Category Archives: Canada

Where We Stand on BC Politics & The Environment

Canada, Politics, Western Canada, ,
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Our readers should know the position of The Common Sense Canadian. In a word, the environment is the #1 issue before the people of British Columbia, indeed the world. If we lose our farmland, our precious salmon, and our rivers, what’s left?

Money?

How do you make money out of farms that aren’t there any more so you have to import your food?

How do make money out of salmon that are killed by lice from fish farms? Especially when all the profit goes out of province, mostly to Norway?

How do you make money destroying rivers and the delicate ecosystems they’re part of, to make power we don’t need, especially when we subsidize out-of-province companies who take all the profits and much more elsewhere?

How do you make money with a pipeline with someone else’s oil-or black sludge as The Tar sands produce – across delicate wildlife habitat, 1000+ rivers streams and agricultural land when a rupture would wreak incalculable damage-knowing that the pipeline company, Enbridge, is notorious for its negligence?

How do we profit from exposing our delicate coast to tankers carrying this stuff? Have we learned nothing from the Exxon Valdez?

And where’s the profit in taking a huge ever-increasing risk in piping oil to Burnaby to be taken thence, through the two dangerous narrows in Vancouver harbour out through the Salish Sea and through the treacherous Juan de Fuca?

There is no amount of money in the world that makes these risks, indeed certainties, worthwhile.

We stand firmly for help to the disadvantaged, improved healthcare, aid to the homeless, and better education-but how can we do that if we have to import more and more of our food?-if we toss away not only the commercial sale of fish but the significant domestic and tourist use of that resource?-if we subsidize foreign companies to provide electricity for themselves, bankrupting our jewel, BC Hydro, in the bargain?

The long and the short of it is we cannot prosper by wiping out our natural resources-in fact we commit fiscal suicide and abandon our children’s heritage.

This means that The Common Sense Canadian will support candidates or parties based not on their political philosophy, but on their commitment to saving our environment-not just because it’s beautiful but because to do otherwise is fiscal madness.

Does a labourer, a small business person, someone in need, the sick, the elderly, the unemployed-or even the well off for that matter-win if the party they support ruins our environment?

No matter how smart you are with money, you can never make up fiscally or spiritually for the loss of the environment.

It’s not too soon to be looking ahead to the May 2013 election. We at The Common Sense Canadian are already campaigning and will do so full time until the election.

In the next few months we’ll learn a lot about who is going to be promising what.

With the Liberals it’s hard to see who can pull them out of their political quicksand. Will Carole Taylor be dragooned into seeking the leadership? Will it be Christy Clark? Mike DeJong? Kevin Falcon? George Abbott? An unknown?

Carole Taylor can’t escape responsibility for the disastrous Liberal policy towards farmland, fish farms, and energy. She would have to make pledges that would cost her support from industry and Ms. Taylor knows something about money matters and that you don’t get campaign funds unless you’re prepared to pay the piper.

Christy Clark is more to blame than Ms. Taylor, for she, after all, has had three years with her own talk show to support our environment before a large, daily audience. Rather than holding the Campbell government accountable, she has uncritically supported her old cronies the Liberal Party to which she’s joined at the hip. As for all other cabinet ministers, they, too, supported the utter desecration of our environment for the profit of their political friends.

The NDP is in the process of devouring each other but then it’s always been a nest of adders that rarely sheath their fangs. Even at the testimonial to Dave Barrett last Saturday you could sense the unsettled conditions. The question in the NDP, in case you’ve been on Mars for the past couple of years, is whether or not Carole James can win. It never seems to dawn on them that she might lose because they can’t get their act together.

The Carole James I saw in her press conference last week when she took the best the media could throw at
her and batted pitch after pitch out of the park, showed toughness not much seen before. It was the same at the tribute for Barrett-she didn’t beat about the bush and made it clear that she was in the fight to stay.

If she can maintain that steely determination and get her venomous adders targeted on Liberals rather than themselves, she could be tough to beat.

