Dandelion Leaf

"Benjamin climbed over the wall, into a meadow....It was getting late in the afternoon. Other rabbits were coming out to enjoy the evening air. One of them in a blue coat by himself, was busily hunting for dandelions.--'Cousin Peter! Peter Rabbit, Peter Rabbit!' shouted Benjamin Bunny." (from The Tale of Mr. Tod, by Beatrix Potter, 1912, pub. Frederick Warne)

(HASC presented Hamilton Council with a 900 signature petition and prepared a leaflet - text below -  to support a ban on chemical pesticides - by showing solidarity with the much maligned Dandelion!)

DANDELIONS ARE NOT THE ENEMY: CHEMICAL LAWNS ARE!

Dandy CanLit quote:


"Few of our colonists are acquainted with the many uses to which this neglected but most valuable plant may be applied. The time will come when this hardy weed, with its golden flowers and curious seed vessels, which form a constant plaything to the little children rolling about and luxuriating among the grass in the month of May, will be transplanted into our gardens, and tended with due care." Susanna Moodie, Roughing it in the bush (1852)

RECIPE: Susanna Moodie's Home-Made Dandelion Root Coffee

"I carefully washed the roots quite clean, without depriving them of the fine brown skin which covers them; and which contains the aromatic flavour. I cut my roots into small pieces, the size of a kidney bean, and roasted them on an iron baking-pan in the stove-oven, until they were brown and crisp as coffee. I then ground and transferred a small cupful of the powder to the coffee-pot, pouring upon it scalding water, and boiling it for a few minutes briskly over the fire. The result was beyond my expectations."(Roughing it in the bush, p. 354)

Dandelion NUTRITION:

Dandelion greens are more nutritious than spinach. The dandelion leaf is rich in many minerals and vitamins. It is best to harvest the greens in spring and early summer before the plant flowers. Whether cooked raw in salads, dandelion greens are bitter (that is the medical part) and taste best prepared with other greens and complimentary ingredients. To ensure the integrity of the nutrition in the Dandelion greens, they should not be ripped or cut until they are to be eaten.

RECIPE: Dandelion Greens (a tasty side dish for fish)

2 bunches dandelion greens


2 tbsp olive oil


1 cup onion, finely chopped


2 tsp chopped garlic


salt and freshly ground pepper


t tbsp balsamic vinegar


Bring a large pot of salted water to boil on high heat. Trim stems from greens and discard. Add leaves to pot. Boil until tender. Drain and rinse with cold water. Heat oil on medium heat. Add onion and saute until softened. Add garlic and cook another minute. Add greens and saute until heated through. Stir in vinegar and season well with salt and pepper.

Dandelion MEDICINAL USES

The Dandelion plant may be used for various medicinal purposes. The leaves are a very powerful diuretic and unlike pharmaceuticals will not rob the body of potassium. The diuretic properties of the dandelion leaf help with the treatment of high blood pressure by reducing the volume of excess fluids. Herbalists endorse dandelion root as one of the most effective detoxifying herbs. The medicinal properties of the root works primarily on the liver and gallbladder to remove wastes and toxins. The root has helped to clear up many eczema like skin problems. The leaf and root may be used to prevent gallstones and may even help to dissolve already formed gallstones. The white milky sap from the stem has been used to treat warts if applied several times daily. It is best to harvest dandelion roots in the fall, before the frost.

RECIPE: Cleansing Tea

2 tsp (10ml) fresh, washed dandelion root gathered in fall and finely chopped

2 tsp (10ml) of nettle leaf (fresh or dried) finely chopped or ground


1/2 tsp (2ml) each of oat straw, fennel seed and corn silk


1 litre boiling water


Pour boiling water over the herbs. Steep in a pot for 20 minutes. Strain the herbs and drink one or two cups as needed.

RECIPE: Dandelion WINE

Make this wine in April and enjoy it for the winter holidays


2 litres of Dandelion flowers


11/2 kilos sugar


4 oranges


4 1/2 litres water


yeast and nutrient (consult wine making store)


Pick the dandelion flowers in sunshine or at mid day so the heads are open. Make the wine immediately after picking the flowers. Measure yellow heads and discard as much green as possible. Boil water. Pour the boiling water over the flowers, steep for two days, no longer. Boil the mixture for 10 minutes with the orange peel (no white pith) and strain through muslin onto sugar stirring to dissolve it. When cool add they yeast nutrient, fruit juice and yeast. Put into fermentation jar and fit air-lock. Siphon off into clean bottles when the wine has cleared.

