
Here are some suggestions:
• Gather with your colleagues for a discussion over lunch or at another convenient time.
• Gather with your friends for a meal or take a walk together and focus the discussion on Earth Rights.
• Design and create an Earth Day Flag or Poster to display in a public place.
• Create an Earth Day event or seminar in a school or university.
• Organize a poem and/or song/music festival with Earth Day themes.
• Make kites with children, decorate with Earth Day designs, and FLY THEM!
• Invite people of different faith traditions to come together in celebration of the Earth.
• Request that Radio and TV programs host broadcasts with Earth Day themes. Offer to help with this.
• Write an Earth Day Letter to the Editor to your newspaper.
• Clean up and clear some land and plant a garden. Discuss land rights and the hunger problem.
• Go to a place where the land, air or water is polluted. Decide on a helpful action to take.
• Go to an empty or underutilized lot of land in an urban area. Write this question on a big poster so everyone passing by can read it: Why is this land vacant when there are homeless people in need of shelter and unemployed people in need of work?
• Meet with local Public Officials and ask them to take action concerning land rights and the environment.
• There are no doubt dozens of other ideas that you can imagine!
Please let me know by March 15 if you intend to create an Equinox Earth Day Action and what you will do. I will inform others.
----------------------------------------------------------------
9. At the Margin: Quips and Quotes
It's really the cat's house -- we just pay the mortgage.
~Author Unknown
One of the most striking differences between a cat and a lie is that a cat has only nine lives.
Ignorant people think it is the noise which fighting cats make that is so aggravating, but it ain't so; it is the sickening grammar that they use.
~Mark Twain (friend of Henry George)
Cats are rather delicate creatures and they are subject to a good many ailments, but I never heard of one who suffered from insomnia. [as did Henry George]
~Joseph Wood Krutch
----------------------------------------------------------------
10. Publication affairs: Contributing to this issue
Along with those acknowledged above with each blurb,
Editor: Jeffery J. Smith
Assistant Editor: Caspar Davis
Archivist: Stewart Goldwater
Owner: Robert Schalkenbach Foundation
Founder: Adam Jon Monroe
Send your news and other interesting material to the Georgist News, jjs at geonomics.org or gn at progress.org. The deadline for the next issue is the 25th of this month.
The Georgist News, a project of Robert Schalkenbach Foundation, is an email newsletter brought to you free of charge. Its purpose is to keep you updated on the latest news, citations, events, and initiatives of relevance to people who, like Henry George, seek a world free from special privilege and the causes of poverty.
Do you know someone who'd enjoy reading the GN? Please forward them an issue and ask them to subscribe, or send us their eddress. As always, it's free. Thanks.
To stop receiving the Georgist News, simply send an email to gn at progress.org and ask to be removed from the list. Please specify what email address you have been receiving the Georgist News.
The Georgist News is also available on line http://www.Georgist.com/.
The Georgist News, Volume Fourteen, Number Eight, March 1, 2012.
Volume Fourteen, Number Eight, March 1, 2012
This month saw the publication of Common Sense by Tom Paine (physiocrat). Last month saw so much support in the British press, wow! Let's hope it wasn't a peak. Enjoy the read, and if you know anyone else who'd enjoy the News, put them in touch. Thanks.
---------------------------------------------------------------
CONTENTS:
1. Good Press: BBC - Democracy Live
2. News: US land speculators see lucre in solar projects
3. Numbers: In 2011 Investors' Bids on US Land Up 128%
4. Movement Progress: Africa Pipeline Summit; PLRG links with OMEGA
5. Letters: Last issue; Groups Support Monetary Reform Bill
6. Obituaries: Richard Douthwaite
7. Likable link: School of Cooperative Individualism; LVTfan Blog
8. What You Can Do: Edit the LVTfan Blog
9. At the Margin: Quips and Quotes
10. Publication affairs: Contributors, About the Georgist News
----------------------------------------------------------------
The 32nd North American Conference of the Council of Georgist Organizations
July 30 - August 6, 2012, Next to Harrisburg, Pennsylvania at the Camp Hill Radisson
Tentative Program
Land value tax in Pennsylvania
Land and race, from Thaddeus Stevens to Martin Luther King
Sessions to make us more effective
New Methods in Georgist Education
Toastmaster-Style Speeches. Open Mike.
Two public outreach sessions:
A panel on the hot Marcellus Shale controversy, focusing on collecting a royalty or severance tax and on including mineral rights in the property tax
A debate on whether to replace property tax with a non-real-estate tax
Sue Walton, conference administrator, sns at swwalton.com
----------------------------------------------------------------
Biannual IU in Buenos Aires, Argentina, May 15-18
Chief organizer Hector Sandler has recruited the ASAP, an NGO with over 300 members who all are graduates of public economy a major institution to affiliate with the International Union. Plus, other social NGOs will attend our conference.
INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE
BUENOS AIRES, 15 TO 18 MAY 2012
AT THE SCHOOL OF LAW (UBA)
The International Union for Land Value Taxation and Free Trade will hold its XXVIIIthInternational Biannual Conference, in the City of Buenos Aires, from 15 to 18 May 2012.
The IU has appointed the Institute of Economic Training (Instituto de Capacitación Económica (ICE)) and the Argentine Association of Budget and Public Financial Administration (ASAP) as organizers of the meeting. Besides, it will support the International Association of Public Budget (ASIP) formed by a network of organizers similar to the ASAP, existing in different countries.
The Conference will be held at the Main Hall of the School of Law, situated in Av. Pres. Figueroa Alcorta 2263, Autonomous City of Buenos Aires.
This International Conference is called to review topics corresponding to the content in the title:
HOUSING, LAND AND SOCIAL INCLUSION
A TAXATION SYSTEM TO ACHIEVE IT
The objective is to enrich and spread scientific knowledge about the relevant factors in the task of building up a fair and progressive economic order.
The participants will propose, based on their countries' experience, operative and realistic measures that enable to achieve social peace, individual freedom, economic growth, equitable wealth distribution, democracy, and social justice.
Due to its content, the Conference will be multisectoral and transdisciplinary, as the idea is to overcome the segmentation of knowledge and to be able to program socially shared and self-sustainable solutions.
For that purpose, institutions and different groups, although coincident, will be called to set a social order where the economic, political, legal and cultural aspects of life are consistent to one another.
HOW TO PARTICIPATE IN THE 2012 INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE:
Individuals interested in submitting lectures at the Conference must send, before 30 December 2011, an abstract of their paper, with a maximum of 2,000 characters in A4 paper sheet size, with electronic support in Spanish, and, if possible, its translation into English. In addition, in a separate sheet, they must send their personal information to keep in contact with us.
Those individuals only interested in attending the sessions of the International Conference, must send an email to the following email addresses, in order to receive the application forms and any other information needed:
- ASAP: asap at asap.org.ar
- ICE: ice_argentina at speedy.com.ar
All the Georgists of Argentina hope that a crowd of Georgists from around the world will join them in Buenos Aires. To register for the conference, please contact Hector Sandler <hsandler at speedy.com.ar> and copy the accountant Gonzalo Lecuona (Secretary General of the ASAP) gonzalo_lecuona at me.com. Also, please send Hector the email addresses of others whom you think may like to receive an invitation. Thank you.
----------------------------------------------------------------
1a. Good Press: BBC - Democracy Live
by columnist Samuel Brittan, 26 Jan 2012, via Carol Wilcox, Labour Land Campaign
A Land Value Tax for Wales?
news.bbc.co.uk
Labour AM Mark Drakeford led a short debate on LVT in the Welsh Assembly.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/democracylive/hi/wales/newsid_9690000/9690359.stm
And there's much more out of the UK, sent in by readers and collated from various Georgists lists and the LVT FaceBook group.
Macmillan Lecture 2012: Nick Boles sets out 'national mission' for improving Britain's competitiveness
http://tinyurl.com/72qjx5h
Progressive Conservatives should support a Land Value Tax
http://tinyurl.com/6mgqymv
Practical Politics No. 193 - December 2011
http://tinyurl.com/7q6gksl
Labour Can Enhance Economic Credibility With an Alternative Budget
http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/mike-morgangiles/miliband-labour-economy-credibilty-with-an-alternative-budget_b_1271859.html
OECD to Northern Europe: Raise Your Property Taxes!
http://www.ibtimes.com/articles/300101/20120216/oecd-property-taxes-germany-denmark-norway-britain.htm
Tax England's green and pleasant land
In the Financial Times, an article from Samuel Brittan
http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/1e98b4da-5d56-11e1-869d-00144feabdc0.html
Time to talk about land taxes
http://www.newstatesman.com/blogs/mehdi-hasan/2012/02/land-tax-income-brittan-case
There's been so much good press out of the UK lately that it's getting harder and harder to resist hoping for fundamental reform there real soon!
----------------------------------------------------------------
1b. Good Press: BBC - Ottawa Citizen, February 18, 2012
by Frank de Jong, President, Earthsharing Canada Toronto
Community's fair share
Re: Group decries land value plan, Feb. 12.
I applaud Ottawa city council's plan to capture some of the land value rise resulting from re-zoning and using it to improve community facilities. The proposed Section 37 guidelines will return to the community some of the wealth that results from new development or re-development. Quality new developments or warranted new infrastructure causes local land values to rise. Normally this "community-generated" wealth accrues to local land owners, but Section 37 will rightfully return some of it to the community. Collecting "unearned" land value rise (which economists call economic rent) is not "yet another form" of taxation - it is returning to the community what the community generated in the first place.
