From The Man Who Invented The Internet

Al Gore Strikes!

'"The election in Canada was partly about the tar sands projects in Alberta," Gore said Wednesday while attending the Sundance Film Festival in Utah.

'"And the financial interests behind the tar sands project poured a lot of money and support behind an ultra-conservative leader in order to win the election . . . and to protect their interests."(link)(via)(100+ Canadian Comments On Al Gore's Stupidity)

For all Al Gore knows about Canada he obviously doesn't know that there is a limit on what corporations can donate to political parties up here unlike the US. Also the Tories ran on a promise to ban corporate and union donations to political parties. Also the Tories got most of their donations from individuals according to elections Canada. It was the Liberals that got more money from big business wouldn't you know.

Could the election, maybe, possibly, per chance, hazard a guess to have been about the hundreds of millions stolen in the sponsorship scandal? Or what about the billions lost in other scandals? Didn't that even cross Gore's mind when he opened his mouth?...

Sorry using the old Canuckian noggin' again. Stupid Canuck, I should know better than to use what's in between my ears.

'"They've talked about the need for a made-in-Canada plan, which is exactly the terminology Stephen Harper used," Bennett said. "They've talked about targets for Kyoto being unreachable -- that's similar."'

It's a conspiracy! Two Conservatives from two different countries coming to the same conclusion... And beavers can fly... Well maybe in Manitoba they can.

Gore believes the issue of the oilsands and the sway he contends the industry holds with Harper didn't garner news coverage during the election because "media concentration has taken a toll on democratic principles around the world, and Canada is no exception."

What a ridiculous thing to say. A majority of the money donated to political parties from both the CTV and CBC media outlets in this country went to the Liberal party. There's media concentration in Canada alright - with a Liberal bias. And Harper's connections to Alberta were brought up in the campaign more than once. Apparently being an Albertan is a liability, because they're rich, and have oil. By that logic everyone that comes out of that province is some demon spawn of hell.

"I see them moving a lot closer to the Bush government. Talk a lot, but do nothing."

Actually that would be moving a lot closer to the previous Liberal government. They talked alot about Kyoto. But what did they do to implement it? What eco-fascist or environmental nutso out there would even begin to claim that some green friendly tax credits would achieve the reductions required by Kyoto? Especially after the Liberals gave exemptions to the powerfull auto industry - and guess who else?... that's right the Alberta Oil industry. So who's in cahoots with big oil again?

All this amazing insight comes from Al Gore, the man who once said he helped invent the internet... We got a saying for that type of fantasy in Canada - It's called eating the Mad Cow eh...

Addendum...

Since my claim about the Auto Industry and the Oil Industry receiving exemptions for Kyoto has been called into refute I'm posting the following quotations from selected sources...

'“At a time when the Minister of Natural Resources is proposing to weaken Kyoto targets for industry on economic grounds, we wanted to understand the extent to which the federal government is actually bolstering the profits of this already highly profitable sector,” said John Bennett, Executive Director of the Climate Action Network.

'Twenty percent of Canada’s greenhouse gas emissions came from the oil and gas sector in 2002 — an increase of 47% over the 1990 level. “Kyoto targets for the oil and gas industry should be significantly toughened, especially in light of this corporate welfare that the sector is receiving,” added Bennett. (link)

The Sierra Club is biased of course. But they are right when it comes to the oil and gas Industry making small cuts. Just look at this from government of China:

'"Project Green," Canada's 10-billion-dollar plan to meet its commitments under the Kyoto Protocol international treaty to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, makes individual Canadians responsible for at least 74 percent of emission reductions even though they are responsible for only about one-fourth of the country's emissions, environmental organizations said.

'By contrast, they added, Canada's booming oil and gas sector, among the most pollution-intensive in the world, gets off lightly under the plan. (link)

And that's the exact conclusion I came to when I heard of the exemptions the Liberals were making to the auto and oil industry. If they don't make the cuts there, just where will they make them? On consumers of course. At first I figured the Liberals would just start an Albertan revolution by implementing Kyoto, but after that announcement I figured they would start a Canuck revolution!

'All major companies in Canada's automobile industry are part of the agreement.

'"Canada's automobile industry has a long history of introducing new technologies that make the vehicles we produce more environmentally friendly and safer,'' said Hinrichs.

'"As we look to the future, we remain committed to doing our fair share to reduce GHG emissions while contributing to economic growth."(link)

That was when the Liberals made the Kyoto deal with the auto industry. What reductions did the auto industry have to make? 5.3 megatons. How much were they originally going to have to cut? A whole heck of a lot more than that. And most of the "cuts" are supposed to come from the incorporation of new "green" technologies.

What's worse is now I'm going to quote David Suzuki:

'Though the Large Final Emitter (LFE) system has not been transformed into a voluntary system, the federal government has responded to pressure from the oil and gas sector. Most notably, industrial targets are now based on emissions intensity. That means if production goes up, LFEs are allowed to emit more greenhouse gases than their original target. Thus, massively increased emissions from the tar sands, as projected by NRCan, will be allowed under Canada’s plan.

'Further, the LFE emission reduction target has been weakened from 55 Mt in the 2002 climate change plan to 36 Mt in the 2005 version.10 The new target is just 13% of the reductions needed for Kyoto, though LFEs make up almost 50% of Canadian emissions. Worse, the business-as-usual “baseline,” the starting point from which industry must reduce emissions, has been increased by 35 Mt, mostly due to increased emissions from the tar sands. This makes the new LFE target indistinguishable from business-as-usual projections from a few years ago.

Took that from a pdf from the David Suzuki foundation but have no link as of yet.

Notice that the Liberal deal included targets based on "carbon intensity"? That's what the oil companies have wanted for years. That's what Harper's Conservatives have always suggested should be done. And I even think that's what Bush's Environmental plan in the US is based on. It's a reasonable bar to measure carbon reductions by, no matter what David Suzuki says.

So Suzuki and the rest of his eco-fascists are ticked off for good reason. The Liberals signed Kyoto, in my view, with little real intention to implement it.

I think some probably figured whatever they couldn't haggle out from industry they could gain by getting credit for clean energy Canada exported to the US. Canada never got credit for that, and emissions keep on going up in the meanwhile. In other words, Canada is no where near it's targets, and the deadline looms.

I see Kyoto as being good PR. I never saw it as realistic. And neither did the Liberals obviously by their exemption giveaway spree. I wish I could find the links to the original stories that I read calling it outright an "exemption" but you'll have to trust me that I had seen them before... Probably a good year ago.

Either way the auto industry and the oil and gas industry in the plan have to make no real significant reductions. That's why investors are now investing again in Alberta and haven't fleed in fear. They know the truth. It's sad that not everyone else does.