Looking Toward The Future

I'm feeling an unaccustomed lightness of spirit these days. The growth of Green Party support is at least in part responsible:

A New Day

Having abandoned any notion of voting for the Liberals in the next election, I find it irritating beyond expression to be constantly confronted by the binary thinkers among us who shrilly declaim that a vote for someone other than Trudeau is a vote for Andrew Scheer. This kind of absolutist thinking not only shows disrespect for our democracy, but it also suggests that we are doomed to always pick the least odious party when we cast our vote.

Well, it would seem there is now a new kid on the block called The Green Party. Fresh off its major gains in P.EI. and in tandem with the impressive performance of Green Ontario MPP Mike Schreiner, yesterday saw the election of Paul Manly in the Nanaimo-Ladysmith byelection, garnering 38% of the votes.

Manly will become the second Green Party member in Parliament, joining Leader Elizabeth May.

“This bodes well for the Green Party across Canada,” he said.

His victory shows the other parties that Canadians are serious about climate change, Manly said, adding he expects the Green wave of support to grow in the October election.

Unlike the other conventional, tired parties, the Greens have a vision:

“How we can change the economy — that we are working in to protect the environment that we need for our health, for our children, for our grandchildren,” he said. “How we can do a better job of taking care of people who are less fortunate.”

He said governments should stop subsidizing the “old” economy.

“We moved beyond the horse and buggy and its time to move beyond the internal combustion engine,” Manly said, as the crowd cheered.

It’s also time that the government stop giving foreign multinationals tax breaks that “frack our environment and expand oil production,” he said.

“Those days should be over. It’s time to move forward,” Manly said.

“I will not compromise on the future of our children and our grandchildren.”

That's all I have time to post today. But for me, it is more than enough.

Pay To Slay

That's what critics are calling Bill 108, the “More Homes, More Choice Act,” introduced stealthily, as the cowardly are wont to do, by the Ford regime in Ontario. Buried in an omnibus bill, the favoured vehicle of the dishonest, (including both Justin Trudeau and Stephen Harper), the bill promises to open up to developers sensitive aeas that will greatly endanger Ontario's at-risk animals and plants.

On the day a UN study reports that more than a million species worldwide are at risk of extinction, we should all be standing up taking distressed notice.

Bill 108, the “More Homes, More Choice Act,” would weaken classification criteria, allow the environment minister to delay protections for up to three years, and provide developers, industry and others who impact the habitat of endangered species with a suite of options to continue their activities, including a fee-in-lieu fund derided by critics as “pay to slay.”

Of course, the Ford regime, led by a man who has never met a developer he didn't like, is cloaking it as a means of addressing housing shortages. Hence the bill's simplistic title: the “More Homes, More Choice Act.” It is a subterfuge his willing, amoral acolytes and MPPs are happy to propagate, insisting the bill will actually enhance protections:

Lindsay Davidson, a spokesperson for the Ministry of the Environment, Conservation and Parks, said Ontario is committed to ensuring “best-in-class” protections for endangered and threatened species.

“The proposed changes … will enhance government oversight and enforcement powers to ensure compliance with the act and improve transparent notification of new species’ listings,” Davidson said in an email.

Cold reality is perhaps best expressed by experts in the field of biodiversity:

“It really is very deferential to exactly those threats that are affecting species at risk today,” said Justina Ray, president and senior scientist of Wildlife Conservation Society Canada. “I’m very concerned that at the end of the day, we kind of have an empty shell of an act.”

Or, to put it more bluntly,

“It really is a doomsday scenario for endangered species in this province,” said Kelsey Scarfone, program manager at Environmental Defence Canada.

“It’s basically been whittled down to nothing. They might as well have just cancelled it,” she said.

Every day brings forth more bad news. It is the fate of the newspaper reader to absorb this news, and to be as well-informed as possible about the depredations that envelop us. But it doesn't end there. Until each of us realizes that the well-being of nature (and I do urge you, in the strongest terms possible, to read about the UN report) and our very survival are inextricably linked, the destruction and rapidly increasing extinctions will only continue.

Bad, greedy people know no bounds.

Now, A Word From Premier Doug Orwell

The Ministry of Truth has released the following message from Our Glorious Leader. Widespread distribution is strongly encouraged.

