It's All About the Spin Baby. It's All About the Spin.

George Bush had included environmental concerns, as part of his 2000 election campaign, promising aggressive action to roll back carbon emissions.

Not long after being elected into office, his administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency, Christine Todd Whitman, announced: "This president is very sensitive to the issue of global warming.... There's no question but that global warming is a real phe­nomenon ...." (1)

I could have told the American people then that it was balderdash. Nonsense. Spin.

See, I live in Ontario and following politics, know who Christine Todd Whitman is. I should. She helped to inspire the neoconservative Common Sense Revolution of Mike Harris, that was indeed revolutionary, but totally lacking in sense, common or otherwise. It was just mean and short sighted.

But the Harris team worked with Republican strategist Mike Murphy, who had just come off a successful campaign for Whitman, as she became the freshly minted governor of New Jersey.

Whitman defeated a popular Democratic incumbent, Jim Florio, primarily on the basis of a Murphy-inspired campaign using a "common sense" slogan and pledging a 30 per cent tax cut. Since her victory, the activities of her government in implementing this plan had been carefully charted by Harris aide Bill King. In March 1994, Harris actually travelled to New Jersey to meet Whitman and discuss strategy. Two months later, the "Common Sense Revolution" with its 30 per cent tax cut was unveiled. (2)

You have to look at the big picture of neoconservatism. There are few traditional Republicans in the United States and few traditional Conservatives in Canada. Most are now part of a big tent. They move back and forth across the border, a border that they hope to soon erase, sharing strategy and war stories and feeding off each other.

Harper's Reform Party - Newt Gingrich

Reform Party- Mike Harris

Jason Kenney- Grover Norquist

Pierre Poilievre - Jim Sensenbrenner

Stephen Harper- George Bush, Frank Luntz, Art Finklestein (Nixon's former guru), etc., etc., etc.

There can be no Canadian sovereignty if neoconservatism has any chance of success. And we can have no environmental policy if it does succeed.

The Conservatives talk a good game, but simply using the right language is no guarantee that they will do what they say.

Bush's former treasury secretary, Paul O'Neill, had described ".. the threat of global warming as being equal to that of a nuclear holocaust. In 2001 a report from the nonpartisan National Acad­emy of Sciences concluded that carbon dioxide and other gases spewed from such man-made sources as factories, power plants, and motor vehicle exhaust pipes were indeed being trapped in the atmosphere and beginning to cause global warming. This study warned that global temperatures could rise anywhere from three to ten degrees Fahrenheit over the coming cen­tury, risking catastrophic damage around the globe." (1)

And yet Bush did more to reverse action to fight Global Warming than anyone before him. Stephen Harper now holds that dubious title, as he continues to sabotage any hopes of a binding international agreement.

So when WikiLeaks reveals that former environmental minister Jim Prentice, was "shocked" about how the world views the tar sands, I say"

Balderdash. Nonsense. Spin.

The gravity of Canada’s predicament first came clear to the respected cabinet minister during a trip to Bergen, Norway, where he attended a carbon capture and storage conference in late May, 2009. Norway, then in the run-up to a parliamentary election, was debating the involvement of government-owned Statoil in the Alberta oilsands, which had been deemed a source of “dirty oil.”

“As Prentice relayed it, the public sentiment in Norway shocked him and has heightened his awareness of the negative consequences to Canada’s historically ‘green’ standing on the world stage,” said a U.S. embassy cable that recounts the meeting.

This government knew full well how the world felt about the tar sands, and feigning ignorance just doesn't cut it. So when WikiLeaks also reveals that Prentice was going to "get tough" with the tar sands, I again say:

Balderdash. Nonsense. Spin.

Former environment minister Jim Prentice privately told U.S. Ambassador David Jacobson more than a year ago that he was prepared to impose new regulations on the oil sands if the industry and province did not improve their environmental performance, newly released Wikileaks documents reveal.

The WikiLeaks cable also hinted at "tensions between Prentice and Lisa Raitt. That's where the real story is. When the embarrassing tape of a conversation between Raitt and her aide, was made public, we discovered where Prentice's allegiances were:

Money earmarked to support wind energy producers was diverted to research and development in the oil patch in backroom budget wrangling, the minister of natural resources said in a conversation with an aide in January.Lisa Raitt told aide Jasmine MacDonnell that she suspects Environment Minister Jim Prentice took the money for wind power and redirected it to his Clean Energy Plan – a $1-billion fund for research and development in the oil sands.

The revelation is likely to intensify criticism of the government of Prime Minister Stephen Harper as unfriendly to the environment.Mr. Prentice is the MP for Calgary-Centre North, home to much of Canada's oil industry. (3)

Like the Bush Administration, the Harper government says the right things, but then does the polar opposite.

I for one am sick of being played. How about you?

Sources:

1. The Book on Bush: How George W. (mis) Leads America, By Eric Alterman and Mark Green, Penguin Books, 2004, ISBN: 0-670-03273-5, Pg. 13-14

2. Hard Right Turn: The New Face of Neo-Conservatism in Canada, Brooke Jeffrey, Harper-Collins, 1999, ISBN: 0-00 255762-2 4, Pg. 166

3. Wind money given to oil producers instead, Raitt tape suggests, By Stephen Maher, Chronicle Herald, June 10, 2009

Is the New Conservative Party Feeling the Seven Year Itch?

It happens in many marriages. After the first seven years, one or more of the partners starts feeling the urge to roam.

Apparently there is a little domestic trouble for the marriage of the Reform/Alliance and the Progressive Conservatives.

One of them has already opted out and another is being seduced.

Hubby Harper is too domineering and they're not going to take it anymore.

Or could it be that another has moved in and wants the wifies to go?

Harper's new chief of staff, Nigel Wright, a little jealous, has never cared for those progressive spouses. He once threatened violence stating that his "aim now is to drive a stake through the heart of the Tory party.”

Maybe Prentice and MacKay are doing the right thing, escaping with their lives. Not they hadn't been warned by some of those Tories in Wright's cross hairs: Joe Clark, Sinclair Stevens and Lowell Murray.

As Don Newman says:

...if the two most prominent Progressive Conservatives leave the government at the same time, it will really drive home the public perception — and the reality — that this government is really just the Reform/Alliance political machine. And Joe Clark, Sinclair Stevens and Lowell Murray will be right.

Touche!

Jim Prentice Wants to Leave While the Crowd's Still Cheering

With the announcement that Jim Prentice is leaving politics, the pundits are all in a spin. He was seen as the next leadership hopeful, and this will leave the doors open for other prospects.

But something Prentice said is quite compelling, invoking his father: "Leave while the crowd's still cheering".