Warning! Pesticides pose a threat to the health of children.

"The cumulative effects of being exposed to many different pesticides over a lifetime represent an unqualified and unacceptable risk to all Canadian children."


May 25, 2000, Ontario College of Family Physicians and CELA "The Children's Health Project"


"At least 20 epidemiology studies in the peer-reviewed literature document a relationship between exposure to pesticides and increased risk of cancer in children. Children are generally more susceptible to the toxic effects of these chemicals than adults, and current animal tests and regulations do not protect children.


(NRC 1993a, WHO 1986)

dandelion lovers unite against pesticides!

Help Hamilton Council preserve the integrity of the earth by urging them to support a phase-out of the cosmetic use of pesticides; help right the wrongs the Chemical companies have foisted upon their favourite villain: our much beloved and much maligned composite plant of the Asteraceae family, the dandelion.


Dandelion lovers of the world unite! JOIN US FOR A DANDELION TEA & COFFEE PARTY
HAMILTON CITY HALL Lobby, 2nd floor outside council chambers, 12:30 pm, Wednesday, January 9, 2002. The Ghost of CanLit giant Susanna Moodie (Roughing it in the Bush) will be pouring out warm beverages made from Dandelions prior to hearings on Hamilton's pesticide by-law.
Moodie is offended that the Dandelion, so central to the immigrant experience in Canada, has suffered the indignity of being sprayed with poisonous chemicals and treated as a bad weed.
"Few of our colonists are acquainted with the many uses to which this neglected but most valuable plant may be applied," explains Moodie.


During the fall of '35 (that's 1835) Moodie began to discover the many uses of this "neglected but most valuable plant."

• The leaves used in salads are "quite equal to endive."
• The leaves when boiled can be used as a substitute for cabbage.
• The tops can be boiled and the liquor added to hops, fermented and made into beer "equal to the table-beer used at home."
• Coffee made from the dandelion root "proved excellent-- far superior to the common coffee we procured at the stores."

An excellent source of vitamin A, young leaves can be eaten raw or boiled for 5-10 minutes. Among many other culinary uses, the flowers can be dipped in batter and fried.


FOR MORE INFORMATION PLEASE CONTACT BEATRICE EKWA EKOKO of the TARAXACUM OFFICINALE PRESERVATION SOCIETY (TOPS)  (TOPS is a member of Hamilton Action for Social Change) - - - - 

Pesticide use put to public
Many support recommendation for city to reduce chemical use.

By CORINNE AESCHELMANN

Special to The Hamilton Spectator

__________

Sheila Brown gambles with her health every time she steps into her back yard.

The Waterdown resident suffers from an environmental illness that her doctor believes is aggravated by chemical sprays used to beautify lawns. Her symptoms, which have worsened since new neighbours began using pesticides, include light-headedness, weak limbs and recurring colds.

"I have to be careful in my own back yard again," Brown told a city council subcommittee yesterday.

She was one of more than 30 speakers who came to City Hall to share their views at a special hearing on pesticide use.

Like many of the others, she applauded a staff recommendation for a continued reduction in the city's use of chemical sprays, but urged council to take the initiative a step further. In order to eliminate the health risks associated with pesticide exposure, Brown said, the city must also restrict the use of chemical sprays used by private landowners.

"We live in a chemical soup" that puts people at unnecessary risk for health problems, she said.

Pesticides, which include chemical herbicides, insecticides, and weed killers, have been linked to numerous health and environmental problems.

Yet some speakers expressed doubt about the health hazards.

University of Guelph toxicologist Len Ritter argued that studies linking pesticide use to certain illnesses, such as cancer, are inconclusive.

Still, Ritter cautioned that because doubt exists, pesticides should always be treated as "potentially dangerous chemicals."

A Supreme Court of Canada ruling last June upheld a bylaw passed by Hudson, Que., prohibiting the use of lawn sprays, and other municipalities have since enacted similar bylaws. So far, Hamilton city council has elected to wait for recommendations from the medical officer of health.

