Steve Harper, Bruce Carson and the Koch Brothers

Canada's king of the petro-pols of Parliament Hill, Stephen Harper, is now firmly linked to ex-con Bruce Carson in what appears to be a perverse relationship.   While key government officials are prohibited from lobbying after leaving their government employment, Carson, it seems, was brought onto the government payroll and into the Prime Minister's Office to lobby for the Tar Sands.

It seems reminiscent of Dick Cheney when, after Bush was handed the presidency, wasted no time bringing the likes of Kenny Lay, Enron and the Fossil Fuelers into the White House to covertly write their own national energy policy.   Is that what Harper brought Gordon into his confidence to do, to be his direct line to the Oil Barons?   Until Harper comes clean we'll never know.   All we will know is that Harper chose to take on as a "political advisor" a defrocked former lawyer, caught stealing trust funds and convicted and imprisoned for his efforts who later twice resorted to Bankruptcy Act protection.   With that curriculum vitae who wouldn't turn to a guy like Carson for advice?   And leave out entirely the fact that this 66-year old is shacked up with a 22-year old "former" escort who was to be on the receiving end of the cash from a lobbying deal Gordon was pushing before he was caught out.

And if all this isn't scummy enough, let's bring in the Koch Brothers (tm), Charlie and Dave.   It turns out that one out of four barrels of Tar Sands bitumen is processed by Koch Industries.   They're big time Tar Sanders when they're not busy energizing the Tea Party and pumping megabucks into campaigns to derail action on global warming and sow doubt on climate science.

Talk about birds of a feather.   Make that "buzzards."