Was it his own personal cheering that might stop or his party's. John Ivison is crowing that the Conservatives have already won the next election and Harper is going nowhere, but why would anyone assume that the Conservatives will win the next election?

Polls show another minority, but polls at this stage of the game mean very little, as history has shown. Paul Martin was "polled" to win a majority in 2004 and a minority in 2006. Neither of those things happen.

The Conservatives have a lot of baggage, especially Stephen Harper. These things are not on people's minds right now, but they will be during the next election campaign.

Two self-serving prorogations, the detainee issue, excessive spending, lobbying scandals, inaction on climate change, losing our UN security bid, just to name a few. He may find himself playing defense the next campaign, and he doesn't handle that well.

The other problem, is that many of Harper's moderates are leaving. Jim Prentice was PC as was Greg Thomson, who resigned as head of Veterans affairs because of Harper's abuse of veterans.

Chantel Hebert says that none of Harper's Quebec MPs get along, and with the ongoing Christian Paradis scandal, they can't be pleased.

Prentice, however, appears to be getting tired of being a cabinet minister, but having no power. Instead he takes direction from a "communications" team in the PMO, where only politics matter.

How many others are getting tired of this arrangement?

In Lawrence Martin's Harperland, he paints the picture of an angry man in the prime minister, who must control every aspect of the government. Dean Del Mastro claimed that he's even afraid that he might pick out the wrong tie and be chewed out for spoiling an image.

Who can work under those conditions?

Another thing that most Canadians now realize, is that Stephen Harper's conservatives are not a party in the centre, as he originally tried to portray them. They are definitely far right, and Prentice's exit helps to validate that.

This could help the Liberals, the only centre party left.

Is Prentice getting out while the party is still in power, having no desire to sit in opposition?

Harper's Cabinet Shuffle. James Travers May be on to Something

Harper's reputation as a brilliant strategist is unfounded but his reputation for vindictiveness is right on the money.

And so is his reputation for eliminating the competition. But not necessarily the competition from the other parties. He has Guy Giorno to do that. I'm talking about the competition from within his own caucus.

In a recent column James Travers refers to them as "crash test dummies".

What do Jim Prentice, Peter MacKay, Jim Flaherty, Tony Clement and Stockwell Day have in common?

They all challenged Harper's leadership.

But what else?

They were all left holding the bag when the you know what hit the fan. Travers only mentions two:

Tony Clement is just the latest to hit the wall in the Prime Minister’s place. Scan this summer’s scathing headlines and find the industry minister absorbing the twin shocks of runaway summit spending and public outrage over the willful destruction of the census. Before Clement it was poor Jim Prentice. Once seen as a potential and more progressive Harper successor, the environment minister is now wandering lost in the badlands that lie between international pressure for Canada to finally get serious about climate change and the domestic priority of protecting the oil sands.

Now with Flaherty things are a little different. Like Harper when he's questioned on the economy, like the sub-prime mortgages he bought on behalf of the Canadian taxpayer, he doesn't answer to us. He doesn't answer to anyone. He grins and changes the subject.

But he has friends in high places, like Nicole Eaton who tried to have Harper ousted two months before the 2006 election call. And Charles McVety, who has more power than most of the elected officials.

But then Flaherty never openly ran against Harper for the party leadership ... yet!

Peter MacKay hasn't really either. He planned on it but Harper bought him off by having someone pay off his 1/2 million dollars in debt. We still don't know who it was and Harper claims that we don't need to know. But it's always been understood that MacKay would probably be the next party leader. That was before Harper made him wear the Afghan Detainee scandal.

Jim Prentice was vying for the leadership and his name has been tossed around to succeed Harper. But that was before he was made to wear the climate change mess.

Then there's Tony Clement. While Nicole Eaton was pushing Flaherty, Mike Harris had Clement all polished up and ready to go. That was before Harper made him wear the census debacle.

And finally poor old Stockwell Day. The Alliance leadership got pretty ugly but some believe that Day may have given it one more kick at the can. But that was before Harper made him wear the "build it and they will come" prison nonsense.

Harper has closed in his little circle of allies, and in a bunker mentality, everyone outside that circle is the enemy. And he will not be taken alive.

Jim Prentice Has resorted to Lying to Prove That we Need Him

Since Guy Giorno's newest Omnibus Bill has abandoned any hope of this government having an environmental platform, I wondered if we still needed Jim Prentice. I mean what is his job now?

But not to worry.

Jimmy has invented a job by fabricating accolades, since clearly the big middle finger from most Canadians didn't convince him of the "job" he was doing.

Yesterday, Minister of the Environment Jim Prentice released a list of quotes from environmental groups supporting his pending proposal to overhaul heavy vehicle emission regulations. Followers of Canadian environmental politics might have been surprised to see an enthusiastic endorsement of the plan from the Sierra Club, an organization with a less than cordial relationship with the Harper government.

The Sierra Club of Canada's executive director, John Bennett, certainly was. "We didn't know anything about it," he said. "I got a call from Sun Media last night asking if the quotes were from us. I looked at them and they're not ours, they're quotes from the Sierra Club United States, they're over a year old, they don't refer to any event in Canada and they certainly don't represent anything we actually said."

Whoa! I just got a whiff!

Will the Reformers Bar Jean Chretien From Anniversary of Park he Helped to Create?

In yet another move to put partisanship above the common good, the Harperites appear to be excluding Jean Chretien from the anniversary celebrations for a park that he helped to create.

He might have created the national park near his hometown but Jean Chrétien shouldn’t necessarily count on an invitation to its 40th anniversary party. The Conservative government won’t offer any guarantees that the three-term former prime minister will be on the guest list for the anniversary event near Shawinigan.

Chrétien helped inaugurate Mauricie National Park in 1970, while he was still a young cabinet minister in Pierre Elliott Trudeau’s government. The birthday bash is scheduled for next month. Environment Minister Jim Prentice’s office can’t say for certain whether the Liberal prime minister will be invited. It says the event-planning is still in its initial stages. That the attendance of Shawinigan’s favourite son should even be in doubt has angered local supporters, who detect a Tory conspiracy afoot.

I'm sure residents will be thrilled that Jim "I don't have time to act on the environment because I'm too busy doing my hair" Prentice will be there.

Does Jim Prentice Still Have a Job Now That Harper Has Abandoned the Environment?

Months ago Stephen Harper stated that he was going to use the G20 to convince the world's wealthiest nations to abandon tackling climate change until the economy was improved.

Then he went on a spending spree.

Then he went on another spending spree.

Then he went on a two and a half month vacation costing millions.

Then he went on another spending spree.

And to address the oil spill Harper has hired oilmen and no scientists. He hates scientists.

