LEWISTON, Idaho - A judge on Tuesday revoked special permits allowing a company to truck four oversized loads of oil refinery equipment through a federally protected river corridor, saying the state failed to address public concerns.

A small victory was won in the battle to stop the devastation of Alberta tar sands development: the EPA officially weighed in on the Keystone XL tar sands pipeline, calling the project’s Draft Environmental Impact Statement inadequate and raising serious concerns about the environmental review.

On July 15th, thirty-one years ago, all was usual in the Church Rock area of the Navajo reservation. Life was “everyday normal” for Navajo families, but maybe not “everyday normal” for the average person living in the United States. You see, at this time, many Navajo families had no electricity and drove several miles to haul potable water, as no running water was available. This was life as normal for the area.

Again. Really? “This is not your land. This is not your land. This is not your land.” Repeatedly, the federal government continues to proclaim that this land does not belong to its original inhabitants. This time, the 10th Circuit of Appeals, has told plaintiff's Eastern Navajo Dine Against Uranium Mining (ENDAUM) and the entire Navajo Nation that allotted lands in the checkerboard area of the Navajo Nation do not fall within the definition of "Indian Country" and are therefore not under the jurisdiction of the Navajo Nation.

We had one last day of learning about some significant Native justice issues in Montana. We left from our hotel on Flathead Lake to travel down to the National Bison Range on the reservation. We were lucky to hear a last impromptu rallying talk from Jodi Rave and Eriel Deranger about the emotional perspective they have while doing work on behalf of Native social and environmental justice. It can’t really be overstated how important it is to have your land and culture in tact, and to understand the challenge of working on these issues in communities where the basics of food and shelter are still hard to come by.

My friend, Spider McKnight in Missoula reminded me tonight of a word I want to keep in mind - reciprocity. We owe it to the earth, to ourselves, and to Native communities to do the work to support and to heal the eco-system and the human family. These Honor The Earth tours humble me. We have fed ourselves and grown drunk with consumption, in our fossil fuel economy at the expense of our Indigenous neighbors. Yet, it is our Indigenous environmental activist neighbors who are the visionaries for a new energy economy and who bring a righteousness to these battles that we often turned away from. I see the intellect, the creativity, the organizing, and the sheer will of the groups Honor works to support, and I am heartened and compelled to join the good fight.

MISSOULA, Mont. -- Indigo Girls Amy Ray and Emily Saliers are teaming up with Native activist Winona LaDuke and members of the Women Donors Network to host free community events on the Blackfeet and Flathead reservations June 4 and 5.

PABLO - Two-time vice presidential candidate and Native American activist Winona LaDuke will be here Saturday afternoon to moderate a panel discussion of energy issues facing Montana and its Indian reservations.

Now that the dust has settled and a giant addition to the Big Stone coal power plant known as Big Stone II has been canceled, what next?

Honor the Earth is proud to join a coalition of national and international groups who signed a recent advertisement in Variety comparing tar sands development with the plot of the movie Avatar and the ad has generated a lot of attention. The ad is running in Variety just before the Oscars and it expresses support for Avatar because it closely parallels the struggles of real life Indigenous Peoples inundated by tar sands developers.  Below are links to some of the prominent media coverage of the ad and a copy of the ad itself.