Rock stars. Is there anything they don't know?

You watch, Green Day is just ahead of the crowd.  The environment is getting sexy again. Scary and depressing as it can be to watch what we do to nature people are finally going to address it.  And you watch young people -- led by their rock stars -- are going to be the ones who make it happen.  So be grateful that there are a few bands like U2 and Green Day who can go beyond the money and even the art to social conscience.

What's the difference if someone is a rock star, an artist, an actor, a lawyer, or a professor?  If they're informed people who care, their opinion is as valid as any.  Any public people who use their platform to create social change are being responsible citizens, and shouldn't be condemned for it--unless it is a stupid, uniformed stance they are taking!  This is not the case with Green Day.  Good for them, and for bands like Coldplay, also using their fame to bring attention to issues like hunger and global warming.

Lets remember, or inform those that don't know, that Willie Nelson runs all his buses only on Biodiesel, owning a Biodiesel co. himself. He also has organic Yogurt before each show. Perhaps his small, family farm aid assistance could help solve the problem.

In a clever marketing move, the National Resources Defense Council has teamed up with the venerable pseudo-punk pop band Green Day to "Move America Beyond Oil." How will NRDC and the band accomplish this move? With "cell phone activism" and by empowering "music fans to demand clean, renewable energy solutions...."

There's no need for investment in new technologies or consideration of economic costs and consumer choices. No, all that is needed to achieve for safe, clean energy security is to "empower" people to "demand" solutions. How simple. Energy policy for the whiney and self-indulgent.

Why develop new energy resources and conservation strategies when NRDC and Green Day are offering a "brand new tool that allows..." their followers "to send text messages directly from their cell phones to lawmakers and corporate leaders..."? Wow. Energy security through text messaging. What a concept.

It is easy to dismiss the NRDC-Green Day alliance as nothing more than another bit of silly self-promotional fluff - the sort of PR essential to pop stars and NGOs. Unfortunately, the environmental watchdog and the band are reinforcing the notion that achieving a balanced, sustainable energy policy requires nothing more loud demands and exclusive videos not to mention the all-important "chance to win Green Day gear."

According to Wikipedia, John Lydon aka Johnny Rotten recently described Green Day as "plonk" and "phony." The former Sex Pistol's words also serve as an apt description of the NRDC-Green Day energy campaign.

Your willingness to patrol the environmental efforts of others for signs of impurity and insufficient rigor is nothing short of heroic. To think, we almost let a bunch of whiny teenagers get involved in environmental advocacy! Those poseurs don't even know punk from pop!

A grateful -- if marginalized and aging -- environmental movement thanks you.

www.grist.org

that Green Day are informed on this topic?

You're making an assertion without proof.  Those morons didn't even know it was legal to burn the American flag during the US tour.   It's more likely they are mega-poseurs who are fronting for an organization with its own agenda for how the issue should be handled.

Personally, I like pebble-bed nuclear reactors and want lots of them built, in conjunction with EV development.

The idea that Bush hasn't been involved in advancing alternative fuel technologies that they insinuate in the video is a blatant lie, aimed at the ignorant who get their information from GD first-hand.  You may not like how fast he's moving or how much he's done, but to pretend the issue is not on his agenda is politics of the worst sort.  Green Day are nothing short of a propagandists.

"The administration COULD ... support alternative fuels." So it's not already (big time!)?

Methinks people should be sending text messages to Green Day, instead. Something along the lines of "Hey, try reading a newspaper" might be good for starters.