BP disastrous blowout has prompted both Canada and the United States to review offshore oil and gas drilling, but the results could be dramatically different given the contrasting nature of the panels charged with charting a new course for the industry. While U.S. President Barack Obama has appointed a panel of prominent people with virtually no ties to the industry, Prime Minister Stephen Harper is relying for advice on the National Energy Board, many of whose board members come straight from the energy sector.

And he also has the Chamber of Commerce pushing to abandon action on climate change, like he needed a push.

Canada’s largest and most influential business organization has launched a lobbying campaign urging Canadian senators to kill legislation requiring the government to deliver a science-based plan to fight global warming and provide
regular reports on its progress.

A "science based" plan. Did I mention that Stephen Harper hates science?

But he least he got some pretty pictures.

Where Harper has come under increasing criticism is his environmental policy, or, his lack of commitment to any truly serious program to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. At the end of the day all the photo ops in the world with international leaders won't be able to compensate for a foreign policy which only satisfied Harper himself

So I don't know what Jim Prentice is doing. Maybe he's in charge of stocking "fake lake" with fake fish.

I guess all we can do is laugh.

It May Not be Environmentalists Who Shut Down the Tarsands But Investors

The trouble with having the most secretive government on the planet, and a media that nurtures it's secrecy; is that we have to read online papers from across the globe to discover what's happening in our own country.

I'm not a scientist or an investment specialist by any means. Just a curious old broad who had a light bulb moment.

And in that moment, the future of the tar sands flashed before my eyes.

It started with a story out of the UK, covered by the Bloomberg Press:

BP Shareholders Protest Canadian Oil Sands Project
By Fred Pals
Feb. 8, 2010

BP Plc shareholders put a resolution to the annual meeting on April 15 for a review of the risks of the company’s Canadian oil sands project, following a similar protest against competitor Royal Dutch Shell Plc.

A coalition of investors requested the review in a resolution to BP’s annual meeting, FairPensions, the campaign’s coordinator, said in a statement today. The risks include increased carbon costs and reputational damage from environmental damage, according to London-based FairPensions, which represents unions, charities and faith groups.

“There’s now a growing group of investors who are questioning the wisdom of BP’s apparent move from ‘Beyond Petroleum’ to ‘Back to Petroleum’, which these resolutions illustrate,” Louise Rouse, director of Investor Engagement at FairPensions, said in the statement. “Investors are learning from recent shocks that it is in their interest to act as responsible owners.”

About 140 investors back the resolution, according to Duncan Exley, a director at FairPensions. The amount of shares held wasn’t provided.

FairPensions is a blanket organization that works with investors, faith groups and NGOs to ensure that pension dollars go to fund responsible investments.

While growing a nest egg for your retirement, your pension savings could also be paying for environmental destruction, illegal arms sales or the exploitation of workers. That's because the money you pay into your pension fund each month may be invested in businesses with irresponsible practices.

It's interesting to note that KAIROS, one of the first victims of this government's axe, also protested the Tarsands as it related to the future of humanity. They worked in countries being hit the hardest as a result of global warming. But as soon as you bring up the 'humane' word, it becomes a catalyst to the Harper regime and you knew their fate was sealed.

But even worse, they once questioned Israel's possible complicity in war crimes, something that even many Israelis are questioning. Jason Kenney pulled out his old testament, went into a trance, started speaking in tongues and POOF, they were gone.

This brings me to a recent article in the Toronto Star, again about future western investment in the Tarsands:

2 U.S. firms wash hands of tar sands
February 10, 2010
By Mitch Potter Washington Bureau

WASHINGTON-Canada’s controversial tar sands industry took its first retail blow Wednesday as two Fortune 500 companies announced plans to eliminate the high-carbon Alberta fuel from its supply chain.

Are we detecting a trend as investors start to pull out of the project, not because of environmental concerns so much as the cost of cleaning up the oil to meet environmental standards? Perhaps.

Is this why Jim Prentice announced that we are lowering our targets even further and is hinting at an exemption for Alberta?

But what if none of that works, and more and more cautious investors refuse to throw good money at a project with questionable returns? Stephen Harper did promise $800,000,000 of our money for carbon capture, but many people know that's a farce.

We now have to go to Hong Kong for the next stage of the story:

SEOUL/HONG KONG
Korean Oil puts Canada on its radar
Miyoung Kim and Joseph Chaney
RTGAM

SEOUL/HONG KONG - Korea National Oil Corp (KNOC), sitting on a multi-billion-dollar warchest, is setting its sights on Canada as the state-owned company aims to ramp up production and catch up to Asian rivals.

Seoul said this month that cashed-up KNOC will spend $6.5-billion (U.S.) on M&A in 2010 in an effort to cut South Korea's almost total dependence on imported oil.

That goal will put the company in direct competition with Asian energy giants such as PetroChina, Malaysia's Petronas, and India's ONGC.

KNOC may be eyeing assets offered by such Canadian companies as its top oil firm Suncor Energy, No.2 independent petroleum producer, EnCana Corp. and No.3 independent oil explorer Talisman Energy.

In addition, Canadian oil sands company Opti Canada and its peer Nexen Inc. are seen as potential acquisition targets. Their shares moved up as recently as late last year on speculation of bids from Chinese energy giants. So far, no public offers have emerged.

Foreign owned, foreign controlled, and propped up with Canadian tax dollars. Gotta' love neoconservatism.

But why would Korea be willing to invest in a project with a questionable future, because of environmental concerns?

Drum roll please ...

Back to Bloomberg Press

Harper Says Global Recovery Must Precede Environment
By Rob Delaney

Dec. 7 (Bloomberg) -- Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper said he will use Canada’s co-chairmanship of next year’s Group of 20 countries meeting to urge members to put economic recovery before efforts to protect the environment.

“Without the wealth that comes from growth, the environmental threats, the developmental challenges and the peace and security issues facing the world will be exponentially more difficult to deal with,” Harper said in an address to South Korea’s National Assembly.

So where will we find the next bit of news on what's happening in Canada? Maybe I'll check out the Timbuktu Gazette.

Stephen Harper Turns His Back on Women and Civilization

So while our dictator tried to tell us with a straight face that he was a born-again human being, who would be putting women's issues front and centre; his actions and those of his party suggested otherwise. It was the same old, same old.

Destroy Canadian sovereignty while padding the pockets of the Corporate elite.

Gorrie: An environment policy that hurts women
February 6, 2010
By Peter Gorrie Environment Columnist

Prime Minister Stephen Harper says he wants to save the most vulnerable people on Earth. "As president of the G8 in 2010, Canada will champion a major initiative to improve the health of women and children in the world's poorest regions," Harper said in a recent opinion article in this newspaper.