Although yesterday's hearing dealt with nonagricultural pesticide use, farming representatives like Larry Freeman expressed concern about the implications of a possible future ban on pesticides.

Freeman called prohibiting pesticides "impractical and unenforceable."

"It could severely restrict a farmer's ability to keep pests out of their crops," he said.

Council's committee of the whole will review the city's plan to reduce pesticide use sometime this spring.

[photo]

[caption] Dressed for the part, Evelyna Kay, 6, helped her mom, Beatrice Ekwa-Ekoko, offer dandelion tea during yesterday's public hearing at Hamilton City Hall on the city's plan to reduce pesticide use. Barry Gray, The Hamilton Spectator.

COKE CAMPUS

KILLING FOR COCA COLA IN COLOMBIA

COKE ASSAILED FOR ALLEGED LABOUR BRUTALITY
The Hamilton Spectator [A2 - Tuesday, December 11, 2001]


Human rights and labour activists want McMaster University to urge Coca-Cola to clean up its conduct in Colombia.
The McMaster-based Ontario Public Interest Research Group (OPIRG) held a small, peaceful demonstration on campus yesterday, International Human Rights Day.
Members of OPIRG and the United Steelworkers of America poured a bottle of Coke into a metal pail covered with the names of Colombian Coca-Cola workers they say have been murdered or jailed for being members of a union, Sinaltrainal. The Coke represents workers' blood.
OPIRG member Murray Lumley later handed the pail to Mary Keyes, associate vice-president, student affairs. She promised to relay their message to McMaster president Peter George.
In 1998 McMaster signed a 10-year multi-million dollar agreement to sell only Coca-Cola products on campus. The company will contribute towards operating costs of the new student centre and has provided money for scholarships and new score boards.
OPIRG hopes McMaster can use its influence with Coca-Cola to secure human rights for Colombian workers. The group is not asking for a boycott.
A lawsuit filed in Florida accuses Coca-Cola, its Colombian subsidiary and business affiliates of using paramilitary forces to murder, torture and kidnap union leaders. Two OPIRG members went to Colombia last August and heard accounts of labour organizers being terrorized.
But Coca-Cola spokesperson Wendy Kubota said the allegations are untrue.
"The Coca-Cola Company does not conduct business in this manner," Kubota said. "We believe this action is nothing more than an effort to garner publicity and besmirch the reputation of the company and its partners."
A company statement says it does not condone the abuse of individuals' human rights anywhere in its system.

U.S. ACTIVIST STAUGHTON LYND, FROM GLOBALIZATION TO RESISTANCE

Staughton Lynd, McMaster University, Feb. 3, 2001

---

A visitor from the imperialist heartland should be hesitant to pontificate about globalization and resistance.

Lynd, photo by Madeleine Kay (age3)

In so many ways, Canada is a more civilized and a more developed society than the United States. In the 1960s, young men subject to the draft or already members of the Armed Forces of the United States fled to Canada. When my passport was taken away for traveling to Hanoi during wartime, I made a point of visiting Canada, for which a passport was not required, I hope that my words on those occasions may have added something to your resolve to provide sanctuary to war resisters from the States.
In that same decade, both of my older children attended the Everdale Place, an experimental school not too distant from where we meet tonight. Later, your public health system gave heart not only to health care advocates in the States, but also to those of us who as Legal Services lawyers or Headstart teachers were trying to provide a public service administered in a decentralized and democratic manner. Less than two months ago, Canada's finance Minister announced a moratorium on $700 million of the $1.1 billion debt owed to Canada by heavily indebted poor countries, so that those countries could spend that money "on urgent social priorities such as health care, education and poverty reduction." You have, I believe, a far more comprehensive and respectful approach to the self-determination of indigenous peoples than do we in the States. And you have abolished the death penalty.
My deepest sense of obligation is to individual comrades like Margaret Keith and Jim Brophy in their industrial health and safety work, or to Bruce Allen, who under his nom de web Praxis 1871 makes me sensitive to things I need to know about not only in Canada, but in the States as well, and indeed around the world.
For all of the foregoing, thank you, Canada.
At the same time, I believe you will join me in recognizing that Canada is still a capitalist economy, deeply enmeshed in the globalization that is our subject tonight. From this standpoint you in Canada and we in the United States are all in the same soup, or perhaps more precisely, all under the treads of the same neo-liberal juggernaut. Because of this common predicament that we share I venture to share some thoughts about globalization and resistance.
What should be the principles of our common resistance to globalization?
I am going to suggest certain principles, but I am concerned that the moment I do so, we will become lost in a discussion of labels. So let me begin in a different way by holding up as a model or mantra the activity of the resistance movement in the third society subject to NAFTA -- and of course, more grievously subject to it than either the United States of Canada -- namely, Mexico.
The Zapatista movement in Chiapas seems to me extraordinary in at least the following ways:

1. Without participating in electoral politics, the Zapatistas have ended 71 years of uninterrupted government by the Institutional Revolutionary Party, or PRI. How have they done this? One critical component is a vast effort at popular education. Mayan peasants, who had never before left their native villages, traveled all over Mexico meeting with popular organizations such as the rebelling students at the national university.
2. Of course the Zapatistas are not nonviolent in any traditional sense. But neither are they a traditional Latin American guerrilla movement. Without giving up either their arms or the principle of armed struggle, they have carried on for the last five years an essentially nonviolent resistance. For example, the Mexican government has sought to build roads into the Lancandon jungle that is the Zapatista stronghold, The government claimed that this was to help farmers get their produce to market. The real reason, obviously, was to be able to move soldiers and military gear into the area. At the western edge of the jungle is a village named Amador. During the summer and fall of 1999, the soldiers seeking to build the road were met each day by a cordon (a picket line) of women from Amador. Since many of the soldiers were indigenous, the women appealed to them to recognize their true interests and to put down their weapons. To prevent this dialogue the government played music through loud speakers, I lost track of this encounter for about a year. Then I noticed that after Vicente Fox became president, he announced the abandonment of a number of military bases in Chiapas. The first base to be abandoned was at Amador.
3. When my wife and I briefly visited San Cristobal in 1999, we talked with a woman who for years has worked with indigenous communities in the area. She was completing a book of interviews subtitled "Voices from Mayan Communities in Rebellion in Chiapas." She told us:
   

Housing Strategy Action

National Housing Strategy Day of Action

Hamilton ON, November 22, 2000

Today at noon Santa and 20 or so elves who are also supporters of Hamilton Action for Social Change, Homes Not Bombs, and Christian Peacemaker Teams, visited Hamilton West Liberal MP Stan Keyes' campaign office on James St. S., Hamilton.

The group invited the Canadian government to "give the gift of affordable housing" to the 1.3 million Canadian children and their families living in poverty.

MP Stan came out of his office when he spotted the ONTV camera and made a speech extolling all of the goodies his party had promised to the homeless and those in danger of losing their shelter. He promised that things would be better for the poor of Hamilton somewhere in the future, because Homeless Minister Claudette Bradshaw had interviewed homeless people two years ago.

Santa reminded MP Stan that we were there to promote the 1% solution, that 1% ($2 billion) of Canada's GDP be spent to eliminate poverty by providing affordable housing as Canada's MP's pledged to do more than a decade ago. Santa also said that this small group was there in solidarity with the National Housing Strategy Day of Action taking place across Canada today.

Santa and his elves presented MP Keyes with a cardboard replica of an apartment building along with some readings from the UN's Declaration of Human Rights, which guarantee housing as a human right.

The group quoted Martin Luther King Jr., who said that "A nation that continues year after year to spend more money on the military than on programs of social uplift is approaching spiritual death."

They then pointed out to the MP that in the fiscal year 2000-2001 Canada will spend $11.2 billion on war, and zero dollars on new affordable housing construction to address the national crisis of homelessness.

Canada annually spends over $80 million enforcing sanctions which have killed over a million Iraqis. That money could have provided for over 2,000 affordable housing units.

Mr Keyes was presented with the cardboard affordable housing unit and these words:

"In order to remind Mr Keyes that his government must radically alter priorities, we present you with this gift, a model of decent affordable housing so desperately needed to save the spiritual soul of Canada. We vow to see that whoever is elected will not avoid their responsibility to ensure affordable housing for all. We intend to hold the government accountable. Happy Holidays!"

