Now and again, when the subject of environmental alarmism comes up, someone – such as the likes of me – might wonder when, or whether, a mainstream, high-profile politician in an important country will get up and stick it to the Green lobby. For perhaps obvious economic reasons, given its vast natural resources, Canada seems to be the country where this is starting to seriously happen. Consider this report (Reuters):
On the eve of public hearings into a proposed oil pipeline from Alberta’s tar sands to the Pacific Coast, the Canadian government lashed out on Monday at what it said were foreign-funded radical groups opposing the project. The comments by Natural Resources Minister Joe Oliver were another sign of the pressures mounting against Enbridge Inc’s proposed C$5.5 billion ($5.4 billion) Northern Gateway pipeline. Canada’s right-leaning Conservative government, which says the pipeline would help diversify energy exports away from the United States and more towards Asia, says activists are clogging up the regulatory process.
There’s more:
“Unfortunately, there are environmental and other radical groups that would seek to block this opportunity to diversify our trade,” Oliver said in a statement. “These groups threaten to hijack our regulatory system to achieve their radical ideological agenda … They use funding from foreign special interest groups to undermine Canada’s national economic interest.” Ottawa and the oil industry are particularly interested in Northern Gateway after Washington delayed a decision on approving TransCanada Corp’s Keystone XL pipeline, which would transport oil sands crude from Alberta to Texas.
Of course, it goes without saying that the UK government is a million miles from this sort of rhetoric, with the partial exception to how ministers sometimes try to push aside environmental concerns that are raised about various transport or other projects. In these cases, though, there are legitimate private property rights issues as stake (such as the use of compulsory purchase powers to make way for something like a high-speed rail link). And as for AGW alarmism in particular, there is yet no sign of a major political figure realising how many votes might be won in confronting this.
As one senior politician said to me – “I don’t believe in AGW but it is not politically sensible to say anything”
Ezra Levant has more information about this story here:
http://ezralevant.com/2012/01/bigtime-bias.html
One thing I don’t understand is why the proposed Keystone XL pipeline (still on hold by the Obama administration) had to go all the way from Alberta to Texas. Why couldn’t it just go across the border into northern Montana, and build a refinery there? The fact that it had to traverse the entire length of the United States was inevitably going to cause a backlash, and surely the cost of a new refinery would have been much less than the cost of 2,000 extra miles of pipe (plus all the land rights). Does anybody know the answer?
Laird: I believe refineries are more expensive than you think.
Also, I would bet that the relative costs were already computed by the oilcos.
It’s good to see the right – by which I mean the AGW skeptics – going on the attack.
In the global warming debate, the right has tended to argue the facts: glacials and interglacials, the medieval warm period, the Maunder minimum, etc. Meanwhile, the left has tended to go in for ad hominem attacks. “You doubt global warming? You’re just a paid shill for the oil companies!” (That one is supremely ironic, given that the oil companies are now pretty much on board the global warming bandwagon. Presumably they either feel limits on carbon dioxide emissions are now inevitable and they may as well help shape the legislation, or they’ve figured-out how to make money trading carbon credits.) Unfortunately it’s an effective tactic, which tends to silence all but the brave.
That the right is now doing the same, in this case condemning the environmental groups for ” … their radical ideological agenda …” using “… funding from foreign special interest groups …” is an excellent development.
Give the left a taste of its own medicine, I say. And let’s expand it to a few other areas.
Also, the environmentalists are just getting silly and desperate. See here:
http://www.350.org/en/about/blogs/you-cant-eat-tar-sands
Why try to make a pipeline from Canada to Texas? Because that’s where the refineries are, and environmentalists have made it legally impossible to build new refineries in the US; it’s presumably also true on the Canadian side of the border, which is why they aren’t talking about making their own refineries at all, but instead are looking for some way to ship the crude.
Laird, Boobah is correct – the regulations (and law cases) have prevented the building of new refineries in the United States for a long time. Taxes, insane government spending, regulations, out of control tort law (and on and on) the American economy (like the British economy) is doomed.
It is later than most people think – the present economy of the United States is a credit bubble (nothing more). It will collapse within a couple of years.