Some 500,000 women die in pregnancy or childbirth every year, and 9 million kids die before their 5th birthday, he wrote. "Far too many lives and unexplored futures have already been lost for want of relatively simple health-care solutions." ... If Harper were serious about his new campaign, he'd put Canada in the lead on climate change rather than keep us a laggard. He'd make that policy part of a coherent effort to change the conditions that condemn so many women and children to desperate, short lives.

"We don't see them connecting the dots," Fox says. Worse, they act as if the dots don't even exist.

And if you're going to work to destroy civilization, you might as well threaten our national unity while you're at it.

Quebec tailpipe law is 'folly,' Tories say
Quebec points out that it is not acting alone
By Mike De Souza,
Canwest News Service
February 3, 2010

The Harper government defended its criticism of Quebec's climate change plan on Tuesday, but was unable to produce evidence to back its warnings of catastrophic economic consequences from the province's crackdown on pollution from cars. Environment Minister Jim Prentice told a Calgary audience in a prepared speech this week that Quebec's new tailpipe standards for new vehicles would drive up prices by as much as $5,000, prompting accusations that the government was fearmongering ....

Going Green: Let's Talk Climate Change

As Rick Mercer suggested recently, Stephen Harper's idea of going green is turning his caucus into potted plants.

But in the meantime, just like the Afghan detainee issue and the lobbying scandal that have been put on hold; climate change and what our government plans to do about it, is also off the table for now.

But I'm afraid waiting for this government to do something, will be a very long wait.

While keeping our own media on a 'need to know, but they don't need to know much', basis; he told Bloomberg's when he was in Korea that he will “…use Canada’s co-chairmanship of next year’s Group of 20 countries meeting to urge members to put economic recovery before efforts to protect the environment.”

So where does that leave us?

The other parties want action now. Elizabeth May, as we know, is an expert on the issue. Jack Layton, though he made me angry when he campaigned against the Green Shift, is now ready to accept a carbon tax; and the Liberals new environmental platform is being lauded by climate scientists. All this while Stevie is sabotaging any negotiations.

The Montreal thinkers conference, scheduled for March will include many experts in the field, and will help the Liberal Party expand and fine tune their environmental platform.

Climate change a problem in desperate need of leadership
The Liberals would stand out by presenting clear environmental policies to Canadians
January 21, 2010
Désirée McGraw CO-FOUNDER OF LIBERAL RENAISSANCE

It is now an accepted fact here in Canada and around the world that our country has gone from being an environmental leader under former prime minister Brian Mulroney to a laggard under the Liberals – and now a pariah under the Stephen Harper government.

The recent UN climate change conference in Copenhagen made this even more painfully clear as we were given the dubious Fossil of the Year award for the third straight time and dubbed a "corrupt petro-state."

Copenhagen demonstrated an important shift in global geopolitics with emerging powers China, India and Brazil at the main table along with the U.S., while Canada was not even in the room. This is not surprising given Canada's failure to address the most important issue of our time: climate change.

Canada is the only country to have ratified the Kyoto Protocol and then to wear its refusal to meet our international obligations under the agreement like a badge of honour. At first, the Harper government claimed we needed a "made-in-Canada" climate change plan (as if Kyoto precluded one when in fact it compelled one) and now it claims it cannot produce a Canadian plan without an international agreement in place. This hypocrisy undermines our credibility regarding environmental issues, but also other areas of international affairs, particularly as global warming affects the global economy and global security as well as the environment.

Canadians get it. A new survey commissioned by the Canadian Defence and Foreign Affairs Institute found that Canadians believe climate change poses a significantly bigger threat to the "vital interests" of this country over the next decade than international terrorism.

Some provinces have responded to these concerns by putting their own plans in place to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. This patchwork approach has pitted regions of Canada – particularly oil-producing Alberta and hydropower giant Quebec – against each other and has created great uncertainty for business.

This national leadership vacuum represents a real opportunity for the Liberal Party of Canada – provided it can get beyond its own uneven record on climate change.

Under the Jean Chrétien government, Canada signed the Kyoto Protocol in 1997 and then ratified it in 2002. The intervening five years of "consultations" were largely a wasted period of procrastination, equivocation and outright obstruction by the official Opposition.

The Liberals were strong on rhetoric and weak on action, as Chrétien adviser Eddie Goldenberg admitted in his book when he stated that the then-prime minister signed Kyoto essentially as a PR exercise. It was not until 2005 that a plan took shape under Paul Martin with Stéphane Dion as environment minister. This plan ("Project Green) was quickly discarded by the new Conservative government. Four years after their election, the Conservatives still lack a credible plan of their own.

This summer's meetings of the G8 and, in particular, the G20 – which comprise the world's major greenhouse gas emitters among both industrialized and developing countries – represent an opportunity for Canada to get global climate change negotiations back on track and, in so doing, reclaim our leadership on this critical issue. Although Canada will play host, the Conservative government is unlikely to take up this challenge because it does not want climate change on the agenda.

In anticipation of the G20 – itself the brainchild of former prime minister Paul Martin – the Liberals should present clear and compelling environmental policies to Canadians. This can be achieved by stating that Canada under a Liberal government would rejoin the international community and show leadership by working with G20 countries in forging a credible agreement on climate change.

Furthermore, a Liberal government would work with industry and the provinces to put real measures in place to reduce emissions. The Liberal party recently pledged to invest in green technologies, creating sustainable jobs for the future.

In contrast, the government's recent stimulus package missed a critical opportunity to make these investments (with Canada coming in second to last among countries that used stimulus funding to green their economies), while the EU and China made the most of theirs and the U.S. recently announced $2.3 billion in tax credits for clean energy technology development.

The goal should be clear: making Canada a green energy superpower. The Liberals have announced that they would use this period of parliamentary prorogation to consult on the economy as well as the environment. But Canada is well past the point of consulting on a climate change plan. The challenge now is to create buy-in from Canadians not for mere aspirations but for real action – starting with putting a price on carbon through cap-and-trade and taxing pollution.

The Green Shift fiasco of the 2008 election was rooted mainly in the Liberals' failure to communicate what should have been a straightforward policy: tax more of what you burn, less of what you earn.

The Liberal party must show Canadians that it can muster the massive political will and resources to successfully tackle seemingly intractable problems. The fiscal deficit of the 1990s provides a compelling case in point. The rationale presented was short-term pain for long-term gain – it would be irresponsible to leave such a burden on future generations.

The same logic applies not only to the ballooning fiscal debt, but to the ecological one. If Canada can mobilize around the fiscal deficit, surely we can make headway on the environmental deficit.