There are deep rumblings of a third party to take the place of the old Socreds, a party which under the Bennetts, père et fils, staked out the middle ground where most of the people of BC are politically. If it happens, it will badly hurt the Liberals by capturing the “centre” (abandoned by Campbell), while helping the Conservatives to steal their “right wing” support. The two we hear most about are Gordon Wilson and Chris Delaney, both decent men with an excellent grasp on issues-the edge perhaps going to
Wilson because of his electoral and cabinet experience.

What then does The Common Sense Canadian look to?

Four things:

1. A re-commitment to protecting
farmland, a “commitment that commits them to keep to their
commitment”.
2. A closure of all fish farms in
our oceans especially near routes of migrating Pacific salmon while encouraging
dry land operations.
3. A commitment to keep our precious coast free of Tar Sands oil supertankers from the proposed Enbridge pipeline and Kinder-Morgan expansion

4. A commitment to end all
licensing of private power construction, PLUS-and this is critical-making
public all private power contracts in existence, coupled with a flat refusal to
honour any which are unconscionable.

Carole James has shown a lamentable reluctance to pledge this in the name of “sanctity of contract” and
no doubt out of fear of losing support from business.

We put it to her and other political hopefuls this way: suppose you were running for mayor in a town run by a “Boss Tweed” on a ticket of cleaning up the city. If you won would you continue the unconscionable deals the old council had made with the mayor’s brother-in-law and other cronies which screamed of lining the pockets of friends and supporters? Of course not!

These private power contracts can’t pass the “smell test”-can they pass the “unconscionable” test?

How can it be conscionable to force our own power company, BC Hydro, to buy power that they don’t need, meaning that they must either sell it at a 50%+ loss or use it at 12 times the price they can make it themselves?

Surely these private power so called “contracts” must be made public so that we can see just what Campbell & Co. did, and if they’re unconscionably unfair to the public, be able to rescind them.

We always hear from the corporate giants that if we as a province don’t honour contracts with foreign investors, they won’t come to BC.

Really? Are they saying we should, in order to have their business, let them fleece the taxpayers? Is it their
position that crooks are welcome?

No one is saying that if the private companies simply got a better deal than we would have made that they should be rescinded. But if, as we suspect, BC Hydro is forced to buy power at twice or more what it’s worth, or 12 times as costly as Hydro can make it for itself, does this mean we can’t state the obvious, namely that we were cheated?

Shouldn’t any companies wanting to do business in BC know, right up front, that we will not put up with any more
“sweetheart deals” made by corrupt governments?

Surely even the Fraser Institute, that rightwing “think” tank whose advice Campbell uncritically
accepts, would agree that these contracts should see the light of day, and surely the captains of industry don’t beleive that anyone, a person, a company, or a crown corporation, should be bound by an unconscionable contract
forced upon them.

If these private energy deals are like those given to “Boss Tweed’s” brother-in-law, would any decent person of whatever political stripe or walk of life say that a new, honest government must bankrupt its prize possession because the previous government made a corrupt deal?

We, at The Common Sense Canadian (www.thecanadian.org) ay an emphatic NO! font-family:Arial;mso-bidi-font-

There we have it-The Common Sense Canadian says simply this: While we support all who fight to save our environment, to use the business term, the bottom line, is that in addition to our moral responsibility to leave our environment to generations to come, risking our environment is the height of fiscal irresponsibility.

*Boss Tweed-was an American politician most notable for being the “boss” of Tammany Hall, the Democratic Party political machine that played a major role in the politics of 19th century New York City and State.

 

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Three Federal Departments Worked to Put Positive Spin on ‘Dirty Oil’

Canada, Energy and Resources, Politics, Tar Sands, ,
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Three
major departments in the federal government have been actively
co-ordinating a communications strategy with Alberta and its
fossil-fuel industry to fight international global-warming policies
that “target” oilsands production, newly released federal documents
reveal.

