The Harper Government and The Eve of Environmental Destruction

Despite recent toned-down rhetoric, I suspect Harper and his minions are fooling very few people.

Take, for example, the recent words of our Anti-Environment Minister, the integrity-challenged Peter Kent:

Confronted by a looming 2020 deadline for curbing greenhouse gas emissions, the Harper government will ramp up its efforts to reduce climate change pollutants, Environment Minister Peter Kent said Wednesday.

In fact, as the article points out, the Harper regime has contributed almost nothing to achieve current reductions which take us halfway to the target; that has been wrought primarily by the combined efforts of environmentally conscious consumers and actions taken by provincial governments.

To further undermine any semblance of veracity, it was recently revealed that last year, this contemptible Harper mouthpiece presided over a department that

tried to minimize Canadian media coverage of its contribution to a major international scientific assessment report that highlighted evidence linking human activity to extreme weather events, according to a newly released federal memorandum obtained by Postmedia News.

Actions, as they say, do speak louder than words.

And of course, it is only words we are getting from our Prime Prevaricator, the man who has amply demonstrated through the actions of his micro-managed government nothing but withering contempt for science, data, and facts in general, doing everything he can to neutralize their threat along with those who dare to challenge his stunted and regressive world-view.

Take this rather rich statement Harper recently made, apparently with a straight face:

“The only way governments can handle controversial projects of this manner is to ensure that things are evaluated on an independent basis scientifically, and not simply on political criteria,” Harper told reporters during a visit to B.C.

“And as I’ve said repeatedly, the government does not pick and choose particular projects,” the prime minister said. “The government obviously wants to see British Columbia’s export trade continue to grow and diversify, that’s important. But projects have to be evaluated on their own merits.”

I guess that explains why he neutered the National Energy Board, robbing it of its ability to make a decision on the Northern Gateway Project, a power now residing solely in the hands of Harper and his cronies.

In his column today, which I hope you will get a chance to read, Thomas Walkom has much to say on some of these issues.

Harper's Political Posturing

Given the recent spate of 'bad luck' experienced by Enbridge over its propensity for oil spills, the Harper regime knows it is facing an uphill battle to convince Canadians that the company can guarantee the environmental integrity of the lands over which its pipelines run. In his column today, Tim Harper points out that because the government is running out of opponents to vilify, it is trying a new tact through its mouthpiece, senior minister for B.C./Heritage Minister James Moore:

“This project will not survive public scrutiny unless Enbridge takes far more seriously (its) obligations to engage with the public and to answer those very legitimate questions about the way in which they have operated their business in the very recent past,” Moore said.

Wow! A Harper minion talking tough to business! That surely will solve all the problems, especially when the company repackages its empty and worthless assurances in a new communications' campaign.

And Moore's 'outspokenness' should certainly dispel any impression that Harper Inc. is simply a tool of big business interests.

UPDATE: The emptiness of Moore's rhetoric is attested to, I think, by this announcement today by the federal government.

Gwynne Dyer on Our Future

I have been writing lately about environmental degradation and the bleak future that seems to await us. On that theme, (and because I have a busy morning ahead of me) I am providing a link to an article by Gwynne Dyer, who argues that because of our huge global population and our interconnectedness, there is only one way to stave off total collapse: using our technological and scientific abilities to radically reduce the pressure we are putting on the earth's natural systems.

We are All Complicit in Environmental Degradation

Recently I wrote a post about the chilling effect that the federal budget will have on charities, especially those devoted to environmental activism. Unfortunately, I chose to ignore another reality that is equally grim - the fact that all of us (forgive the sweeping generalization) are to blame both for the current dire environmental situation we are in and for the future horrors that will ensue from that complicity.

In today's Star, columnist Christopher Hume reminds us of a few 'inconvenient truths':

Finance Minister Jim Flaherty’s move to “streamline” the environmental review process and muzzle the environmental movement was deeply disturbing, but Canadians will happily turn the other cheek.

Licking our lips in anticipation of tarsands trillions, Canadians, let alone Canadian politicians, are cheerfully signing up as our corner of the planet is plundered beyond recognition....

We can no longer see beyond the next fix....

As shrill as the deniers might be, we all know that the current path leads to degradation and devastation. Despite mounting evidence, including our own winter that wasn’t, we prefer to keep our collective head buried in the tar sand....

His depressing assessment of our own shortsightedness notwithstanding, I hope you will find time to read Hume's entire piece.

The Harper Budget's Attack On Charities

Although hardly surprising, given both the ideological bent of the Harper regime and earlier warnings from Natural Resources Minister Joe Oliver, there is little doubt that the provisions of the new federal budget authorizing an $8-million special audit by Canada Revenue Agency to see if charities are adhering to the 10-per-cent political advocacy limit is aimed directly at the 'enemies' of this regime.

While the charitable status of overtly political foundations such as the C.D Howe Institute, The Fraser Institute, and the Manning Centre for Building Democracy seem to enjoy a special immunity from scrutiny, those whose vision of Canada run counter to Harper's are undoubtedly in for a very rough ride.