Désirée McGraw chaired the 2006 Liberal Renewal Commission's Taskforce on Environment and Sustainable Development. She is co-founder of Al Gore's Climate Project in Canada and lectures in international development and climate diplomacy at McGill University.

Jim Prentice and John Baird Team up to Create a Possible Nightmare

I posted before about two environmental groups who were taking the government to court because they decided without consent from Parliament to forgo environmental assessments on new projects.

As I stated then, '... many people will say that they were being forced to get the money out the door as soon as possible, so didn't have time for any studies. However, they spent a great deal of time studying how they could direct the stimulus money into improving their political fortunes, while ignoring any notion that the money should go to communities who suffered a greater impact from the downturn.'

Now we learn that the environmental assessment panel has not even met since 2008, and even then conducted no business, so it's pretty clear that that this government has no intention of doing any assessments at all.

And since it would appear that the Canada Action Plan was little more than a PR campaign, by leaving the study to the provinces, if projects get turned down, they will have someone to blame.

They produced the big cardboard cheques and demanded the provinces and municipalities erect huge and expensive signs in their honour. Their job was done.

Tories have ignored environmental assessment panel, member says
By Mike De Souza,
Canwest News Service
January 3, 2010

OTTAWA - A federal panel that advises the government on the environmental impact of new economic development has been left on the sidelines for nearly two years, Canwest News Service has learned. Throughout this time, sweeping changes to regulations have been passed, effectively exempting thousands of projects from mandatory evaluations. `We haven't had any notice that the minister has dissolved the committee, but it's kind of awkward to have a committee that doesn't meet,'' said Gary Schneider, who sits on the panel.

Schneider, the co-chairman of the Environmental Coalition of Prince Edward Island, said the last meeting of the Regulatory Advisory Committee was in the spring of 2008. But, he said, no consultations were held with the panel in 2009, as the government introduced a series of exemptions for new infrastructure projects ...

Copenhagen Was "a Triumph of Spin Over Substance" and Earned Canada Colossal Fossil Honours

You wouldn't know it by reading some of the Canadian newspaper accounts, but Copenhagen was a bust.

Canada was made a laughing stock, earning the title of Colossal Fossil for receiving the most fossil awards throughout the conference.

Harper, the big dummy above, showed up in Copenhagen with a dozen or more oil tycoons, that he called "advisers" so that the Canadian taxpayer would be bilked for the little vacation.

He never spoke and was not even invited to the meeting that Obama arranged for world leaders. I guess that says it all, that Canada is no longer thought of as a leader in anything, except ridicule.

But for simply signing his name, Harper is now the conquering hero. What a farce. This is the billboard that greeted people attending the conference.



Young Liberal Miranda Hussey attended the event and had this to day:

Well in the late hours of last night the leaders finally came to an "agreement" that basically says a whole lot of nothing. It's hard to come away from here thinking that the conference was anything other than a failure.

It was very striking to me when I spoke to people and they found out I was from Canada. In the past when I've traveled abroad I've never heard anything but good things when people find out I'm Canadian, here it was a mark of shame. All week I heard variations on the phrase, "why isn't Canada doing anything to fix climate change, I thought you guys cared?". Over and over I had to explain that most of us did care, but the problem was our Prime Minister didn't.

Obama also taking some heat. The difference is that he tried but the House has tied his hands. With Harper, he didn't try and didn't care, but has managed to tie the hands of the House.

The EU Sunday Times
December 20, 2009
Barack Obama’s climate deal unravels at last moment
Jonathan Leake, Environment Editor

The United Nations climate change conference ended in recrimination yesterday without reaching a clear deal on emissions targets.

After a stormy session in Copenhagen, in which a vociferous anti-American minority brought the talks close to collapse, most countries agreed simply to “take note” of a watered-down agreement brokered by President Barack Obama and supported by Britain.

This accord — which had been drawn up in discussions with China and 30 or so other countries on Friday — sets a target of limiting global warming to a maximum of 2C above pre-industrial times.

Above this temperature, scientists say, the world would start to experience dangerous changes, including floods, droughts and rising seas.

Critics pointed out, however, that the agreement failed to say how this limit on rising temperatures would be achieved. It pushed into the future decisions on core problems such as emissions cuts, and did not specify where a proposed $100 billion (£62 billion) in annual aid for developing nations would come from.

Yvo de Boer, the head of the UN climate change secretariat, called it “basically a letter of intent ... the ingredients of an architecture that can respond to the long-term challenge of climate change”.

Jeremy Hobbs, executive director of Oxfam International, dismissed it as “a triumph of spin over substance. It recognises the need to keep warming below 2C but does not commit to do so. It kicks back the big decisions on emissions cuts and fudges the issue of climate cash”.

The deal was denounced when put early yesterday to a plenary session of the conference after Obama and other heads of state had flown home.

Stephen Harper a 'Shouldn't Have Shown' at Copenhagen

Well he made it folks. Our prime minister descended on Copenhagen with all the fury of a fly in your ointment. It lands, you remove it, then cover your wounds.

Photo-ops and a lovely dinner. I am so proud.

Too busy or bored to speak to the crowd, he let 'Jimmy do nothing' take over, who delivered such an impassioned speech that one of the six people in the audience actually managed to stay awake. We won't tell Jimmy that it was because the man had just taken his Viagra and was waiting for his wife. We'll let him think that smile was for him.

Looks like the whole thing was a complete waste of time.

PM keeps low profile at UN climate talks
While some 57 world leaders took to the podium, the job of delivering Ottawa's view left to minister
Allan Woods Ottawa Bureau
December 18, 2009

COPENHAGEN–Prime Minister Stephen Harper stepped onto the biggest world stage in recent history Thursday and ducked.

The parade to the podium of international leaders was long, and the speeches were longer: Kevin Rudd from Australia, Gordon Brown from Britain, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad from Iran, Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva from Brazil, Angela Merkel from Germany, Nicolas Sarkozy from France.

Fifty-seven heads of state or government in all came to the podium at the Bella Center, where the climate talks are rapidly unfolding. All came with grand pledges exhorting other countries to do more, to go further, to secure a strong and ambitious deal that will limit the earth's temperature rise.

But Canada delivered a nine-paragraph speech that was literally indistinguishable from the lines the Conservative government has been repeating for months leading up to this climate conference.

And the words came not from Harper but from Jim Prentice, the Tory environment minister who has been leading Canada in Copenhagen since his arrival at the start of the week.

Harper opted instead for a fancy gala dinner hosted by the queen of Denmark. While he supped, Prentice spoke, though his midnight time slot assured that not many were listening.

