idealistic than mine was. That’s good. The hour is
very late, and principled pragmatism is needed.
The 20-something staff manning the Earth
Day 2010 campaign ( earthday.net) is committed
to making this a transformational moment on
the climate stage. Much as Earth Day 1970 made
a Clean air act unstoppable, they seek to make a
strong climate bill inevitable. They are employing
every web-based technology that shows promise
as an organizing tool, as well as traditional grassroots tactics. They’ve targeted eight swing states
where citizens can hold political leaders publicly accountable for stalling climate action over
three decades, and engaged millions of students
at 75,000 K– 12 schools and a couple thousand
UW-green Bay’s office of Marketing anD coMMUnication
Laws and regulations set up
_____ within three years of the first Earth Day have channeled at least $10 trillion of public and private money into cost- effective investments in a
safe, healthy environment.
After Earth Day was launched in April 1970, millions of people began to question the “more is
better” ethos that pervaded American life. Here, students at the University of Wisconsin celebrate
the first Earth Day.
published, we are learning how to communicate
with wit, wisdom and streaming video.
Historically, real change has almost always
been driven by a nation’s youth. Today’s youth
is still feeling its way. a huge number are gener-
ous with their time when they volunteer to do
concrete things like feed the hungry or restore
watersheds. But as a generation, they appear to
be profoundly distrustful of organized politics.
The first year of the Obama administration has
reinforced their skepticism. The denizens of Net-
roots Nation have not yet produced their own
authentic national leaders.
This cohort is far more pragmatic and less
colleges. To appeal to the concrete, hands-on
enthusiasm of their peers, they are seeking to
elicit “a Billion acts of Green” from around the
world ( billionactsofgreen.net).