The documents, obtained by Postmedia News, suggest that
Environment Canada, Natural Resources Canada as well as the Department
of Foreign Affairs and International Trade, have collaborated on an
“advocacy strategy” in the U.S. to promote the oilsands and discourage
environmental-protection policies.

“The activities of the
oilsands sector has emerged as one of the high priority files for the
federal government,” wrote Natural Resources Canada policy adviser Paul
Khanna in an email, on behalf of Kevin Stringer, the director of
Petroleum Resources in the same department. “As a result we have
developed several products that provide the department’s views on
oilsands development … and we have contributed (along with EC) to a
DFAIT led ‘Advocacy Strategy’ on oilsands for the U.S.”

The
email, dated Dec. 1, 2008, is part of hundreds of pages of documents
released through an access-to-information request by Climate Action
Network Canada.

Read full Montreal Gazette article here

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Video: Carole James Fights Back

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Watch video of Carole James talking tough on her party’s internal divisions on the Public Eye Online here

Provincial New Democrat leader Carole James has said there is
“some self-centredness” among dissidents within her caucus and party.
Ms. James made the statement shortly after Kootenay West MLA Katrine Conroy
announced her resignation as caucus whip. Speaking with reporters, an
angry and frustrated Ms. James described the dissidents as “people who
would rather fight themselves internally and get focus on those kind of
issues than serving the people in British Columbia.” Ms. James wouldn’t
say how much support she presently enjoyed in caucus other than that it
was a majority. She also stated this weekend’s provincial council
meeting would settle questions about her leadership. That’s where party
officials will debate constituency association resolutions calling for a
leadership convention in 2011. “I expect all – including the members of
caucus – to respect the wishes of provincial council, end the
infighting and get on with the job.” Ms. James didn’t directly respond
to a question whether it was tenable for her to remain leader if a
strong minority of constituency associations or caucus members aren’t
supportive of her leadership.

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Tory Senators Kill Climate Bill Passed by House

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The Conservatives have used their clout in the Senate stacked by Prime
Minister Stephen Harper to kill an NDP climate change bill that was
passed by a majority of the House of Commons. Without any debate in the Red Chamber, Conservative senators caught
their Liberal and unelected counterparts off-guard on Tuesday by calling
a snap vote on Bill C-311, the Climate Change Accountability Act
introduced by Bruce Hyer, a New Democrat who represents Thunder
Bay-Superior North in the House.

Read more of Gloria Galloway Globe & Mail article here

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Why Ottawa Really Said no to Prosperity Mine

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The Sun’s editorial of Nov. 5 slamming the federal decision to reject the Prosperity mine reveals a lack of understanding of the relevant facts. The editorial states: “The government of the day could have saved everyone involved on both sides of the project much time, money and angst by saying no” 17 years ago when Prosperity was first proposed.

Well, the government of the day said exactly that. In fact, three successive federal fisheries ministers from 1995 onward notified both the province and the company, Taseko Mines Ltd., that a project involving the loss of Fish Lake (called Teztan Biny by the Tsilhqot’in First Nation) was not open for discussion. Taseko knew as early as 1995 that destroying the lake was out, but continued to push its original proposal without developing a real alternative that might have saved the lake.

Read more of Tony Pearse op-ed in Vancouver Sun here


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Potential BC Premiers and their Environmental Stances

Canada, Politics, Western Canada,
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There could not have been a worse government for the environment than the Campbell Liberals. On every possible front – farmland protection, fish farm disasters, the sale of our rivers and bankrupting BC Hydro, the total lack of environmental enforcement – you name it, and only Ronald Reagan and James Watt would have been worse, and even that is debatable.

It’s more than just evil deeds but an evil philosophy that’s at the root of the matter. I say that because all candidates for office play the “I-truly-love-the-environment” card punctuated with stories of camping trips when they were kids and such things. Gordon Campbell once told me of how he’d seen a billboard with migrating sockeye at the Adams River on it and how he’d taken a solemn vow to protect the environment for his children and grandchildren so they could share this miracle.