While Prentice spoke for 3 1/2 minutes, Saudi Arabia's petroleum minister, Ali Ibrahim Al Naimi, spoke for roughly six minutes, and talked about his kingdom's desire to become not just an oil producer, but a clean energy giant in the world, particularly of solar power.

Prentice, meanwhile, slipped in a few lines about Canada's vast energy resources and land mass that were not included in an advance copy of the speech handed to reporters, who had mostly left by the time Prentice took to the podium.

He told the world not of the Canadian Arctic, where the permafrost is thawing and seas threaten to swallow up villages whole; and not of salmon stocks that mysteriously disappeared in British Columbia.

"Canada's broad-based actions to address climate change take into account our large diverse land mass, our growing population and the importance of our energy sector for meeting global demand," Prentice told the near-empty hall.

He added that Canadians share a "profound interest" in contributing to the fight against climate change and that the government will contribute its "fair share" toward a financial package that is integral to closing any deal here.

Canada's low profile reflects the Tory government's profound lack of interest on an issue that has drawn 119 world leaders to the Danish capital, said NDP Leader Jack Layton.

"We're concerned that ... we're not hearing the level of engagement and commitment that we're hearing from some other countries and I believe that the vast majority of Canadians would like to see us more engaged."

If Harper and Prentice are not more engaged, it may be because they already appear to have lost the key battle they came here to wage.

The government playbook for this conference included putting the Kyoto Protocol to rest and signing a new treaty that includes the U.S. and all other major emitters of greenhouse gases.

Jean Chrétien's Liberal government signed the pact in 1997, and now emissions are some 30 per cent above the target Canada was supposed to meet.

One of the side-effects of what appears to be a watered-down deal emerging here is the continuation of the world's first emissions regime, flawed though it may be.

Stephen Harper Wins Award For Lying to the Canadian People

If Stephen Harper won an award everytime he lied to the Canadian people he'd need an awfully big trophy case.

But Canada won yet another fossil award in Copenhagen after documents were leaked, revealing that our government has been lying to us.

And we need a leak to tell us that?

Apparently Jack Layton is in Copenhagen but having trouble getting into the venue.

Harper Government Has Been Funding Climate Change Deniers With Our Money

It's not bad enough that we're the laughing stock at Copenhagen, but CBC has just learned that the Harper Government has been funding climate change deniers. I knew that they had appointed deniers to the science board and hired a speech writer that has also been very vocal on the subject, but this is too much.

This group also denies the threat of asbestos. My brother-in-law died of Asbestosis, and it is horrible.

Climate-change skeptics gain from Ottawa funding
December 15, 2009
The Canadian Press

The federal government has been funding an asbestos lobby group that promotes the work of prominent climate-change skeptics.

The revelation comes as Canada's delegation struggles to avoid being cast as the villain at the Copenhagen climate conference, and environmentalists are urging the government to stop financing the group.

On its website, the Chrysotile Institute promotes a chapter that it says debunks the asbestos health-risk hoax from the 2007 book Scared to Death – From BSE to Global Warming: Why Scares Are Costing Us the Earth.

Ottawa has been frequently knocked by opponents for cutting cash to organizations that believe in fighting climate change.

But Chrysotile Institute president Clement Godbout said Monday that his organization — which has received more than $20 million over two decades — actually has no position about the book's chapter on climate change.

He said his group is only promoting the book for outlining how the science of asbestos, and its potential health risks, have been systematically exaggerated by the "anti-asbestos lobby."

"We've never said a word about climate change — we have a mandate on chrysotile [the type of asbestos mined in Quebec] and we take care of that," Godbout said when asked why his website refers to the bestseller by noted British newspaper columnist Christopher Booker and co-author Richard North.

"We haven't studied this dossier … Booker says what he says, I have no comment on that."

Climate change groups lose funding.

But this case is only the latest of many funding spats involving the federal government and climate change.

Earlier this month, a church-based group that conducts human rights and environmental work said the federal government chopped its funding for overseas projects without warning.

A week before the cut, members of Kairos had told officials from the four main political parties that Ottawa needed to do more about climate change and called for a halt to new oilsands projects.

"The government has cut funding to a lead organization that's been doing very constructive work around addressing climate change," said Kathleen Ruff, a senior adviser with the Rideau Insitute and a vocal opponent of the asbestos industry. "And at the same time it's funding an organization that promotes one of the world's leading climate-change deniers.

"I think the world is becoming more and more aware that Canada is a threat to progress on environmental issues."

Ruff and the Sierra Club of Canada are now urging the government to stop funding the Chrysotile Institute, which has received funding from the federal government since 1984.

Sierra director John Bennett said Canadian taxpayers are financing an organization that promotes bad science.

"It's part of the disinformation campaign that industry employs when the world discovers that what they do is damaging to public health or the environment," he said Monday. "In the book, clearly, climate change is a hoax, asbestos is a hoax, [but] the science is quite clear: neither of those things are hoaxes."

Asbestos debate sensitive

The debate over asbestos is sensitive in Quebec, the only province in which the mineral is still mined.

There has also been little political opposition on chrysotile, once hailed as the "magic mineral" before numerous studies linked it to health hazards, including cancer.

Public Works Minister Christian Paradis, the Conservatives' Quebec lieutenant, represents the only riding where it is still mined.

Despite public pleas from more than a dozen Canadian scientists and physicians who say chrysotile is dangerous, Canada still exports the substance to several countries, especially poorer ones.

"In the industrialized world, only Canada is promoting asbestos for continued use — everywhere else in the world, except for developing countries, it's banned," Bennett said.

But Godbout insists that chrysotile is safer than the type of asbestos mined decades ago and he praises the authors for pointing out the differences.

"Their book's purpose is to tell the inside story of many of the major 'scares' which have been given obsessive media coverage in recent years, from the millennium bug to bird flu, from lead in petrol to man-made climate change," reads part of a statement on the Chrysotile Institute's website, which includes the book's price and information on how to buy a copy.

"As the authors show, each of these scares has followed a consistent pattern. They centre on some supposed threat to human health or well-being based on seemingly plausible scientific claims which eventually turn out to have been vastly exaggerated or wholly mistaken — but which in the meantime have cost Western economies astronomic sums, amounting to hundreds of billions of dollars."

As part of its mandate, the Chrysotile Institute educates industry and foreign governments about work practices and standards on how to use the product safely.

In an email, Natural Resources Canada said it continues to fund the Chrysotile Institute because it "provides information to governments, industry, unions, media and the general public in more than 60 countries explaining the risks associated with the handling of chrysotile fibres."

Canada's Shame is Going Global. Jim Prentice Must be Detained in Afghanistan

One more reason why we must not allow Harper to prorogue Parliament again, is how he and his party are handling climate change. Everything is secret and when secrets are revealed, things are worse than we first anticipated.

