It's Labor Day. Over 100 years ago, workers risked life and limb to get things like a five day work week, an eight hour day, and the right to organize. Walmart, the country's #1 retailer, and one of the biggest corporations in the world, is doing its best to dismantle those gains one by one.

Help stop a 19 billion bag-a--year habit in California and put an end to plastic pollution. Tell your Senator to support the AB 1998 at http://www.HealtheBay.org/BagBill

Three firms control 89% of US soft drink sales [1]. This dominance is obscured from us by the appearance of numerous choices on retailer shelves. Steve Hannaford refers to this as "pseudovariety," or the illusion of diversity, concealing a lack of real choice [2]. To visualize the extent of pseudovariety in this industry we developed a cluster diagram to represent the number of soft drink brands and varieties found in the refrigerator cases of 94 Michigan retailers, along with their ownership connections.

Watch the CBS 5 KPIX August 10, 2010, report in the top of the left column below for a startling report on how San Francisco is violating its own precautionary principle law by dumping toxic sludge on city gardens.

"New America Now" sat down with Sunita Sohrabji of India West Newspaper and Sheila Davis, the executive director of the Silicon Valley Toxics Coalition for a 2-part discussion on the e-waste issue in India and spotlight the SVTC documentary "Citizens at Risk". Below is part 2, featuring SVTC.

Tom shared this video on his informative blog Beyond Money, a great place on the web for learning about alternative currencies and the problems caused by business-as-usual economics.

A network of international citizen lobby groups has launched a gritty campaign against Alberta, telling tourists to "rethink" a trip to our province because it is home to, “the tar sands and the dirtiest oil on earth”.

Featured this week at the start of the US Social Forum

About 5 minutes into the video above, a film crew dives in the South Pacific waters and films for what is probably the first time ever (that's what they claim, anyway) the inside of a gigantic purse seine tuna net.

A rapid synopsis of the history of lung cancer and the cigarette presented at the Lung Cancer in the Natural State conference in Little Rock AR June 11 2010.

How can the world coordinate to address the threat of depleting drug effectiveness? Who bears the cost of decreasing drug effectiveness? And what will the world look like in 10 to 20 years with and without global efforts to contain resistance?

A panel including Ron Suskind, Vince Warren and Fisher Stevens explore the dark corners of illegal kidnapping, confinement, secret prisons and torture.

The central tenet of democratic capitalism has always been to allow the market to operate with minimal interference from elected governments. This underlying assumption is now being challenged. With the public's distrust of government growing, will they entrust major financial decisions to politicians?

The video above, courtesy TckTckTck, explains one of the under-the-radar issues that was present all through the COP15 talks and now is re-emerging at the Bonn climate talks.

What forces are driving the rapid technological developments that continue to shape our world? According to author Peter Nowak it is a very un-holy trinity; the war, porn and fast food industries.

Here's another piece of video you really need to see to get a handle on the BP oil spill. 60 Minutes has interviewed a survivor of the Deepwater Horizon, who jumped into the sea to escape, and the scientist tapped by the Obama administration to investigate the disaster.

Diane Wilson, author of An Unreasonable Woman: A True Story of Shrimpers, Politicos, Polluters, and the Fight for Seadrift, Texas appeared on KPFA radio’s The Visionary Activist to talk about her past experiences with oil and chemical companies.

Nils Gilman describes deviant globalization as "the unpleasant underside of transnational integration." These are not marginal, "informal" activities. These are enormous, complex businesses straight out of the Harvard Business Review. The drug business in Mexico, for example, employs 400,000 people. A thousand-dollar kilo of cocaine grows in value by 1400-percent when it crosses into the U.S. -- nice profit margin there.

It is a pleasure to welcome him back to this Public Affairs Program, on the publication of his latest book, The Plundered Planet: Why We Must—and How We Can—Manage Nature for Global Prosperity. This work builds upon his renowned research on developing countries and the poorest populations. The same skills that Professor Collier displayed in his earlier texts are evident once again, which is to say, straightforward explanations, humor, and accessibility. It is also a bit more personal, in that he talks about his own struggle to reconcile the quest for global prosperity with an ethical approach to the natural world.

