Passacantando's career has taken him from Wall Street to philanthropy to a leading role in the global fight to stop climate change. He worked for Jude Wanniski -the "high priest" of supply side economics - and is a committed practitioner of non-violent civil disobedience as taught by Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King, Jr. He has a master's degree in economics from New York University, as well as a record of a dozen arrests for engaging in peaceful protest. He has been quoted in every major newspaper, appeared on most major news programs and has been a regular commentator on environmental issues for Fox News programs.

Passacantando just completed eight years as executive director of Greenpeace USA, the longest serving director in the history of the organization. In addition to select speaking engagements, Passacantando is now developing a series of business ventures under the theme From Crisis to Opportunity. He is also working on a book that explains the economic crisis to a lay audience while proposing the development of a modern economy that draws on the creative powers of citizens.

"In a world of falling trade and disintegrating confidence people have in large institutions from banks and oil companies to auto companies and utilities, some citizens have begun to build a new economic order. This new economy will break from the rigid 20th century model of global trade and rising debt levels that drove successive rounds of consumption, wars and ecological destruction. The new economy will instead build on regional connections, resilient food, water and energy sources, leveraging the most creative abilities of citizens, all built on a sustainable ecological base. It's happening now and it doesn't cost, it creates wealth."

Blog Entries by John Passacantando

Obama Punts on Copenhagen and Eisenhower Calls off Invasion at Normandy

1 Comments | Posted November 22, 2009 | 12:53 PM (EST)


Bill McKibben pulls it all together today in his Washington Post essay explaining what's at stake if President Obama sticks to his decision to let the coming climate meeting in Cophenhagen fail.

Try to re-imagine World War II in this context. Just before the invasion of Normandy, General Eisenhower...

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Fossil Fuel Companies Block Climate Treaty

6 Comments | Posted November 18, 2009 | 10:34 PM (EST)


The announcement by President Obama that the US would not seek a comprehensive climate deal at an upcoming global meeting in Copenhagen, Denmark next month is a gut punch to anyone who cares about the fate of the planet. A reading this past weekend of the elite press on this...

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Greenpeace to Add Obama to Mount Rushmore?

Posted July 8, 2009 | 03:01 PM (EST)


This is Greenpeace's message to President Obama today, while he meets at the G-8 summit, showing him the kind of historical moment he has in his hand, if only he will lead on global warming: http://www.greenpeace.org/usa/

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Geithner Bails Out Wall Street, Ignores Main Street

Posted March 24, 2009 | 11:47 AM (EST)


Last Laugh of the Financial Elites

Wall Street boomed yesterday, apparently driven by institutional investors who have been given the deal of their lifetimes by Treasury Secretary Geithner. Big investors will be able to buy toxic assets, created by the banks and AIG, with a 93% subsidy from the same...

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Corporate CEOs Look Like Hypocrites: Promise to Solve Global Warming, Give Money to Deniers

Posted March 20, 2009 | 10:32 AM (EST)


Some of the biggest polluters in the country sent a promising signal a few months back when they came together as the US Climate Action Partnership with a unified proposal to solve climate change. While it was weaker than scientists say it needs to be, and loose on just how...

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Joe Lieberman to Turn Climate Policy into Corporate Boondoggle

Posted March 16, 2009 | 07:36 PM (EST)


This is the story of how a plan to save the climate and jump start the economy will become a massive corporate welfare program if Congressional Democrats oppose their president and align with the likes of Joe Lieberman and the big business lobby.

We know that to avoid catastrophic...

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The Inevitable Solution to Climate Change

Posted March 5, 2009 | 06:13 PM (EST)


The challenges facing President Obama at the beginning of his term have been compared with challenges President Lincoln faced at the outset of the Civil War. Both were confronted with a nation divided between the desire to continue the ways of the past and the inevitable realities of the modern...

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