About
I’m an old guy who goes around preaching that small-scale enterprise is the best tool we possess for protection of the environment. This conviction, I’m sorry to say is not widespread – not even in the environmental movement – though it’s not for want of trying on my part. I’ve been preaching on this subject for a long, long time.  In 1963, I read Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring, which made me an environmentalist.  In 1973, I read E. F. Schumacher’s Small Is Beautiful, which made me an advocate of small-scale enterprise.  Taken together, these ideas galvanized me.  Since then I’ve tried, at various times, in various ways, to forge these ideas into some coherent, politically relevant whole. Frankly, this has been an uphill struggle and it continues to be. Still I’ll preach it to anyone who will listen. I’ll preach it until I grow blue in the face. And I’m still at. Here are some landmarks along the way. Earth Day 1970 In the late 1960s, working as a community organizer for the Conservation Foundation, I helped lay groundwork for Earth Day and the worldwide explosion of civic and political activism that followed in its wake. It’s worth recalling that back in those days, if you told someone you were an environmentalist, you had to explain what the word meant. Small is Beautiful In the 1970s, I collaborated with the late E. F. Schumacher, author of Small Is Beautiful, to realize the book’s vision of small-scale enterprise as a principal protector and restorer of the environment. Schumacher taught me the overriding importance of scale, why the size of things should be a principal matter of concern socially, economically, technologically, and even politically. Small Business is Beautiful Too In the 1990s, I noticed how Information Age technologies were vastly expanding the capacities of small-scale enterprises. Small was now more beautiful than ever! To promote understanding of this, I founded the Center for Small Business and the Environment (CSBE), a non-profit organization, in 1998. CSBE promotes green small businesses and green entrepreneurs.  The Small Wonders Report In 2009, the Center for Small Business and the Environment issued what is probably the the best broad survey of green small business: How the Creative Drive of Entrepreneurial Small Businesses is Combating the Recession, Creating New Jobs & Economic Growth, Solving Energy Problems, Fighting Global Warming and Protecting the Environment http://www.aboutcsbe.orghttp://www.smallwondersreport.orghttp://www.smallwondersreport.orghttp://www.smallwondersreport.orghttp://www.smallwondersreport.orgshapeimage_3_link_0shapeimage_3_link_1shapeimage_3_link_2shapeimage_3_link_3shapeimage_3_link_4
It takes gall to be a community organizer. Imagine going about asking others
to toil on behalf of something as amorphous as “the common good” and
– what’s more – asking them with no hope of monetary compensation,
or, indeed, of any earthly gain.  
 
I am, it seems, loaded with gall, because that’s what I did back in the 1960s and 70s when I was organizing the environmental movement. Today, my supply of gall remains intact because I am once again up to my old tricks. (Maybe gall is a renewable resource.)      
 
Okay, so it’s arguable whether producing comedy videos for YouTube serves “the common good.” But I sure as hell have succeeded in getting a bunch of talented people to toil voluntarily on this project. I offer my heartfelt thanks to:
Acknowledgments
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
    •    Joe Handy, our media guy in L.A.,
          none of whose charm is fake.  I love
          to describe Joe to impressionable
          people as our Hollywood publicist,
          trying to create the impression,
          without saying so, that he once
          represented clients like Cary Grant
          and Katharine Hepburn.  
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
    •    Sarah Marshall, noted actress
          in Washington, DC who is one of
          the funniest people I’ve ever seen
          on stage.     
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
    •    Ron Megee, the actor who portrays
          Rue Rylvester, is a celebrated performer
          in Kansas City, Missouri where his
          recent portrayal of Joan Crawford
          played to sold-out houses.     
    •    Ben Weinberg, a multitalented young man – he’s a novelist and freelance film producer – who is series co-director and our videographer. Ben is intrepid too. He once tried out for "The Amazing Race" because he thought it was about the Jews.
 
    •    Gordon Binder, wise counselor and interpreter of the mysteries of climate politics.  For many years, Gordon has edited “ands” and “buts.  Doubtless, his last service to me will be fussing over the inscription on my tombstone. 
 
    •    Graham King, the voice of Dino, who masquerades as the co-owner of Balance Gyms in Washington, DC, but who actually is a stand-up comic waiting to be discovered.
 
    •    Jeff Church, Artistic Director of the Coterie Theater in Kansas City, Missouri, who functions as my very own personal dramaturge (if you don’t know what dramaturge means, look it up).
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Also, I wish to thank the following friends and collaborators who provided me with much valuable advice and criticism: Mark Crosby, Brendan Doyle, Karen Friedman, Ed Farha, Peter Harnik, John Hunting, Kori Kamradt, Cathy Lerza, Mike McCabe, Elaine Pofeldt, Greg Smith, and Mary Beth Wise.   
 
    •    Michael Rawson, puppeteer extraordinaire, who takes his
          charges seriously. In the course of these productions,
          Michael taught us all that animal puppets have rights
          just like anybody else.
 
    •    Glenn Pinder, co-producer of this series,
          designer of sets and props and, not
          incidentally, my domestic partner for 47 years.