Here’s what you’re not hearing from BP: it will take decades to get rid of the oil in the Gulf spill. The health consequences for residents of the coast will be severe and long-lasting—and even more acute for cleanup workers directly exposed to the oil. And the marine wildlife may never fully recover.

United States Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton outlines the Obama administration's agenda for human rights in the 21st century during a speech at Georgetown University's Gaston Hall.

It's true that water, like oil, is critical to the global economy. However, unlike oil, there is no substitute. Water has been and is the most important driver of human development.

Corporate Responsibility Magazine has released its first annual list of the 30 least transparent companies, dubbed the 'black list'. Looking at corporations traded on the US stock market in the Russell 1,000—the top 1,000 stocks in the Russell 3,000 list—the magazine pinpointed the bottom 30, exposing those companies that choose to hide in the dark.

Chanda Chevannes has made an important documentary film about Sandra Steingraber's work, based largely on her first book, Living Downstream.

Walmart (blue) started slow in 1962 and then spread like wildfire in the southeast, starting in 1970, and then made its way towards the west coast. Sam's Club starts to sprout up in the 1980s with bursts up to present.

Money talks - make yours do that. This film unequivocally show that what is happening to the people and the land around the Alberta tar sands is absolute disgrace on every level.

Renowned environmental journalist Andrew Nikiforuk breaks down the tar sands operations in northern Alberta, Canada in this video. Based on his new book, Tar Sands: Dirty Oil and the Future of a Continent

Greenpeace's first Polluter Harmony video, starring Lisa 'Dirty Air' Murkowski and the lobbyist who helped write her amendment to limit the Clean Air Act, made a big enough splash to warrant a sequel.v

Plastics. In the Graduate, it's the big secret Benjamin gets from a well-meaning family friend, and it's one of our dirtiest, creepiest secrets too.

President Obama's first executive action was the Open Government Memorandum calling for more transparent, participatory, and collaborative government. It is likely that one of the longest lasting effects of the current administration will be how much it changed the culture of Washington by opening government data and pioneering innovations in policymaking.

In a bold online video, the environmental group Greenpeace cleverly links candy-giant Nestle to oil palm-related deforestation and the deaths of orangutans.

GO tap water!

Farron Levy is president of True Impact (www.trueimpact.com), a leading provider of web-based tools and consulting support to help organizations measure the social, financial, and environmental return on investment (ROI) of their programs, activities, and operations.

To understand the complexities of the international food market -- and how traders in Chicago can cause Africans to starve -- you could get a Ph.D. in economics, or read a 400-page report from the World Bank. Or you watch this superb nine minute video, directed by Denis van Waerebeke.

In the age of the Internet, government is transparent only when public information is available online. The Public Online Information Act (POIA) is legislation, introduced by Rep. Steve Israel, that embraces a new formula for transparency: public equals online.

The current crisis has exacerbated the effects of neoliberalism and hugely increased inequality, with money going from labour to capital.

In this interview, Chris Hedges elaborates on his Truthdig column that says democracy in America is a useful fiction.

Roundtable discussion filmed by TNI during the Reclaiming Public Water Network Global Strategy Seminar held in Brussels between 1-3 February 2010. Participants V. Suresh: Practicing Advocate in the Madras High Court.

Sharks were a big part of the film fest, and conversations revolved around finning and the massive decline of an apex predator that holds the balance of the oceans together. But not every video at the Ocean Film Festival was serious footage about the decline of the oceans.

Mark Hodge, Director of the Global Business Initiative on Human Rights, talks with Bloomberg's Asia Confidential host Bernard Lo about Google and China in the context of the wider need for business to respect human rights

Oxfam America has just launched a new animated video showing how so little of the profits from extractive industries reach local communities. In the US the video is intended to encourage people to take action and contact their member of Congress regarding the Energy Security Through Transparency Act –

Econstories.tv is a place to learn about the economic way of thinking through the eyes of creative director John Papola and creative economist Russ Roberts.

