Dance for Darfur

check out this link for an awesome project...the dance is on september 16th...contact the coordinators for information on how to make a donation...every dollar helps! thanks for all your work guys...you're awesome! :)
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Dance for Darfur

Background
Historians will look back in puzzlement at the way our 21st century world tolerates the genocide of more than four hundred thousand people in Sudan. According to reports by the World Food Program, the United Nations and the Coalition for International Justice, 3.5 million people are now hungry, 2.5 million have been displaced due to violence, and 400,000 people have died in Darfur thus far. Aid coming from governments, private donors, and non-profit organizations has been limited. In fact, the United Nations just reduced the present feeding rations in Darfur from 2,100 to 1,050 calories a day, which is by definition substandard for human living. Perhaps the most striking distinction in the history of genocide is not between those who murder and those who don't, but between ''bystanders'' who avert their eyes and ''upstanders'' who speak out.

What is Dance for Darfur?
The idea of ‘Dance for Darfur’ was started in April of 2006 as a way to raise awareness, funds, and supplies for the refugees impacted by the genocide in the Darfur region of Sudan. It will be a “block-party” style philanthropic event located in New York City on September 16th, 2006(Rain date, September 17th, 2006), whose primary goal is to raise awareness about the tragic situations occurring in the Darfur region of Sudan. ‘Dance for Darfur’s’ secondary goals will be to raise as much money and supplies as possible for the refuges through various methods of fundraising.

Who is Dance for Darfur?
Eva Sas, Jason Machowsky, Anne Rubins, Kuber Bhalla, Lian Kuang, Dhaval Shah, Tina Vazirani, Raj Tailor, Marleen Welsh, and Nitu Desai are committed to making the Dance for Darfur benefit a huge success. Continuous diligence is taken to keep all partners involved updated with the latest news and events.

Tell Ford to Stand by Its Hybrid Commitment

i would like some more hybrid cars please...
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Motor vehicles are responsible for almost a quarter of America’s annual carbon dioxide emissions, the primary global-warming gas. But while global warming pollution and oil use from autos is one of our most pressing national, economic, and environmental security problems, it is also one of the most solvable.

The most effective near-term way automakers can help America reduce its CO2 emissions and its dependence on oil is by using existing, cost-effective technologies to increase the fuel economy of today's vehicles.

Unfortunately, the Ford Motor Company recently took a step backward in that effort, announcing that it will abandon its commitment to produce 250,000 hybrid vehicles a year by 2010. This is the second time Ford has failed to follow through on a major fuel economy commitment.

Ford's shift away from hybrids is a shift away from a genuine attempt to address America's oil use.

Please tell CEO and Chairman Bill Ford Jr. that consumers want and deserve more fuel efficient vehicle choices--not more greenwashing rhetoric.

Please Help the D’Arrigo Workers Who Never Give Up

a worthy cause...
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Any objective list of America’s worst employers would have to include D'Arrigo Brothers. We can’t possibly list all the ways D’Arrigo Bros., one of America’s largest and most successful growers, has mistreated its farm workers. It would take too long and make you angry. Since voting for the UFW 30 years ago, D'Arrigo's 1,500 workers have never given up fighting for their rights. With UFW help, they have protested, demonstrated, and even gone on strike. They have challenged the company in court. Slowly but surely, they are winning. They urgently need your help to push on to victory.

Efren Fraide, has worked picking broccoli for D'Arrigo for 25 years.

"We have given our best years to this company and during this whole time, the company, instead of raising our wages, they have cut our wages. For all these years, the company has refused to negotiate a fair contract and bargain in good faith with us.

“In the year 2000, we put charges against them for negotiating in bad faith. In 2005, the Judge found them guilty and ordered them...to pay us loss of wages and benefits from 2000 on and up to date...they appealed his decision...The ALRB agreed with the Judge’s decision.

"On July 27, 2006, again we got together with the company and once again they came to negotiations proposing to freeze our wages for three years more. It is very obvious that this company is not interested in the suffering of its workers...They have always stepped all over us and they are stepping all over the law, too."

Thanks to friends like you, we won the passage of a California law that requires binding mediation when companies like D’Arrigo refuse to negotiate an initial contract with a union. Now we must use that law to get D'Arrigo to negotiate in good faith a contract or have the ALRB impose a contract under the mediation law.

Please help fight for the D’Arrigo workers. Send a donation today of $10, $15, $30, $50, $100 or even $250. D’Arrigo is a huge company, with teams of lawyers. With your help we can get these workers the contract they deserve. Thank you.