----------------------------------------------------------------
2. News: US land speculators see lucre in solar projects
The conventional media sometimes cover the reform of tapping natural values for public benefit while de-taxing our efforts. To keep up to date, visit The Progress Report daily. Here is one of the latest articles:
A new bubble on US rural land? A new reform of ownership from UK conservatives? Could the two trends converge?
"UK Progressive Conservatives support a Land Tax"
http://www.progress.org/2012/solarsit.htm
To establish a shared frame of reference for a discussion about how to solve economic issues with friends, family, neighbors, and co-workers, try sending them the progress.org link.
----------------------------------------------------------------
3. Numbers: In 2011 Investors' Bids on US Land Up 128%
Land in America has fewer owners but that might change as a new game catches on and subsidies shrink.
2013 Budget Could Cut Fossil Fuel Subsidies by $4B
http://www.progress.org/2012/co-opoly.htm
----------------------------------------------------------------
4a. Movement Progress: Africa Pipeline Summit
by Dave Wetzel, General Secretary, The International Union, February 14, 2012
I am speaking at the 2012 Africa Pipeline Summit in South Africa [ed. note: Dave's headlining!]
http://www.iqpc.com/Event.aspx?id=611716
. Reviewing how pipelines offer a viable and environmental alternative to the use of lorries and trucks for the transportation of oil & gas
. Increasing land values with productivity and environmental improvements arising from greater use of pipelines
. Understanding how an annual Land Value Tax would be an efficient way to harmonise social justice with economic efficiency
My first speech couldn't have been all bad as the organizers from Bahrein have invited to make a similar presentation at their Pipelines India Conference in June. I make my second contribution this afternoon.
In the evening, dinner with Stephen Meintjes, a Georgist member of the School of Economic Science, and his wife Simone. I'm speaking to students at the school on Saturday morning.
It's not all work - spent time yesterday to visit a lion park and play with lion cubs trying to eat my shoes and shirt! (The cubs were not interested in LVT.)
----------------------------------------------------------------
4b. Movement Progress: PLRG links with OMEGA Centre at UCL
by Tony Vickers, February 22, 2012
LandValueScape Update: The Professional Land Reform Group is pleased to announce that the OMEGA Centre at Bartlett School of Planning, University College London (UCL) has agreed to host its meetings.
http://www.landvaluescape.org/archives/2012/02/plrg-links-with-omega-centre-at-ucl.html PLRG links with OMEGA Centre at UCL
----------------------------------------------------------------
5a. Letter: Last issue
by Stewart Goldwater, January 31, 2012
[He] "eschews genuinely radical measures such as stopping official support for arms sales or instituting a land value tax" is a comment on the original article by one Steven Clarke. So maybe saying the original article was by Samuel Brittan and featured in the FT of January 26 would have been better.
----------------------------------------------------------------
5b. Letter: Groups Support Monetary Reform Bill
Stephen Zarlenga, Director, American Monetary Institute, January 29, 2012
The 29,000 member Chicago Teachers Union passed a resolution in strong support of Dennis Kucinich's HR 2990 NEED Act (National Employment Emergency Defense), and the Quakers in Ohio (Northeast Ohio American Friends Service Committee, AFSC) came out in support, too. Kucinich's HR 2990 dismantles the Federal Reserve System, ends "fractional reserve" banking, and provides for funding for infrastructure.
The Eighth Annual AMI Monetary Reform Conference will be held at University Center in Chicago, September 20-23, 2012.
http://www.monetary.org/2012-conference
----------------------------------------------------------------
6a. Obituary: Richard Douthwaite
via Stewart Goldwater, February 1, 2012
Foundation for the Economics of Sustainability (Feasta) In memoriam: Richard Douthwaite Richard Douthwaite, co-founder of Feasta and much-loved colleague and friend, died on November 14th 2011 after a long illness. We will miss his unique and far-ranging intellect, the clarity of his thought and writing, his warmth and his laughter. Tributes to him have come in from around the world.
www.feasta.org/2011/11/15/in-memorium-richard-douthwaite/
----------------------------------------------------------------
7a. Likable Links: School of Cooperative Individualism
by Ed Dodson, February 24, 2012
Highlighted in the attached newsletter is a just completed narrated presentation titled, "How the French Lost their Foothold in North America." For those who have an interest in this period in our history I hope you will find the story both entertaining and informative. This narrated version is available to view and listen or (or download) at Authorstream.com. Here is a direct link to the three-part PowerPoint:
http://www.authorstream.com/tag/how+the+french+lost+their+foothold+in+north+america
Note: In order to access the page by the above link, it must appear on your email page fully underlined. If the address is broken onto two lines and not underlined, you will need to copy/paste the full address into the address line on your browser.