The group ended the visit by singing the hymn "Amazing Grace" with lyrics by poet Allen Ginsberg, words that referred to homelessness and its alleviation [lyrics reprinted below] 

AMAZING GRACE

I dreamed I dwelled in a homeless place

Where I was lost alone

Folk look right through me into space

And passed with eyes of stone

O homeless hand on many a street

Accept this change from me

A friendly smile or word is sweet

As fearless charity

Woe working[folk] who hear the cry

And will not spare a dime

Nor look into a homeless eye

Afraid to give the time

So rich or poor no gold to talk

A smile on your face

The homeless ones where you may walk

Receive amazing grace

[repeat first stanza]

JUSTICE DEPARTS

JP EXCUSES HERSELF FROM PROTEST CASE
Postpones trial of five who occupied MPP's office
Friday, July 21, 2000 The Hamilton Spectator/A9
By JOHN BURMAN The Hamilton Spectator
STONEY CREEK


A Hamilton Justice of the Peace has excused herself from the trespassing trial of five social activists following their bid to be heard in provincial offences court yesterday.
She also sent a police officer after a spectator who swore out loud when she adjourned the case to November.
Justice Wendy Casey said she was removing herself from the case in order to eliminate any perception of unfairness.
Casey remanded the case until Nov. 27 after members of Hamilton Action for Social Change told her they were prepared to admit the facts against them in order to explain why they occupied Stoney Creek MPP Brad Clark's office April 3 in a non-violent protest against Ontario welfare laws.
Andrew Loucks, Randy Kay, Wendell Fields and Scott Neigh of the Hamilton Group and Matthew Behrens of Toronto Action for Social Change were charged with failing to leave a premise after they occupied Clark's King Street East office in Stoney Creek for 90 minutes. Police carried one of the protesters from the office.
The group is opposed to the provincial government's policy of zero tolerance on welfare fraud, which went into effect April 1 and denies benefits to anyone convicted of welfare fraud.
"We will agree with the facts of the case," Fields [sic] told the court. "It is a very simple case. We are willing to concede we were there and explain."
Casey told the five accused that would amount to a guilty plea. When she questioned their understanding of such an act, Fields started to leave and was called back.
A moment later, a spectator jumped up and shouted, then stormed out of the courtroom. A police officer brought him back.
Members of the group told Casey they understood the implications of agreeing to the Crown's facts in the case.
Some of the accused are quite familiar with public protests and their consequences.
Perhaps the most colourful is Behrens. He's been known to dress up as the Easter Bunny or Santa's Elf No. 2. He has taken canned food from the shelves of a downtown Toronto Loblaw's store and dumped it in the store's food bank bin to protest the company's political donations to Premier Mike Harris's Tories. He also participated in an attempt to perform a citizen's arrest on former United States secretary of state Henry Kissenger when he was in Toronto in May of last year.
Fields, Kay and Loucks were involved with the 1999 Father's Day Coalition for Peace protest at the Hamilton Airshow. Fields has in the past sought election as Hamilton mayor and as an MPP in the Hamilton West riding. He, along with Behrens and Kay, was also involved in a sit-in at Heritage Minister Sheila Copps' Hamilton office in February 1998.
As soon as she set the Nov. 27 date for trial, Casey excused herself from the trial and told the court clerk to make sure her wishes were noted on that day's trial list.
Once the trial date was settled, Casey called Andrew Sedgley to the front of the bench and asked him what he was doing shouting epithets at the court. Sedgley--who apparently is not a member of Action for Social Change in either Hamilton or Toronto, told the court he made an immature response and apologized. Casey accepted his apology.
Scott Neigh, spokesperson for Hamilton Action for Social Change, said in an interview outside the court that the group is a loose-knit organization with about 15 regular members. But it has had between 50 and 60 people out to participate in various demonstrations. Neigh, a freelance writer and broadcaster, said the membership consists of a mix of people who believe in social justice. Most members are between 20 and 50 years old. Neigh also said the group is not affiliated with Toronto Action for Social Change "but we have been known to cooperate in the past." After the sit-in at Clark's Stoney Creek office, Wey Robinson, a member of Hamilton Action for Social Change, said the group wished to protest Ontario welfare policies because of a lifetime benefit ban on anyone who's been convicted of welfare fraud "is immoral and unjust."
The group believes that there aren't enough welfare recipients who commit fraud to justify such a draconian policy, and that it will cost more money to care for people forced off welfare.
The group believes the policy violates the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights and will hurt children, even though the government says portions of benefits which would have been paid to support the children of banned recipients will continue.