Paul Waldie has an interesting piece on the implication of this new measure, suggesting that a kind of chill will now permeate environmental organizations, precisely the intention, I am sure, of the Harper regime that has no interest in respecting differences of opinion, an intolerance typical of extreme right-wing thinking and its refusal/inability to comprehend nuanced thinking.

All The World's A Stage: Harper Hypocrisy in China

Harper blasts foreign money in oil sands debate while welcoming China

Prime Minister Stephen Harper blasted “foreign money and influence” behind critics of Canada’s oil sands even as he welcomed Chinese investment in Canada’s energy sector.

... he made clear he does not equate Chinese foreign investment in oil sands development with the unwanted “foreign money” behind environmental groups, and that he sees no irony in the contradiction.

'Nuff said, I think.

The Power of the Documentary

Although traditionally avoided as a rather staid and boring genre, the documentary has enjoyed a real resurgence in popularity over the past couple of decades, no doubt in part due to the important and provocative work by people such as Errol Morris, Michael Moore, and Velcro Ripper. A good documentary, for me, is one that provokes thought and provides knowledge and insights we often don't have the opportunity to encounter in our day-to-day lives.

Nature documentaries, when done right, can accomplish much. A series on the earth called Earth From Above, spectacular when viewed on blu-ray, but I'm sure almost as visually stunning on a regular DVD, has much wisdom to impart. In the episode I just finished watching, called Amazing Lands, the point is made that every impact humanity has on the earth, whether intentional or unintentional, has far-reaching ramifications.

For example, deforestation means the destruction of habitats to a myriad of species, oftentimes resulting ultimately in their extinction. It also means the loss of flora whose possible medicinal benefits to humanity will never be known. Another impact of that deforestation is land erosion that means heavy rains carry formerly fertile topsoil down in to the rivers, the mud killing the fish, etc. But while we may understand all of this as a series of abstract facts, a naturalist on the show reminds us that we have no ability to imagine what any of this really means. It is very similar to when we are talking about the magnitude of national debts. The numbers really don't mean anything to us.

The only real wisdom here is for all of us to remember that we are not above nature, but rather simply a part of it.

I therefore highly recommend the series as a way of helping us to start understanding what the environmental destruction wrought by an unfettered corporate agenda, aided and abetted both by our political 'masters' and our own rampant and very disposable consumerism, really means.

And since this is Sunday, I will not apologize for the preachy tone of this post, but instead leave you with two of my favourite poems, both written at different points in the nineteenth century; both resonate very strongly with our situation today:

The World Is Too Much with Us - William Wordsworth

The world is too much with us; late and soon,
Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers;
Little we see in Nature that is ours;
We have given our hearts away, a sordid boon!
This Sea that bares her bosom to the moon,
The winds that will be howling at all hours,
And are up-gathered now like sleeping flowers,
For this, for everything, we are out of tune;
It moves us not. --Great God! I'd rather be
A Pagan suckled in a creed outworn;
So might I, standing on this pleasant lea,
Have glimpses that would make me less forlorn;
Have sight of Proteus rising from the sea;
Or hear old Triton blow his wreathèd horn.

God's Grandeur - Gerald Manley Hopkins

THE WORLD is charged with the grandeur of God.
It will flame out, like shining from shook foil;
It gathers to a greatness, like the ooze of oil
Crushed. Why do men then now not reck his rod?
Generations have trod, have trod, have trod; 5
And all is seared with trade; bleared, smeared with toil;
And wears man’s smudge and shares man’s smell: the soil
Is bare now, nor can foot feel, being shod.

And for all this, nature is never spent;
There lives the dearest freshness deep down things; 10
And though the last lights off the black West went
Oh, morning, at the brown brink eastward, springs—
Because the Holy Ghost over the bent
World broods with warm breast and with ah! bright wings.

Civil Disobedience: The Courage of Tim DeChrisotpher

I had not heard of Tim DeChristopher, a brave young man who, in the dying days of the Bush administration in 2008, attended an oil and gas auction in Utah in 2008 and disrupted it by submitting winning bids on various tracts of land, with no intention of paying for them. Despite the fact that the auction was later determined to be largely illegal, DeChristopher was charged with disrupting an auction and sentenced to two years in prison this past July.

An indication of how threatened the 'powers that be' felt by DeChristopher's actions can be inferred from this excerpt from the prosecution's sentencing report:

The rule of law is the bedrock of our civilized society, not acts of “civil disobedience” committed in the name of the cause of the day. A significant term of imprisonment will underscore this truth for the defendant and the community.

In other words, the system protecting the forces of greed and environmental depredation felt the need to send a strong warning to discourage others from trying to alter a status quo that seems impervious to conventional avenues of remediation.

In a time when there seems to be a growing recognition of the need for civil disobedience, this young man's story is a very important one. You can read about him and see a number of short interviews with him here.