He’s been held in solitary confinement in a New York jail

This past November people from all over Mexico gathered in the Valley of Perote, where the village of La Gloria is located, for the fifth Asamblea Nacional de Afectados Ambientales [National Assembly of Environmentally Affected].

SIGN THE PETITION AT http://chevrontoxico.com ! A heartfelt message from the Amazon rainforest communities in Ecuador to new Chevron CEO John Watson: "We don't want to continue dying of cancer."...

This is a short 19-minute documentary about recycling and waste in the U.S. based on the book of the same name by Heather Rogers.

Where is the progressive version of the Tea Party movement?

Sunlight hasn’t been around nearly as long as that song — it was first recorded in 1961 and we opened our doors in May of 2006 — but for us 2009 was a very good year.

People have been literally robbed over the last thirty years as money has moved up from labour to capital. And as people have less money to spend, we are constantly in a crisis of overproduction.

1. Choose what chamber & congressional session you want to see by selecting the appropriate options to the left. 2. Adjust the 'filters' to change the number of politicians and relations shown. [?] 3. Click 'Find the Coal Money!' 4. Want to take action? Email your members of Congress!

This interactive map shows information on enforcement actions and cases from 2009. They include civil enforcement actions taken at facilities, criminal cases prosecuted under federal statutes and the U.S. Criminal Code, and cases in which EPA provided significant support to cases prosecuted under state criminal laws.

Pulitzer Prize winning Ross Gelbspan has been one of the leading lights in exposing the climate change disinformation campaigns waged for decades by coal and oil companies.

Cap and trade is one of the main climate change "solutions" under discussion. In a new nine-minute film, Annie Leonard, creator of The Story of Stuff, offers a warning about what she considers the dangers of cap and trade.

Whether it was promoting the shared flush, peeing in public, or urinating on compost to preserve precious phosphate, my concern with human waste has continued in 2009.

Jon Stewart kicked off the week with coverage of the COP15 climate summit in Copenhagen. He does an admirable job of summing up the good, the bad, the ridiculous, and the maddening from the news that's emerged over the last couple of days.

When I posted the trailer for In Transition—the documentary about the Transition Towns movement as a response to peak oil and climate change—commenter CB was less than enamored with the film making style. Maybe now CB can judge the entire movie, as the makers have just released the entire thing for viewing free on YouTube.

If there are any doubts left in your mind, watch it--it's after the jump.

On March 24th 1989, shortly after midnight, the supertanker Exxon Valdez runs aground in Prince William Sound, a pristine area immensely rich in marine life. A significant part of the crude oil carried by the tanker spills into the sea. The black wave. Most of that oil will never be recovered.

769 toxic products removed since 2009

Despite strict "codes of conduct," labor rights violations are the norm at factories making the world's favorite high-tech gadgets.

A short film showing the environmental impacts of the meat and dairy industry, highlighting Friends of the Earth's Food Chain Campaign

An interactive map of data.

HSUS made history for animals in 2008. Watch some of the major victories The Humane Society of the United States achieved over the year.

This clip is tragedy plus outrage plus allegations of corporate greed and indifference.

Six Reasons to Vote NO on Ohio's Issue 2

A production of H2Oil

Climate Change

There's lots to love in this short clip of a protest against Whole Foods CEO John Mackey's thoughts on health care (which come complete with wit and wisdom from Margaret Thatcher). It's just sad that not every town has a Brass Liberation Orchestra

Who pays to stop global warming? How to allocate emissions allowances? If people are entitled to an equal share of the world's resources, should national allowances be allocated on a per capita basis?

Lost in much of the health reform debate is what reform would mean to rural communities. This is surprising, given that -- as the U.S. Department of Agriculture notes [pdf] -- rural areas have been hit hardest by problems with our faltering health insurance system:

Hear a frank conversation between four experts on Farmworker's rights: Sandy Brown, co-owner of Swanton Berry Farm, Alida Cantor of California Institute for Rural Studies, Alegría De La Cruz, staff attorney for Center for Race, Poverty and the Environment, and Maisie Greenawalt of Bon Appétit Management Company. listen iconDownload (mp3) (around 90 minutes)

Every once in while the mainstream media produces an insightful and fair-handed look at Wal-Mart. Even less often, the mainstream business press produces such a piece.

