Jack Burns Lives!

I’ve always been afflicted by the frequently false notion that the grass is greener on the other side. I always want to be somewhere other than where I am. California, Colorado, Utah, New Mexico, Canada, anywhere but the Bible Belt, a cultural enclave for Bush loving neocons, soccer moms in Hummers and air so thick [...]

Rebuilding New Orleans the way it was is nuts.
Katrina is not only a human disaster, but a massive environmental disaster of unprecedented proportion, now that the area is drowed in a toxic soup and worsening oil spill. But New Orleans was an environmental disaster before the hurricane.
A friend that did some of his Ph.D work [...]

Just returned from a trip in the Smoky Mountains, three days of quiet time in the woods. A time to clear my head and my lungs, commune with the critters and escape my troubles.
While on the trail, I met a fellow that had been on the trail for 25 days! I’m deeply envious of this [...]

I’ve spent quite a bit of time over the past few years observing and participating in the ongoing debate that occurs between environmentalists, developers and industrialists. One that is more often than not barren of the fruits of compromise, even when compromise makes sense for everyone involved.
And of course there are times when compromise is [...]