Ten Small Green Groups that Make a Big Difference

Standing Up to Obama on the Environment

…It takes guts for an environmental group to stand up to a Democratic president in an election year and call him on his betrayals. You risk being marginalized and stripped of your funding by the Democratic-aligned foundations that underwrite most of the mainstream groups. Here are ten groups who stand up for what they stand on, who put protection of the environment before politics. They all operate close to the bone, their meager budgets are spent on activism and litigation, not on self-promoting direct mail operations, glitzy offices or bloated administrative expenses. These groups will put your money to work defending the planet. Now pony up!

Wild Idaho Rising Tide, Moscow, ID

Since October 2010, Imperial Oil, a Canadian subsidiary of ExxonMobil, has shipped, barged, and trucked over one hundred pieces of gargantuan, Korean-made, industrial equipment from the Ports of Vancouver and Pasco, Washington, and Lewiston, Idaho. During the next six months, Northwest interstates could be overrun by another 300 transports of these two-lane wide, 500,000-pound “megaloads” escorted by aggressive, industry-sponsored state police. This is the second front in the fight against the tar sands oil frenzy in Canada. Wild Idaho Rising Tide is leading the battle against ExxonMobil’s scheme to turn all available Northwest and Northern Rockies highways into permanent corridors to the largest industrial project on Earth.

Beyond Nuclear, Takoma Park, MD

Buffalo Field Campaign, West Yellowstone, MT

Climate Ground Zero, Rock Creek, WV

Fund for Wild Nature, Kelso, WA

Heartwood, Gosport, IN

Living Rivers, Moab, UT

Los Alamos Study Group, Albuquerque, NM

Utah Environmental Congress, Salt Lake City, UT

Wolf Haven, Tenino, WA

Read more: Ten Small Green Groups that Make a Big Difference

(By Jeffrey St. Clair, Counterpunch Weekend Edition, December 23-25, 2011)