Emily Saves the World in 12 Easy Steps

Step one: get appointed to presidential cabinet. I'm not crazy. I know very well that the guy giving the speech at the white house rarely writes what he says nor does he have a whole lot of influence getting things done. There's a lot of gridlock in our government, which is as it should be or there would be a lot of reactionary/impulsive legislating going on. Scary. In a cabinet, however, I can voice my opinion and throw around new ideas and I'd be in a position to get the people who actually make decisions to listen to me. It's that, or wake tomorrow as Bono/Angelina Jolie.

Step two: Get people like GE to listen when I say "Hey - you know what would make that EVEN better? Flanking those very pretty wind turbines with a couple of solar grids - ultimately the added up-front cost is a drop in the bucket when you consider your long-term plan and the profit you can expect to get from it is really the gift that keeps on giving."

Step three: Meet up with execs at companies like Exxon-Mobile and say "So, you've made more money in the past few fiscals years than anyone else in the history of money. Ever. Why don't you take some of those ridiculous profits and instead of continuing to ass-rape your customer base, become the forward thinking people that you are and replace two pumps at every station with hydrogen and/or electric filling stations so that you can call yourselves the innovative American company that you want everyone to think you are. And while you're at it, take a page out of the Bill and Melinda Gates book and allow yourself to be forced to set up a foundation that helps restore the environments that you've so blatantly destroyed. Valdez, anyone?"

Step Four: Make nation-wide recycling mandatory. San Fransisco is considering it. And since we all know that trash never really goes "away" we can all rest easier knowing that our consumer-happy lifestyles are a closed-loop in terms of Using Stuff Up.

Step Five: CSAs/Urban Gardens/Vertical Farms/general removal of chemicals from our lives: after things like asbestos, pvc, bpa, pesticide leeching, Crop Failure, Natural disasters, the use of foodstuffs for energy, and the use of HFCS instead of Salt and sugar as preservative and sweetener, the shorter distance between growth and plate the better. (I didn't link to any of the causes I just listed because really, if you've been paying attention to the news, you can think of an example. If not - news.google.com should set you up well.)

Step Six: Get all of the celebs that people are watching to put their money where their mouths are. Paris Hilton and all her dogs? She built them a beauty parlor now she should set up a rescue foundation (and pay someone else to run it). Some good examples here. Oh, and: Duh. (BTW - she's on record as having said "If you make $10million a movie, you can give $5m away and not miss it.")

Step Seven: Get on my own city. Think Global, act Local. The hardest part is getting started. As soon as I'm finished recovering, I'm going to show up to meetings and be the loud squeaky wheel. As it is now, I'm lucky if I'm awake past nine. I'm lucky if I function past 6. Healing takes a lot of energy. If everyone got involved -- found what they were passionate about and Made Something Happen -- think of the difference that would make. Homeless shelters, Nursing Homes, Literacy Rates, usable skills, animal shelters...the list goes on and on. And for a little global help: THIS is a totally fun organization.

Step Eight: SLOW DOWN. Everyone. Find the joy in your life -- if it's gardening, playing with your kids/pets, cycling. Slow down, look around. Ferris Bueller had it right: "Life comes at your pretty fast. If you don't stop and look around once in a while you might just miss it."

Step Nine: instead of building new highways, we lay track. The new NAFTA highway needs to be a rail line. And since they haven't even started it, it wouldn't be hard to re-direct. And while they're at it, let's divert some of the funds we're throwing at stagnant industries (hello, Detroit, and American Airlines) to Amtrak or other rail lines. Force these old-school companies to innovate. We're fucking AMERICANS - our country was built on innovation!

Step Ten: Reward innovation. Seriously. Incentivize these companies to look forward with their developments and then reward it.

Step Eleven: One word: Hoverboards. (want but on the same principle as the mag trains rather than gasoline because we all know *that's* a dead end) Ok, three more: Mag. Lev. Trains. (Have I mentioned that general happiness is a way to save the world?)

Step Twelve: History. Culture. All of it - not just yours. Preserve it. Embrace it. Celebrate it. Vive la Difference!

So there you go. I've probably left a lot of things off. But I'm sure that they fall into one of those steps somewhere. After all, this is just the first blurt.