The first concern is, of course, the Liberal leadership campaign which has the great attraction that the winner is automatically the premier. That this may be just for a few months is true but, what the hell, you made it to the top and your picture will go up on the wall of the rotunda in the Parliament Buildings. It therefore behooves us to examine the candidates very carefully and, in my opinion, rule out anyone who’s been in the Campbell Cabinet.
 
Even the sainted Carole Taylor?

You bet – she was there when the moratorium on farmed salmon was lifted and she knew what the scientific findings were. They all did and not even a road-to-Damascus-like conversion can change that. I have no doubt that Ms. Taylor would be a strong premier, especially on fiscal matters, but I say, and have long been saying this: “a future government can always clean up a bad fiscal inheritance, even though it’s tough to do, but once you’ve lost your environment, it’s gone forever.”
 
What about Christy Clark? After all, her husband Mark Marissen is a Liberal backroom boy with considerable influence.
 
She can’t be ruled out but after her humiliating loss to Sam Sullivan for the NPA candidate-for-mayor a couple of years back, she may well conclude, as I have, that she won’t get the nomination, and if she did, for the same reasons I’ve given for Carole Taylor’s unsuitability, she won’t be elected … then again, if she were, how would she compare being leader of the opposition to the untaxing (the way she does it) job as a talk show host?

What she does have going for her is her gender…but in my judgment that’s not a deal-cincher especially if she’s in against Carole James.
 
You must be able to read political jargon to know who’s in and who’s not and, quite frankly, if it’s George Abbott, Rich Coleman, or whomever, it doesn’t much matter for it’s simply one evil replacing another.
 
There are two outsiders to consider: John Furlong and Diane Watts. When Furlong says he’s out, I would say that’s 90% a commitment. I know John and I don’t believe that he does want the job. He’s a sports nut – a squash pro, and a good one, the head pro at the cushy Arbutus Club until he got into the Olympics. (For what it’s worth, my son-in-law Larry Armstrong has been pro since Furlong left). Furlong loves the game and if he were to leave the jobs and speechifying the Olympics have given him I believe he would move into the international squash scene. Still, until the deadline passes, you can’t count anyone out.
 
I’m changing my mind a bit about Diane Watts. Her recent denials haven’t sounded quite as dismissive as earlier ones have been. It almost sounds like “No, unless there is an enormous draft Watts movement count me out”.
 
Could such a draft occur?
 
Don’t rule it out. Although this is the BC Liberal Party not the federal party – the insiders are much the same for both and they have a very long history of not letting principles stand in the way of getting elected. Even though she has no experience in senior government much less the premier’s office she has proved to be a quick study in local politics.
 
I think she would be nuts to go at this time in her young life. There is no guarantee that she would win, meaning 4 or maybe 8 years in opposition – an unpleasant option – before she was in power. That amount of time in opposition is soul-destroying, especially for someone who has had no previous time in the “zoo”.
 
But by my reading of the chicken’s entrails, Diane Watts has only said “no”, not “no f’ing way”.
 
The other thing environmentalists must consider is the NDP with or without Carole James. Whether or not she is the best the NDP can put forward, let’s consider what would happen if she were to win. Her record on the environment has been dodgy at best. I say that knowing that she has shown an interest, which is more than any Liberal has, but she gets an “F” on private power companies (IPPS).
 
The government has forced upon BC Hydro “sweetheart deals” with IPPS which ruin our rivers to produce power when Hydro doesn’t need it, forcing Hydro to sell it at a 50% loss on the export market thus bankrupting our public power company. Ms. James says she will honour contracts.
 
This statement was no doubt made for the benefit of industry but it’s wrong. It’s like a mayor, getting elected on a “clean government” slate honouring the sweetheart deals the ex-mayor made with his brother-in-law.
 
The standard for judging government contracts made for political reasons is simply, “is it conscionable?”  These IPP contracts are only conscionable if the judgment is made on the rules of “Boss Tweed”, the Prendergast machine of Kansas City, or Chicago mayor Richard Daly Sr.
 