They continue to embarrass us and have made Canada a laughing stock. It's no wonder they're slipping in the polls. Let's grease up those polls and slide them to the bottom. Stephen Harper has got to go.

The group that set out to expose little 'Jimmy do nothing', has gone public. They are my heroes. Keep up the pressure guys. The Canadian people are being held hostage and we need your help.

December 15, 2009 8:14 AM
Meet the merry climate pranksters who put Canada on the spot
Jane Taber

1. Hoax explained. The Yes Men called this morning from Denmark; they’re the merry band of anti-globalization and environmental pranksters who wreaked havoc on the Copenhagen climate conference yesterday, badly embarrassing Canada.

Although they are American, they say about five or six Canadian activists were involved in their prank but The Yes Men are refusing to identify them. “They have chosen to remain a bit under the radar,” said one of the group members. ...

2. Corridor chatter. Green Party Leader Elizabeth May is at the conference reporting to us that Canada is suggesting even weaker targets. “Does not make us look good,” she wrote in an email this morning.

However, she said that the Ontario Environment Minister John Gerretsen is holding a press conference today: “The role of the provinces continues to keep at least some ‘bright spots’ for Canada.” The provinces, such as Quebec and Ontario, have proposed ambitious reduction targets.

If Dimitri Soudas Stopped Talking it Would Help Reduce Our Toxic Emissions

So little Dimmy Witty is at it again, making a complete ass of himself. After the hoax perpetrated on Jim Prentice, little Dimmy tried to accuse Steven Guilbeault, founder of Equiterre; of trying to make his government look stupid.

News Flash, Dimmy. Too late.

And then when 'Jimmy do nothing' tried to selvage his reputation with photo-ops of his smugness next to his U.S. counterparts, they said no way. I can't imagine any delegates from any other country wanting to have their picture taken with Canada.

We are a laughing stock.

Prankster group Yes Men take credit for Canada climate hoax
Kelly Cryderman,
Canwest News Service
December 14, 2009

COPENHAGEN -- The federal government was stung on Monday by a sophisticated hoax that made it appear the Canadian delegation had publicly committed to bold emission reduction targets and tens of billions in new aid to help African nations.

An American social advocacy group told media organizations they were responsible for the fake news releases that set Canadians at the Copenhagen climate conference abuzz late on Monday.

Activists calling themselves the Yes Men said they sent out an initial phoney news release, which laid out the supposed new Canadian targets and action plan.

That email was followed by others, one of which appeared to be a government indictment of the first hoax -- which stated Canada's standing with the international business community had been damaged, and the Canadian government would "seek the full measure of legal recourse against these criminals under Danish and international law."

Another hoax news release had the Ugandan delegation at the international climate change talks reacting with elation to Canada's news.

The news releases were posted on a fake Environment Canada website, and the first appeared on real-looking, but bogus, Wall Street Journal and United Nations Conference of the Party sites.

Falsely quoting federal Environment Minister Jim Prentice, the first hoax release said the Canadian government is setting binding emissions reductions targets of 40% below 1990 levels by 2020 and at least 80% by 2050. The release said that is "in line with the recommendations of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and approaching the levels demanded by the African Group."

The release also committed Canada to eventually spending up to 5% of its Gross Domestic Product to help developing countries adapt to climate change and develop alternative energy sources.

The bogus news release said Canada would send Africa $13-billion in 2010, the first year of the commitment period.

In reality, Canada is still committed to reducing greenhouse gases by 20% below 2006 levels by 2020. And Ottawa has not yet made any firm funding commitment to developing countries.

Every day of the conference, which runs Dec. 7-18, Ottawa has been lambasted for not setting more ambitious targets and failing to meet Kyoto Protocol obligations.

Speaking to reporters on Monday, Mr. Prentice dismissed the hoax.

"My focus is the negotiations," the minister said. "Certainly there are many things going on the periphery of those negotiations, and you know, some of them are undesirable. And there are other things that will continue to happen that will be undesirable, including press releases that are a hoax."

The hoax also led to a heated dispute between government spokesman Dimitri Soudas and Equiterre founder Steven Guilbeault, a climate change activist who Mr. Soudas accused of being the source of the hoax.

Mr. Guilbeault maintains he had nothing to do with it.

"I have nothing to hide," he said, adding he has been up front with his view that Canada has weak climate change policies. He has demanded an apology from the government.

Soudas responded to the hoax in an e-mail, saying "more time should be dedicated to playing a constructive role instead of childish pranks."

Gerald Butts, president and CEO of World Wildlife Fund Canada, said the hoax is not a tactic he would endorse, but it's one that made him laugh.

"It's going to be pretty effective in pointing out what a gap there is between what the government is putting on the table and what people want," Mr. Butts said.

Speaking later in the day, Mr. Guilbeault said he is also offended because the Canadian government accused him of being unpatriotic, due to his criticism of its policies.

"It's scandalous," said Guilbeault. "It seems like we've lost freedom of speech in Canada."

Back to - The Dimitri Soudas Story: And We Pay This Man a Salary, Why?

U.S. Refuses to Have Photo Taken With Jim Prentice

News from Copenhagen is that Jim Prentice combed his hair and slicked himself up, ready for a photo-op with the United States delegates. But apparently the U.S. was not too interested with being seen in public with the worst environmental minister in the world.

Boy, Obama snubs Harper and keeps him out of the loop with his plans for Afghanistan. They tell us to get our own climate policy and refuse to be seen in public with us. Not looking good.

And the hoax perpetrated on Jim Prentice, must really have him in a flap. I think I even saw a hair out of place.

Decemeber 14, 2009
U.S. snubs Canada

Canadian Environment Minister Jim Prentice just finished his press conference and he dismissed the hoax press releases, saying "I am here to negotiate." The Minister's press people distributed a release for a photo-op of U.S. Energy Secretary Steven Chu and Prentice to occur shortly after the press conference, outside of the offices of the U.S. delegation.

I showed up there and noticed Steve Kelly, Prentice's chief of staff, having a raised voice exchange with a member from the U.S. delegation. The problem was the U.S. delegation hadn't given the green light for a photo-op, just for closed bilateral meeting between the two.

Over the course of 10 minutes, Kelly repeatedly asked the U.S. delegation official to reconsider, to which the U.S. delegation official replied, negative. When Kelly asked for this to be taken up the chain of command, the U.S. delegation official replied "it came from pretty high up. It's not going to happen."

The U.S. official said he didn't understand why the photograph was so important, to which Kelly replied "we were carpetbagged this morning by (environmental non-governmental organizations) with a false press release, I gotta change the story."