---

LOFTY POLITICAL DEFENCE FELL FLAT
Hamilton Spectator, December 7, 2000.

Five social activists who occupied the constituency office of Stoney Creek MPP Brad Clark last spring to protest changes in provincial welfare regulations were all fined $300 Monday in provincial offences court.
Andrew Loucks, Randy Kay, Wendell Fields, Scott Neigh and Matthew Behrens were found guilty of trespassing by justice of the peace Donald Stevely.
In a trial that saw one JP excuse herself from hearing the case, they all admitted the trespass but challenged whether it constituted a punishable offence. Conducting their own defence they cited everything from the Nuremberg trials to the UN's Universal Declaration of Human Rights as justification for their actions, arguing a democratic society should tolerate, not penalize, such actions.
In the end Stevely was buying none of it. "You are not making any protest that will be heard," he told the five men, "you're just blowing in the wind and causing a problem."
In his submission on sentencing, Behrens told the court "just because the law's the law, doesn't mean that sometimes there can't be citizen intervention to uphold higher international laws and international standards. We'll probably be seeing a lot of you again in this court because we can't simply be deterred by a fine or the threat of punishment."
In imposing the $300 fine, Stevely asked each if they required time to pay, four said they didn't intend to pay--Kay said he would go to jail before paying the fine. The fifth, Fields, asked for 10 years.
Stevely ignored their remarks and made no mention of the consequences of not paying the fine.
Chances of any of them going to jail are slim. Generally, unpaid fines for provincial offences other than the Highway Traffic Act, are turned over [to] a collection agency after 30 days.
The men were charged last April after police were called to Clark's King Street East office to disperse a group protesting the government's "zero tolerance policy on welfare fraud. Court was told they were arrested only after they refused to leave the office. Two had to be carried out by police.
In their defence, they argued they were merely citizens obliged to obey international law.
Stevely, although generally lenient in allowing political overtones to colour the defence, rejected it all. "This is about trespassing and leaving a premise," he said. "Pure and simple."

22 arrested at Hamilton War Show

Fathers Day Coalition for Peace

1280 Main Street West, Box 19

Hamilton ON L8S 1C0


FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE June 19, 2000



Hamilton War Show Suffers Serious Setback from Combination of Nonviolent Direct Action, Alternative Festival of Life, and Mother Nature; 22 Activists Arrested and Criminally Charged; War Show Faces Major Financial Losses



In what has proven a significant weekend in the new effort to end the 26-year-old Hamilton War Show, a combination of nonviolent protest and resultant traffic tie-ups on Saturday, June 17, and rain on Sunday, June 18, may prove too much for the financially unstable institution to continue its annual homage to planes whose only purpose is mass murder from the air.

A testament to the seriousnessness with which the City of Hamilton treated the protests was reflected in criminal charges and severe bail restrictions. But by the time the last resister was released from jail at 3:30 pm on Sunday, war show organizers were no doubt left wondering what the future looked like considering two crucial factors: given that the Sunday is usually a bigger turnout than the Saturday, a huge source of revenue was lost through the rainout. In addition, the massive traffic jams on Saturday, which were partly credited to the protests, caused numerous cars to turn around, with drivers perhaps thinking Sunday might be a better try. (Later, war show organizers admitted Saturday attendance was actually down from last year, a sign attendees hoped to avoid the protests).

Even more important was the fact that, despite the usual catcalls and verbal threats from the truly dedicated war show fans, thousands of attendees were actually reading the flyers handed to them during their stay in the traffic jam, and some engaged in dialogue with the clowns, grannies and others who were eager to discuss their opposition to the exhibition. For the first time, many of these folks had to consider why they unquestioningly attended something innocently labelled family entertainment each Fathers Day Weekend, to ask themselves how one family's entertainment could represent another family's terror and tragedy.

The War Show, which goes by the friendly moniker "air show", features such events as "Kiddie Commando", in which little children dress up as soldiers in camouflage with facepaint and play war on an obstacle course with real soldiers sporting large water guns, "toy" grenades and military camouflage and facepaint. It is one of the largest displays of aerial firepower each summer in North America, with a range of criminal warplanes from the air forces of Canada, the U.S. and U.K.