Ms. James must assure us that she will make these IPP contracts public and if, as I suspect, they are unconscionable, they must be terminated.
 
We’re faced, then, with a party, Liberal, that doesn’t give a fiddler’s fart for the environment and one that only pays lip service to our concerns.
 
I’ve spoken about a third party, perhaps involving Chris Delaney or Gordon Wilson, or both. This could well be the alternative environmentalists are looking for. They are both very fine, knowledgeable men but if they present themselves, environmentalists around the province must be satisfied that they intend to be that too.
 
These are interesting, no critical, political times and we at the Common Sense Canadian stand ready to join all who care about our environment as they make their political stances clear.

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Poor Pinocchio: Campbell’s Sob Story Hard to Swallow

Canada, Politics, Western Canada,
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I have no intention of being Mr. “Nice Guy” to Gordon Campbell because he’s leaving office to wait for his massive pension to kick in and for lush directorships from the Energy companies to be offered.
 
I’m an environmental activist trying to save our salmon, our rivers, and our farm land. Why should I get warm and mushy all over because Campbell has been pushed out of his office?
 
Under Campbell’s government the moratorium on Atlantic Salmon fish farms was lifted resulting in the loss of 100s of thousands of our wild salmon being lost to sea lice from the fish farms. Far from doing anything about it, Campbell has encouraged more of them.
 
Citizens of Tsawwassen are fighting encroachment on farmland with nary a word of justification from Campbell whose job it is to support the principles of the ALR and stop encroachment.
 
Campbell has actively supported the destruction of our rivers and the ecologies dependent upon them, approving of large companies receiving permits to provide power that BC Hydro must buy, need it or not. Hydro must pay at least twice what it’s worth on the open market and since they don’t need the private power, have two options: sell it at a 50% loss or use it themselves at a cost of 12 times what Hydro can make it for themselves. Is it any wonder that folks who hate this desecration of our rivers, farmland and wild salmon bad mouth the premier and the minister responsible?
 
I raise this last question because Gordon Campbell is whining about how his family was upset by the things he was called – Pinocchio, I presume being one of them.
 
Families of politicians, great and small, always bear the brunt of abuse and if that cannot be borne, one shouldn’t get involved in the first place. I do feel for the Campbell family – my wife and four kids suffered this as well, for while I was not premier, I was a Councilor for and MLA of a smaller centre (Kamloops) and there was scarcely a day when one or more of them didn’t hear their father/husband abused. Prospective politicians should consult carefully with their entire family before taking the plunge. However, Campbell must take the majority of the blame himself.

The premier I worked for, a gillion years ago, unlike Campbell, let ministers do their job unhindered by hassling and “hands on” habits. This way we ministers quite rightly took responsibility for our portfolios.
 
Forgive me if I retell a story.
 
After a speech I made in Tsawwassen on the overhead power lines issue, I was approached a lady, clearly a Liberal, who chastised me for constantly asking where then-MLA Val Roddick was and said “I bet you that you never went to these sorts of rallies.”
 
I told her of a rally in Quesnel where ranchers angry at my stopping the killing of wolves were rallying for only one reason, to dare the minister to attend, and, if he did, hassle the hell out of them. I did and it was a hall full of 500 very angry men and women.
 
I said to her “I suppose you think I was a brave man.”
 
She nodded her head.
 
I said, “bravery had nothing to do with it; had I not gone I would have had my ass kicked out of cabinet.”
 
Bill Bennett expected his ministers to deal with their portfolios, especially the dodgy bits, and I daresay most of my colleagues could tell of the shit they had to stare down.
 
In the premier’s case the normal nastiness is much aggravated because on several occasions he – and there is no other word for it – lied through his teeth. Voters expect and tolerate “spin” but will not accept lies as opposed to polished political prose.
 
Let’s go back to the facing the public bit.
 
