The rest of Canada doesn't "get" British Columbia. I understand that. We're those odd people past the mountains, just beyond Alberta where Canada, in so many ways, ends.
Eastern prime ministers have been coming out here for ages but primarily for photo ops against majestic mountain\ocean backdrops and to sell us "rest of Canada" bullshit.
We pretty much had our fill of it with Stephen "Oil Patch" Harper but then along came this young guy with a legendary name and he brought a bag full of empty promises.
I'll let Michael Harris pick it up from here with his latest, "He's a liar: why the Left Coast may be writing off Justin Trudeau."
He starts with Grand Chief Stewart Phillip:
I am in the downtown Vancouver boardroom of the Union of British Columbia Indian Chiefs and the gentle voice is saying some very tough things.
“My wife and I were scheduled to march in the Chinese New Year’s parade in Vancouver, until we found out that Trudeau was going to be there,” he says. “No way was I going to meet him unless I was on one side of the barrier, and he was on the other.”
...
“Trudeau made serious and solid commitments. He said no relationship was more important to him than the nation-to-nation relationship with First Nations. He was so convincing that our people went out to vote for him in unprecedented numbers,” Grand Chief Phillip says.
It sounded a lot better than the previous decade under PM Stephen Harper, a time of slashed funding and open insults.
“We were virtually at war with the Harper government for ten years,” Phillip says. “Harper inflicted great hardship on our people, openly attacking our communities and leadership. I woke up to that ongoing battle every single day.
“Trudeau gave us hope.”
...
All that changed when the Trudeau government gave the green light to British Columbia’s massive hydro development on the Peace River, the Site C Dam.
“It was late Friday afternoon when Ottawa made the announcement. This did surprise us. This was the acid test, that they would provide these approvals. Treaty Eight people had travelled to Ottawa and laid out the facts. We told them that this would have adverse affects on native people and the environment.
“The truth is, Trudeau lied to us. He is very close to violating the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. I describe him now as a serial liar.”
His point-blank verbal blast at Trudeau is echoed by an iconic figure in Canadian public life and letters — author, scientist and broadcaster David Suzuki.
“It was late Friday afternoon when Ottawa made the announcement. This did surprise us. This was the acid test, that they would provide these approvals. Treaty Eight people had travelled to Ottawa and laid out the facts. We told them that this would have adverse affects on native people and the environment.
“The truth is, Trudeau lied to us. He is very close to violating the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. I describe him now as a serial liar.”
His point-blank verbal blast at Trudeau is echoed by an iconic figure in Canadian public life and letters — author, scientist and broadcaster David Suzuki.
Like Grand Chief Phillip, Suzuki didn’t always see it that way. In fact, he voted strategically for Trudeau in order get rid of the only politician he says he has ever “hated” — Stephen Harper. At first, it seemed like a sound strategy.
“Justin came in and it was such a huge relief after Harper. As a father of four girls, I loved his initial actions — gender equity, then Paris, and of course a big, big commitment to First Nations.
“What the hell is going on now? Site C, Kinder Morgan, he even snuck in the southern line! My daughter and both her two kids were arrested protesting this stuff. His grade today? F. He has lost all credibility with me.”
To me, Justin Trudeau represents the very best British Columbians can expect from our federal government. They need us. They need our taxes. They need our harbours. They need our coast. What do we get back? You heard it from Chief Phillip and David Suzuki - we are repaid in lies, in broken promises.
Against our clear will, Ottawa, Alberta, the rest of Canada, force us to submit, against our will, to more bitumen trafficking, an armada of supertankers plying our coastal waters, an oil spill hazard that you have no idea how to clean up.
Look, this is our coast. It's our history, our heritage, our legacy and you want to put it at mortal risk so that you can blindly ramp up the extraction and export of the world's highest cost/highest carbon ersatz petroleum, in quantities sufficient to subvert the Copenhagen and Paris climate agreements.
Read my previous post, "Stranger Things Have Happened." If America's Pacific coast states peeled away from the U.S.A., there's a good chance we'd be there - in a heartbeat.
I think we've had it.
The disappointment you folks on the West Coast feel, Mound, is shared by many in the East as well. The chance to do something meaningful in climate change mitigation, the promise to improve the lives of working people (he never says "working class," does he?), the declaration that the most recent election would be the last of the first-past-the-post system, and many, many more stated and implied departures from the usual way of governing have all been tossed aside as the traditional, perennial Liberal arrogance has returned. Apparently what Canadians really voted for in electing his government was a change in style, not substance. We were fooled once again.
ReplyDeleteSilliness. Politicians break promises to Canadian from coast to coast, BC isn't unique.
ReplyDeleteAnd Dam C is a BC idea, it doesn't come from Ottawa, look to your own Premier.
And this is to address a previous Ottawa is out to get BC post, but in 2016 Toronto actually surpassed Vancouver as having the least affordable housing in Canada, so the housing speculators are just fucking up BC, they're doing a number on other parts of Canada too.
The RoC is not out to get BC its just we've had alot of bad Prime Ministers, Trudeau is just the lastest example of incompetence.
I think it makes more sense to reach out to Canadians across the country who care about the same issues that you do, instead of inventing excuses to isolate British Columbia.
Silliness. Politicians break promises to Canadian from coast to coast, BC isn't unique.
ReplyDeleteAnd Dam C is a BC idea, it doesn't come from Ottawa, look to your own Premier.
And this is to address a previous Ottawa is out to get BC post, but in 2016 Toronto actually surpassed Vancouver as having the least affordable housing in Canada, so the housing speculators are just fucking up BC, they're doing a number on other parts of Canada too.
The RoC is not out to get BC its just we've had alot of bad Prime Ministers, Trudeau is just the lastest example of incompetence.
I think it makes more sense to reach out to Canadians across the country who care about the same issues that you do, instead of inventing excuses to isolate British Columbia.
Trudeau reminds me most of that "hopey, changey" fellow that just left the White House. Like the US Democrats, the Canadian Liberals are just as much a ruling-class party as their conservative counterparts, though they pretend otherwise at election time. Both run from the left but govern from the right. Both serve one percenters, banksters, oil companies and privatizers more than the average voter.
ReplyDeleteSeeing Trudeau green-light Site C, Kinder Morgan and the LNG terminal was no real surprise. Even during the election campaign, some vague promises about consulting with FN communities and overhauling the NEB were the best he was offering.
But peeling away from the ROC isn't going to solve your problem so long as Christy Clark and her party remain in power. She's four-square behind all those projects you condemn. And as even I can see from my position far to the east of the Rockies, she stands a good chance of continuing as premier come May. Seems to me that BCers on the left have more immediate challenges than figuring out how to leave Canada.
GDP has to grow every year, or else.
ReplyDeleteI have this niggling itch that says JT is setting up Kevin O’Leary to be the next PM. As you had in one of your previous posts, Mound, when a government runs rip-shod over the populace, sooner or later the pitchforks come out.
ReplyDelete