My Friends, Citizens of Ontarioland:

It has come to My attention that the media, the Official Enemy Of The State, has been spreading lies in order to undermine confidence in, and devotion to, Me. In our fair and democratic society, such sedition cannot be overlooked, and you can rest assured that the offenders will soon be offered placement in many of our fine Reeducation Camps strategically located across our fine realm.

In the interim, however, it behooves Me to set the record straight (historical records will be amended as well, at a later date):

Enemy Number One is a perfidious scribe named Edward Keenan. Fortunately, his scurrilous misinformation is not online, but only in the printed edition of his propaganda organ, The Toronto Star, which nobody reads anyway.

Calling me an axe-wielding agent of chaos, he offers the following treasonous lies:

Here was city [of Toronto] manager Chris Murray, in the letter to councillors about the cuts to child care: “The city was not consulted or provided with any advance warning about these changes.”

Sound familiar? The first clause of that sentence read, “As with recent changes to the provincial/municipal costsharing arrangements for public health,” referencing another set of cuts that arrived as a surprise and occupied the city’s attention these past couple of weeks. But it could have said, “As with the sudden cutting of the size of city council in half in the middle of an election campaign,” or, “As with the changes to the city’s transit plan using new routes and new technology,” or, “As with the decision to shortchange the city for hundreds of millions of dollars in gas tax revenue Premier Ford had directly promised to deliver.”

In each case — and in others affecting those across the province using library services, caring for children with autism, or attending and working for the school system, to cite just a few more examples — the people directly affected by these multimillion-dollar decisions were taken by surprise by the drastic, immediate changes to the services they rely on or deliver. No notice, no advance consultation or negotiation and, apparently, very little consideration of any effect beyond the one on the bottom line.

Such defamation flies in the face of the fact that I am famous for consulting the people. I talked to thousands upon thousands in Ontarioland who told me they want new efficiencies that will make elected officials acknowledge the bloat found in every publicly-funded institution, be it health care, education, child care, library services or council size. And they are demanding lower taxes. As a humble instrument of the people, I do as demanded.

Happily, there are many efforts underway to set the record straight:

“In an attempt to protect child-care funding for future generations, our government is looking at ways to better deliver services and reduce administrative costs,” Education Minister Lisa Thompson’s office said.

Thompson’s office says, “we are challenging municipalities to reduce their administrative spending.”

My ever-loyal and doting Minister went further to explain the kindness we are bestowing with our budget 'adjustments:

“In an attempt to protect childcare funding for future generations, our government is looking at ways to better deliver services and reduce administrative costs,” said an aide to Education Minister Lisa Thompson.

“To be crystal clear, these reductions are primarily at the administrative level. We are challenging municipalities to reduce their administrative spending on child care delivery by 5 per cent and refocus that funding on things like subsidies for low-income families,” said Kayla Iafelice.

“The city of Toronto should be looking at ways to make their operations more efficient instead of passing on these costs to parents,” said Iafelice

“There is no need for a single child care space to be lost as a result of a 5 per cent administrative change. Any reductions in childcare spaces would be the result of the city of Toronto’s own decision-making.”

I realize holding up a mirror to the profligate spenders and socialists amongst us is an unpleasant experience for them, but The Truth must be known.

Spirited discussion is to be encouraged in a democracy as glorious and healthy as ours. However, when that discussion moves into the realm of lies and seditious commentary, your government will always act in the best interests of the people, and deal with dispatch and resolve in stopping such attempts to foment discontent.

Remember, I am always For The People.

He Will Never Be Green

My past two posts have consisted of editorial cartoons featuring well-known 'green'characters. The first depicted Kermit the frog trumpeting the very significant electoral gains made by the Green Party in Prince Edward Island, where they now form the government's Official Opposition. The second depicted The Hulk as climate change, about to pummel Andrew Sheer, sheltering under a wholly inadequate umbrella labelled climate plan.

One whom I doubt will ever be depicted as green, either in the mind of editorial cartoonists or the informed public, is Justin Trudeau.

Our pipeline-loving Prime Minister relishes touting his government as having a serious plan to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. The only problem is, it isn't true.

Consider Trudeau's much-touted carbon tax. Distilled to its essence, it is a plan that essentially returns more money (through a rebate) to most people than than it exacts from them. Putting aside the obvious politics involved in the rebate, one can legitimately ask the obvious: How will this deter people from using energy profligately? (The stock answer is that Canadians will appreciate that they stand to gain money if they reduce their carbon usage, a kind of enlightened self-interest that I have rarely witnessed from our fellow-citizens.)