The film tells of the rise and fall of biotechnologist cum mid-level manager Mark Whitacre, who, through a series of events, becomes an informant for the FBI against his employer, Archer Daniels Midland (ADM), one of the world’s largest agricultural processors.

In fact, one of of every four human beings on earth who is imprisoned is in a US facility. Look it up.

Canada's Alberta tar sands produces the world's dirtiest, most expensive, and dangerous fossil fuel. Locked up in sand and clay, extracting tar sands crude consumes 3 barrels of water per barrel of bitumen produced, produces 5 times the greenhouse gases of "normal" crude oil, and leaches enormous volumes of toxics into North America's second largest watershed.

It was midnight when Elise and her husband were woken by armed men in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

Barangay Anislagan is in Placer, Surigao del Norte and is among local communities that are against large-scale mining. Please help the campaign by sharing this video to as many as possible.

In this TED talk at the State Department, Gapminder data master Hans Rosling debunks the question of whether social development comes before wealth generation.

In July 2009, Human Rights Watch released a report entitled Well Oiled: Oil and Human Rights in Equatorial Guinea. In this commentary, HRW Director of Business and Human Rights Arvind Ganesan links this tiny Sub-Sahara African countries’ oil wealth to government corruption and human rights abuses.

Consultant, author, and blogger Alice Korngold talks about her work connecting corporate executives with nonprofit boards, and the transformation that takes place, person after person, as executives come up with new ways to help.

It feels like the rain might never let up in New England this summer, and my garden is drowning.

How did Goldman Sachs end up posting the largest quarterly profit in its 140-year history and paying out a record amount for employee bonuses this year—after receiving a massive taxpayer-funded bailout last year?

WHAT’S ORGANIC ABOUT “ORGANIC?” rings the alarm for the need to develop an ecological consciousness. The film illustrates that the organic food debate extends well beyond personal choice and into the realm of social responsibility.

"What's On Your Plate" is exactly the film we need now. – Michael Pollan, author of In Defense of Food: An Eater’s Manifesto and The Omnivore's Dilemma

Environmental disaster, economic decline and community devastation

You’ve heard of conflict diamonds, but did you know there might be blood on your cell phone? This PSA brings a little-known aspect of the conflict in Eastern Congo to light and offers a suggestion on how global consumers can help.

What obligation do businesses have to be good citizens, and how do corporations committed to ethical practices fare against competitors who focus first and foremost on the bottom line

Well, there's nothing more fundamental than food and health and nowhere is the assault on human rights more aggressive.

Since 1970, for two income family with two kids: * Mortgage payments: up 76% * Healthy families that are getting employers sponsored health insurance: up 74% * Owning multiple cars: up 52% * Child care: up 100% +++ * Taxes: up 25%

Vagina Monologues creator, V-Day founder playwright and activist Eve Ensler took the stage at D7 to talk with Kara Swisher about the Democratic Republic of Congo, columbite tantalite and rape as a weapon of war in the mining industry responsible for bringing the material to high-tech devices.

Fined $25m by the US federal court for funding a terrorist organisation, Chiquita, the US-based banana distribution company, is now facing a number of new lawsuits.

An important Public Service Announcement from your Government and The Biotech Industry (represented here by chemical giant Bayer) pronouncing the benefits of genetically modified rice strain - LL62. Barely tried and tested this GM Rice is coming to your dinner plate nevertheless - unless you take action now!

A grassroots campaign of 50,000 volunteers cleaned up 10,000 tons of trash—in less than a day.

Mark Muller has kindly produced 5 presentations about mining for us, here is ...

The Carnegie Council and the International Labour Organization (ILO) present a unique look at modern slavery from the personal, policy, and enforcement perspectives, to shed light on an insidious practice that has become part of today's labor markets.