I’m involved in the movement to save our environment, especially, though not exclusively, fish and energy matters. I and my colleague Damien Gillis have spoken at public meetings all over the province and never, not once, did a Liberal MLA or candidate show up. In the May 2009 election we specifically asked the Cabinet Minister to attend meetings but nary a one did. I have challenged the premier and/or the energy minister to attend our meetings or simply have a debate with them but no takers.
 
Is it any wonder then that the public call the premier and his shy ministers “cowards” or worse?
 
I say this to Gordon Campbell: Sir, it’s not the media or environmentalists that have caused anguish for your family. For that you have no one to blame but yourself.

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Bon voyage, Pinocchio. It's been swell!

Campbell in Full Flight

Canada, Politics, ,
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I can only say this about Gordon Campbell’s resignation: if Damien and I did anything to assist this happening I’m only sorry that we didn’t do more and quicker. He was not only a bad leader – he disgraced himself and us. As an environmentalist I must also say that no matter who takes over as Liberal leader, they will need to do a massive 180 degree turn to even begin the recapturing of our province from the forces of greed and, yes, evil not just encouraged but paid off out of taxpayers’ money.

The only puzzle left about Campbell is what well paying job is waiting for him in the private energy world and what cushy directorships will he garner.

My guess as to who will take over at a later time simply hasn’t reached my brain yet, but even knowing what the Liberals think of my opinions, here’s another one for them.
 
Do not make the mistake the Socreds made when, in 1991, Vander Zalm resigned and Rita Johnston became premier.
 
Many in the cabinet thought that Ms. Johnston ought to turn the reins over to someone who would pledge not to seek the leadership, taking away the unfairness of Johnston running while she was premier. In fact a senior minister, Russ Fraser offered to do just that.
 
Johnston stayed and won the leadership in a fight with Grace McCarthy who, regrettably, took too much time to enter the race.
 
Most commentators who watch these sorts of things opined that had Grace won, she would probably have been defeated in the 1991 election but would have kept the party intact and there would have been no amazing rise of Gordon Wilson and the Liberals. This, it can be surmised, would have meant that the NDP would have been a one term government.
 
My point is not to speculate but to state that the Liberals would be wise to select a caretaker pending the outcome of their nominating convention. This might be a good time to drag perennial backbencher Ralph Sultan out of his hiding place in the corner.
 
Your guess is as good as mine as to who the new leader might be. The name most mentioned is Kevin Falcon which ought to bring joy to those who want the Liberals to go right into the ashcan. From my perspective as an environmentalist, he would be a terrible choice though he would present, with his appalling record, a fabulous target to shoot at.
 
So would Colin Hansen. His 1:51 blog (google Colin Hansen-private power) encapsulated the fact-free Campbell energy policy. It might seem unwise for me to recommend people watch this blog but every single point he makes is a falsehood and demonstrates that the Campbell energy policy is a collection of bare-faced lies.

Here are two consequences I see.

First, this opens the door for a centre party. Such a party with a recognized competent at the helm, with a mission statement like that of the old Socreds (minus all mention of God and Christianity) should recapture the majority of British Columbians who range from centre-right to centre-left; in other words, the people who supported the Socreds for 39 years.
 
Second, this is a huge wake-up call for the NDP. They cannot drift along with their leader speaking to service clubs and chambers of commerce. This is not the time to watch events but to take charge of them. Without a strong leader of the NDP, on the centre-left of the spectrum and the Liberals losing the centre-right, the opportunity for a new Socred-type party  is there – but not for long.

We at the Common Sense Canadian take this as the time we must press forward to ensure that whoever takes over, will do so with an aroused public, in full flight, on their case demanding that our province, with all its beauty, be rehabilitated and sound environmental initiatives put in place.
 
Please support us – and if you’re wondering how, this little story.

The great American trial lawyer, Clarence Darrow, had a happy lady burst into his chambers gushing “Oh Mr Darrow, How can I thank you for all you’ve done?”
 
Darrow replied – “Madam, ever since the Phonecians invented money, there’s only been one answer to that question.” Click here to follow Darrow’s advice.

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