Sadly, the Trudeau charade of constructive action against climate change is also pierced by his ongoing advocacy for tarsands bitumen, made evident in the aforementioned pipeline purchase, and one reinforced by a new deal on emissions he is offering to Alberta:

The type of oilsands developments that emit the most greenhouse gas could be exempt from new federal reviews for major projects—but only if Alberta keeps its cap on emissions from that sector.

The proposed exemption was included in draft regulations published Wednesday that outline which new developments would be subject to federal reviews under Bill C-69, legislation to revamp project assessments in Canada that has been denounced by some industry groups and the Conservative opposition.

Under the proposed regulations, Ottawa would exempt new “in situ” oilsands projects in Alberta from federal reviews because the province’s emissions cap for the sector—set at 100 megatonnes per year—is in line with Canada’s climate change framework, which aims to cut greenhouse gas emissions to 30 per cent below 2005 levels by 2030, government officials said during a background briefing Wednesday.

Emissions from these projects nearly quadrupled to 42 megatonnes from 2005 to 2017, when they made up more than half the emissions from Alberta’s oilsands, according to the federal government’s most recent tally of national greenhouse gas emissions.

Environmental defence groups are appalled:

Nichole Dusyk, a senior federal policy analyst for the Pembina Institute, said Ottawa is backing away from its environmental responsibilities if “in situ” oilsands projects aren’t placed under the new review process.

“Exempting it because there is a cap misses all of the other impacts that are within federal jurisdiction,” said Dusyk, pointing to potential effects on the habitats of “at-risk” species.

Julia Levin, climate and energy program manager with Environmental Defence, questioned why other emissions-intensive projects like pipelines that don’t cross borders will continue to be exempt from review, when renewable energy projects like certain hydroelectric, wind power and tidal energy facilities will be placed under the new federal assessments.

Like Dusyk, Levin said the regulations should ensure projects with a certain amount of greenhouse gas emissions fall under federal review, so that Ottawa can manage emissions as it strives to hit its targets under the Paris Agreement.

“This was not the place to abdicate responsibility and that is what the government has done,” she said.

Today sees a new report on how rapidly permafrost is melting in Canada's Arctic.

Nearly one-fifth of Arctic permafrost is now vulnerable to rapid warming, [Merritt] Turetsky’s [University of Guelph biologist] paper suggests. Plenty of it is in Canada, such as in the lowlands south of Hudson Bay.

Soil analysis found those quickly melting areas also contain the most carbon. Nearly 80 per cent of them hold at least 70 kilograms of carbon per cubic metre.

That suggests permafrost is likely to release up to 50 per cent more greenhouse gases than climate scientists have believed. As well, much of it will be released as methane, which is about 30 per cent more efficient at trapping heat than carbon dioxide.

And yet, to hear the official propaganda, Canada is serious about climate change mitigation. Time for Canadians of all political stripes to wake up, understand the grave peril we are in, and make their next electoral choice an informed one.

And Now, A Word From Another Green Guy

H/t Theo Moudakis

And Now, A Word From Kermit

H/t Greg Perry

Still not convinced? Perhaps these letter-writers can help:

Local governments all over the world are declaring a climate emergency, so stop using the neutral term “climate change” in your coverage. There’s nothing neutral about the looming disaster for our “life support system” (aka the environment). Let’s call it “climate breakdown” or “climate chaos.”

It’s not balmy “global warming,” it’s “critical planet overheating.” The oil and gas industry once successfully lobbied the media to call their nasty tarsands project the cleaner-sounding “oilsands.” Clearly, words matter. The emotional urgency of these words matter. Our future is at stake.

Pike Krpan, Hamilton

There are so many ways in which we need to fight the environmental injustice of climate change, but at every turn, governments in Canada are moving backward on the existential issue of our time.

Bill C-69 is one way to counteract the wave of retreats in the battle against climate change and other potential environmental damage. The fossil fuel industry is well aware that it stands to lose economically from this bill and they have mounted a misinformation campaign aimed at convincing the Senate to water it down or delay it until the federal election.

Canadians expect our governments to act to protect our rights, including Indigenous rights, and to act in the best interests of citizens and residents, not multinational corporations. The Senate needs to do their job and pass this bill, which has already been three years in the making.

Amy Scott, Toronto

Tom Scanlan, Toronto

Rob Strang, Orangeville