In fact the plan is for it to collapse in 2013 – so that the newly relected Comrade Barack has an excuse to get rid of the last bits of the power of Congress and establish emergency rule.
And if a Republican is elected in November?
Then the collapse in the economy (which CAN NOT now prevented) will be blamed on the Republicans – and the Marxist “Occupy” moverment (and so on – and with the full support of the media) will seek to make America as chaotic as possible – in order to get people to despair and appeal for the government to “help people”.
The left have many other people apart from Comrade Barack – suppose he was hit by rock from outer space tomorrow?
What difference would it make? Hillary Clinton (who the Democrats would find some way to nominate at the Convention) is also an Alinskyite – indeed she was trained by Saul Alinsky himself (Barack was too young to be trained by Alinsky in person).
And if Hillary was hit by another rock from outer space? Then the left would produce someone else.
Remember they control the education system (both schools and universities) and the media (not just the news and current affairs shows – but also the ENTERTAINMENT media) and so on.
They can have many candidates available fo 2016 – assuming that there is still a United States in 2016 (which there may well not be).
Can Canada opt out of the “global goverence” (we must not say “World Government” because that is “paranoid”) that the international totalitarians have long planned?
I do not know – but some things in Canada in recent years (under the Liberal Party as well as the Conservatives) have pleased me greatly and showed that Canada is not yet dead.
And AMERICA IS NOT DEAD YET EITHER.
I expect a rally – how I do not know, but some form of rally I do expect.
It may not work – America may well be destroyed anyway.
But America will not die with just a whimper.
Do not go gentle into that good night, but rage, rage against the dying of the light.
Also, nobody wants to build refineries any more. There is no money to be made in downstream operations, oil companies make almost all their money in upstream, i.e. crude and gas production. I think all the supermajors are looking to shed as much of their downstream operations as possible, but legacy issues and unions (in the case of Total in France, at least) are hampering them.
On the specific issue of human emissions of C02 causing global warming…..
Perhaps the Canadians are looking at the Germans – the most ardent “warmists” on the planet.
How many new nuclear power stations are being built in Germany?
None.
In fact they are closeing down their existing nuclear power stations.
Supposedly because they fear a massive wave of water from the Pacific – destroying nuclear power stations in Bavaria.
The “minor detail” that radiation killed NO ONE AT ALL in the recent Japanese event (when an earthquake and vast wave of water destroyed a nuclear power station) is not consided important………
If the German people (who have forced the hand of their government) really believed in “man made globel warming” they would be demanding the building of new nuclear power stations (there would be public subscriptions to help pay for the cost, and so on) not demanding that all existing ones be closed.
It is the same with the “environmental movement” (with a few exceptions such as James Lovelock) in the rest of Europe and North America.
So if they do not really believe their “man made globel warming” doctrine (which they plainly do not), why should anyone else believe it?
Perhaps the political class in Canada is developing some sense, but apparently that hasn’t spread everywhere. Ben Stein is alleging that he was fired from an advertising contract over his AGW “skeptic” stance, and he is suing Kyocera over it. Interesting.
No one should be fired from adverising contract for their opinions on the effects of human C02 emissions – but I am very wary of Ben Stein.
He is not just a “climate sceptic” – he is also an “evolution sceptic” (yes they are not all “wacko Christians”).
And he is a person who always seems to favour higher top rates of income tax (and so on) “my friend Warren….”
Also (in the days before I worked every Saturday) I remember Ben Stein on Neil Cavuto’s Saturday business show on Fox News.
Every other person on the show would (when asked) give investment advice on SPECIFIC COMPANIES – after all it was a business show.
All accept Stein – who just suggested investing in the index.
Perhaps that is correct (although it does make human thought utterly pointless – just bung all your money on the index and forget about everything), but it does raise the question of WHY HAVE STEIN ON THE SHOW.
One could simply have said (each show) “and some people say just invest in the index – and some of these people are rich, such as Ben Stein”.
No need to pay Ben Stein to come on the show (every week) to say bugger all in terms of specific information.
By the way – I wonder if Mr Stein really got rich just investing in the index. Or whether “my friend Warren” (and Warren’s friends the government) got him some nice deals.