I look forward to any comments you might care to share.
----------------------------------------------------------------
7b. Likable Links: the LVTfan Blog
by Wyn Achenbaum, February 22, 2012
I'm serializing Ernest H. Crosby's "The Earth-for-All Calendar," a circa 1900 "birthday book" with a quote or two, occasionally three, per day and room to write in the names of one's friends whose birthdays fall on each date. The book contained 365 days' worth, but I've found an extra month's worth published elsewhere, so this should run through next January. Some of the quotes are familiar to Georgists, but I've been introduced to many I didn't know.
And I continue to post other items to the blog as inspiration and time permit. If you see something you like, by all means share it with others!
http://lvtfan.typepad.com/
----------------------------------------------------------------
8. What You Can Do: Edit the LVTfan Blog
by Wyn Achenbaum, February 22, 2012
I've started a series called "The Land Questions" which I hope to put on a website of their own when they've been honed a bit. They're mostly multiple choice questions intended to encourage thought about land-related issues. At the moment, I think I've got about 70, though I may edit some out. To date, I've posted 22. There is no particular sequence to them. I'd be grateful for any editing or additions you might suggest, via the comments opportunity on the blog.
http://lvtfan.typepad.com/
----------------------------------------------------------------
8. What You Can Do: Equinox Earth Day Events
by Alanna Hartzok, Earth Rights Institute, alanna at earthrights.net, February 28, 2012
This is a Call to Action inviting you to create an event on or near the date of March 20 in celebration of Equinox Earth Day. Have a theme of "our rights to the earth as this relates to restoration and protection of the environment."
Here are some suggestions:
• Gather with your colleagues for a discussion over lunch or at another convenient time.
• Gather with your friends for a meal or take a walk together and focus the discussion on Earth Rights.
• Design and create an Earth Day Flag or Poster to display in a public place.
• Create an Earth Day event or seminar in a school or university.
• Organize a poem and/or song/music festival with Earth Day themes.
• Make kites with children, decorate with Earth Day designs, and FLY THEM!
• Invite people of different faith traditions to come together in celebration of the Earth.
• Request that Radio and TV programs host broadcasts with Earth Day themes. Offer to help with this.
• Write an Earth Day Letter to the Editor to your newspaper.
• Clean up and clear some land and plant a garden. Discuss land rights and the hunger problem.
• Go to a place where the land, air or water is polluted. Decide on a helpful action to take.
• Go to an empty or underutilized lot of land in an urban area. Write this question on a big poster so everyone passing by can read it: Why is this land vacant when there are homeless people in need of shelter and unemployed people in need of work?
• Meet with local Public Officials and ask them to take action concerning land rights and the environment.
• There are no doubt dozens of other ideas that you can imagine!
Please let me know by March 15 if you intend to create an Equinox Earth Day Action and what you will do. I will inform others.
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9. At the Margin: Quips and Quotes
It's really the cat's house -- we just pay the mortgage.
~Author Unknown
One of the most striking differences between a cat and a lie is that a cat has only nine lives.
Ignorant people think it is the noise which fighting cats make that is so aggravating, but it ain't so; it is the sickening grammar that they use.
~Mark Twain (friend of Henry George)
Cats are rather delicate creatures and they are subject to a good many ailments, but I never heard of one who suffered from insomnia. [as did Henry George]
~Joseph Wood Krutch
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10. Publication affairs: Contributing to this issue
Along with those acknowledged above with each blurb,
Editor: Jeffery J. Smith
Assistant Editor: Caspar Davis
Archivist: Stewart Goldwater
Owner: Robert Schalkenbach Foundation
Founder: Adam Jon Monroe
Send your news and other interesting material to the Georgist News, jjs at geonomics.org or gn at progress.org. The deadline for the next issue is the 25th of this month.
The Georgist News, a project of Robert Schalkenbach Foundation, is an email newsletter brought to you free of charge. Its purpose is to keep you updated on the latest news, citations, events, and initiatives of relevance to people who, like Henry George, seek a world free from special privilege and the causes of poverty.
Do you know someone who'd enjoy reading the GN? Please forward them an issue and ask them to subscribe, or send us their eddress. As always, it's free. Thanks.
To stop receiving the Georgist News, simply send an email to gn at progress.org and ask to be removed from the list. Please specify what email address you have been receiving the Georgist News.
The Georgist News is also available on line http://www.Georgist.com/.
The Georgist News, Volume Fourteen, Number Eight, March 1, 2012.
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