Connecting the Dots
Connecting the Dots: Reclaiming the Rule of Law
Chris Mancini, former U.S. DOJ prosecutor and host of the new audio series Connecting the Dots, offers a powerful chance to explore how law, power, justice, and corruption intersect—and how storytelling can help the public understand and act on systemic truths.
This series is ideally positioned to decode complexity and reveal how “the dots” between politics, corporate influence, climate, human rights, and economic injustice are all deeply connected.
Chris Mancini, Esq. Former U.S. DOJ Prosecutor, Southern District, Florida.
Chris is a criminal defense attorney with 45 years of extensive federal and state trial and grand jury practice in Miami, Palm Beach, Orlando and other courts across the nation and internationally. Born and raised in Rochester, New York and later to earn his juris doctor degree at Marquette U. in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, Chris Mancini arrived in Miami, Florida on assignment to the U.S. Attorney’s Office during the infamous period of the “Mariel Boat Lift” during which tens of thousands of Cubans fled their country to seek a new life in the U.S. As a U.S. prosecutor, Chris discovered that some of the most violent and dangerous men and women were allowed to immigrate during the boatlift. By 1986, he had been given many awards for his service and held the post of Deputy Chief of the Major Crimes Division, U.S. Attorney for the Miami office for the U.S. Department of Justice.
In the late 1990s, Chris began gathering original artefacts and materials about the history of crime in Miami and especially corruption within the Miami Police Department. He interviewed past and present police officers and those most deeply involved in the investigation. Using what he had gathered, Chris conducted a series of lectures every three to four months for members of the Miami-Dade Historical Society and that has led to his deep understanding of the organization and effects of the extensive history of crime in South Florida.
Chris Mancini is the author of two books, Pirates in Blue: The True Story of the Miami River Cops and Deliberate Indifference and has represented many famous clients.
In this episode of ‘Brighter’, Adam busts some of the myths on a particularly bad idea, the idea that ‘less’ – less energy, less transportation, less food, less labor – is a solution to our problems
Doing less cannot get us to net zero emissions. Degrowth doesn’t repair anything. And less economic productivity and less abundance only make solving climate change, and our other major problems, worse.
Adam’s book, ‘Brighter: Optimism, Progress, and the Future of Environmentalism” is available on Amazon https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0BNYC1GWY and as an audiobook on Amazon, Audible, and iTunes.
Visit the RethinkX Website:
This question, dominant in our society, harps on our economic system—capitalism. A driver of progress for centuries, capitalism has led to technological marvels and an increased quality of life. It’s easy to see the fruits of capitalism: the smartphone in your pocket, the car in your garage.
Although, there’s a darker side. Income inequality is rampant. A small fraction holds the majority of wealth. Consumerism equates happiness with possessions. Our natural resources are on the brink of exhaustion. From this perspective, we seem to be serving the system instead of it serving us.
Just as with capitalism, our environment raises a question: Is it a resource for exploitation or a sphere of life needing protection? Far from being a mere resource, our environment is a complex life system providing essentials—air, water, food. We’ve exploited it for our gains, forgetting its true worth. Forests have been chopped, rivers polluted, habitats destroyed—all in the name of progress. The environment has been treated as a mere resource.
The fallout is here: climate change, biodiversity loss, worsening pollution. These challenges arise from our disregard for the environment. Can we shift our perspective? Can we treat the environment as a sphere of life that demands respect and protection?
The question now is: Can we change our ways? Can we shift our perspective to see the environment for what it truly is—a precious sphere of life that demands respect and protection?
Imagine a world where communities decide their destiny, where nature is not just a resource but a living entity with rights.
Welcome to the Community Rights Movement—a powerful wave of change sweeping across the United States. This movement is about people taking power into their own hands, envisioning a new sustainability constitution, and adopting new laws at the local level. It’s about challenging the system that prioritizes corporate rights over the rights of communities and nature.
The Community Rights Movement is grounded in nonviolent civil disobedience, using municipal lawmaking to push for change. At its core, it aims to recognize and enforce the rights of nature and ecosystems. This isn’t a new concept but rather an ancient understanding traced back to Indigenous cultures.
For them, nature isn’t property to be owned but a living entity—a relative. The Anishinaabe, for example, speak of protecting the flying people, swimming people, and singing people. The Uru Nation regards the Cloth River as a living being, a relative. Contrast this with the Western perspective, where nature is seen as a commodity—a thing to be exploited. It hearkens back to the words of Sir Francis Bacon, who urged us to “torture nature on a rack to extract her secrets.”
The Community Rights Movement is challenging these outdated views, following the trail blazed by pioneers like Christopher Stone. In his seminal work *Should Trees Have Standing? Toward Legal Rights for Natural Objects*, Stone argued for conferring rights onto entities previously considered rightless.
So, where do we stand now?
We’re at a critical juncture. The future of our environment, our communities, and our very way of life hangs in the balance. The Community Rights Movement offers a different path—a path where nature’s rights are recognized, where communities have a say in their destiny, where the economic system serves us, not the other way around.
In conclusion, the Community Rights Movement is not just a movement but a necessary shift in perspective. It’s about empowering communities, recognizing the rights of nature, and challenging an economic system that has long prioritized profit over people and the planet. It’s about envisioning a world where sustainability, respect, and community are not just ideals but the foundation of our society.
A web of life for all life, inspired by the original network, nature. Powered by Passion. Empowered by Action. Mobilized by all of us.