A second U.S. official showed up and was able to get permissions for a compromise, which was no public photo-op, but an official Canadian photographer could enter the meeting to take a shot."

It makes you wonder when the U.S. Secretary of Energy is embarrassed to have a public photograph taken with the Canadian Minister of the Environment.

Canada Wins Top Environmental Award. Yeah! Wait a Minute .. What's a 'Fossil' Award?

With Harper promising one thing and doing the exact opposite, Canada continues to be an embarrassment; not only at Copenhagen, but around the world; as we are seen as the new Bush Administration.

There is a great op-ed piece in the Globe and Mail by Eric Reguly, that outlines just how the Harper government is handling our environmental policy, or lack thereof.

Ottawa plays foul with number game
Canada's emissions have been soaring and it's easier to cut from a high level than a low level
Eric Reguly
December 11, 2009

The Harper Conservatives like to think they have healthy, hands-off approach to business: Let the markets weed out the good from the bad. It's a nice philosophy.

It's also one that's conveniently ignored by the Tories when they see fit. Case in point: At the stroke of a pen in the lead-up to the Copenhagen summit on climate change, the government's fiddling with one number, and one number only, instantly created a new list of potential industrial winners and losers.

The number in question is 1990 - the base year for reporting carbon emissions under the Kyoto Protocol. The government changed to 2006, to serve as the new base year for any post-Kyoto treaty. When Canada drones on about its pledge to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 20 per cent by 2020 - an impressive figure, it seems - it's talking about a 20-per-cent reduction from three years ago, not 19 years ago. Canada's emissions have been soaring and it's easier to cut from a high level than a low level.

Leaving aside the dubious morality of the date switch, the 2006 base year has thrust a wedge into industrial Canada. On one side are the industries whose emissions have been shooting up in recent years. No prize for guessing that this group would include the oil sands and the power generation companies. The 2006 base year is a godsend for them; if they had to cut 20 per cent from the 1990 level, they'd file for bankruptcy tomorrow.

On the other side are the chumps who made most of their efficiency gains before 2006. They know there is truth in the saying: No good deed goes unpunished.

This group would include the pulp and paper companies, the chemical companies, some refineries and a few manufacturers. At the time, they weren't concerned so much about preventing the planet from burning alive; they were responding to brutal domestic and international competition.

The pleasant byproduct of their efficiency and automation campaigns was lower energy use, which saved money and translated into lower emissions. The Forest Products Association of Canada claims its pulp and paper members have brought down emissions by 57 per cent since 1990, equivalent to 10 times Canada's (unmet) Kyoto targets.

Now look what's happened. Harper & Co. rolled into town and realized Canada couldn't possibly meet its Kyoto target - in fact, emissions climbed 26 per cent between 1990 and 2007. So they fixed the problem by scratching out 1990 and writing in 2006. In other words, the industries that already made the bulk of their efficiency gains will be asked to do it all over again, because Canada has now agreed to cut from a base year in which emissions were much higher.

This is why the oil sands players are laughing and the pulp and paper companies are not.

Another hurting party is the Ontario government, which years ago agreed to mothball its coal-fired electricity plants, one of the biggest sources of carbon dioxide in the land. Ontario should have waited. It now has to fight to get credit for carbon reductions that it had agreed to make a long time ago, before anyone had heard of Copenhagen.

Of course, using the new base year to divide the country into winners and losers is not this simple, because the industries that behaved well on the efficiency front will argue that they are being unfairly punished. They are right. They will say that the 20-per-cent emissions reduction target promised by the government should not be applied evenly across every industrial sector.

They will also argue that Canada is not an island and that any reductions should take international rivalry into account. The pulp and paper companies compete fiercely with Scandinavian, Brazilian and Chinese players. If the Brazilians cut, say, 5 per cent, and the Canadian are forced into a 10-per-cent reduction, the Canadians are effectively transferring wealth to the Brazilians.

They will face a formidable foe - the oil sands. The impression among the 192 countries at the Copenhagen summit is that the Canadian government will do anything to protect northern Alberta's filthy monster. If the feds' love for the industry goes undiminished, the industries that already made the bulk of their efficiency gains face a gruelling war. By definition, continued high oil sands' emissions have to be offset by lower emissions in the rest of industrial Canada.

In short, the feds have created a huge mess for themselves. While they have a new base year and a new emissions target, they have nothing resembling a plan to reach that target. There is no carbon cap-and-trade system in place, no market price for carbon, no real idea how technology will be used or financed to ensure efficiency gains. They don't know how to deal with the industries that were put at a disadvantage by shifting the base year.

The Canadian government has a shabby image in Copenhagen. It may soon have a shabby image among the Canadian firms that think free passes for some should not come with punishment for others.

Young People Getting Loud While Our Government Wins Another Fossil Award (Not a Good Thing)

While we are hoping that our government does the right thing in Copenhagen, it would appear that it may be the same old, same old. They seem intent on embarrassing us, and further destroying our country and our planet.

Simply put, they do not believe in the science of climate change, and as such have taken on board deniers and think tanks that are fossil fuel friendly.

A recent poll reveals that Canadians want this government to step up. They do want them to simply hook their wagon to the United States, but to come up with a viable plan to address this important issue. I'm not holding my breath because so far they are off to a bad start.

Canada takes first 'Fossil of the Day' at Copenhagen climate conference
By Travis Lupick

Canada has been awarded the first Fossil of the Day “award” at the UN Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen, Denmark. “Canada garnered today’s award for its unwavering commitment to stand firm in its inaction throughout these negotiations,” a media release states. The summit, COP15 for short, opened today (December 7) and is scheduled to run through to December 18.

We've also learned that the situation for those living downstream from the tar sands, is worse than suspected.

Toxic chemical levels higher in water downstream of Alberta oilsands plants
By Hanneke Brooymans
edmontonjournal.com
December 7, 2009

EDMONTON - Levels of toxic chemicals in the Athabasca watershed are up to 50 times higher downstream of oilsands development, a new University of Alberta study has found.
The research, spearheaded by renowned aquatics ecologist David Schindler, also estimates that Suncor and Syncrude deposit the equivalent of an oil spill’s worth of bitumen into the surrounding environment each year.

And that this decade has been the warmest on record.

2000s warmest decade on record: UN
December 8, 2009

The head of the World Meteorological Organziation, a United Nations weather agency, said Tuesday that this decade will "very likely" turn out to be the warmest on record going back to 1850. Michel Jarraud, the WMO's secretary general, added that 2009 will likely be about the fifth-warmest year on record. The WMO released it findings on the second day of the Copenhagen climate conference. Delegates at the 192-nation conference, which opened Monday, are trying to reach a new agreement on controlling greenhouse gas emissions.