For Sentient People, Liberals and Conservatives Excluded, It's a No-Brainer.

Yes, I just disparaged Liberal and Conservative supporters but I have my reasons.  For starters, they're on the wrong side of what is sweeping the world, Canada included.

Maybe they've been conditioned to believe in fairy tales, utter nonsense. Could be, I don't know. However they're willing to believe some really twisted nonsense.

Fr'instance. Some of them believe that climate change isn't happening or, if it is, it's just part of the natural cycle. Some believe it's an outright hoax. Some believe that Canada, as a major emitter of greenhouse gases, overall and per capita, is too small to matter. Some of them, especially Liberals, buy Justin's warped fairy tale about how the battle against climate change can only be won by flooding world markets with high-carbon, low-value, climate wrecking bitumen.  You've gotta be double-dumb to swallow that.

Back when I left the Liberals for the Greens, I'd just had my fill of that party's ineptitude. That was about halfway through the Ignatieff years. Remember that joker describing the Tar Sands as "the beating heart of the Canadian economy" for the 21st century?

In 2015 I voted Green but old loyalties die hard and I was still hoping that this Liberal wunderkid with the legendary name would put Canada back on the right path. Boy did I get that wrong. At least I didn't vote for them. I've had a lifetime of buyer's remorse.

So, Green it is then. Unless they do something to screw it up, the Greens are going to take their place as a political force in our country. That's because they own the environmental issue. You know, the existential threat Canada faces. The greatest threat we've ever faced. The mortal threat that imperils our society, our economy, our lives, our future.

You would think that would be Number One on any government's priority list. Only the current regime, acting like nothing so much as the bunch they ousted, is doubling down on bitumen.  Even his choice of environment minister, Dame Cathy, speaks volumes. When it comes to standing up for the environment, she's as pliable as a Gumby.

But there is hope. James Dennison writes in The Guardian that "Europe's Greens are on fire" and parties on the Left and the Right are being swept into environmental politics.

In May’s European parliament elections, the Greens won 22 more seats and 4.4% more of the vote than in 2014. Domestically, the German Greensparticipate in a majority of state governments and top national polling; the president of Austria is a Green-Independent and Greens have secured record vote shares in recent elections in Finland, Belgium and the Netherlands. They are also poised to pick up votes in forthcoming Swiss and Austrian elections. Although setbacks in Denmark and Sweden highlight the importance of national context, Greens have been gaining footholds outside their historical strongholds and are surging in polls in Ireland and the UK. 

The most obvious explanation is found in shifting attitudes to the environment and the climate crisis. Although Europeans lost some belief in the threat during the 2000s, by 2016 large majorities across the continent agreed that global heating was happening, that it was at least partially caused by humans and that its impact would be negative. It is this “salience” that activates emotions and changes voting behaviour.

...However, there is more to the current Green success than greater environmental concern. The geographical disparities can still be partially explained by the long-term emergence of “post-material values” in affluent western European societies in the 1970s. These saw individuals move beyond materialist, redistributive concerns to quality-of-life matters, including care for the environment.

Justin Trudeau was roundly celebrated for his pithy response to his choice of a gender equal cabinet - "because it's 2015."  Wowser. Then he proceeded to govern as though it was still 1980.

He's still up to his neck neoliberal. He's still questing for perpetual exponential growth in GDP. He's every inch a petro-pol and, climate change or no, he's determined that Canada should remain a petro-state. It's all so 1980.

The Euros are well ahead of us, no question, but we'll catch up before long when climate change really starts hurting us. My take is that we're going to experience a lot of unwelcome change between now and 2030. Eventually even Liberals and Conservatives will ask, "what were we thinking"?

UPDATE:

I just learned from Lorne, at Politics and its Discontents, that the Canadian public may have reached a climate tipping point. It seems we're becoming fed up with the Liberal/Tory runaround. We're going to take the agenda back from these greasy petro-pols.  A survey commissioned by iPolitics suggests the Canadian people, especially young Canadians, have stopped buying what Trudeau and Scheer are selling.

61 per cent of respondents strongly or somewhat agreed with the statement that it’s more important for the government to solve the issue of climate change even if that means that the economy suffers. That number was even higher in Quebec (76.8 per cent), Atlantic Canada (67.3) and B.C. (62), and among women (66.1), 18-35 year olds (64.4) and those aged 65 or older (64).

Over 85 per cent of respondents agreed that private companies should have to pay to pollute, including 69.1 per cent who strongly agreed. Support was highest in Quebec (89.1 per cent) and lowest in Alberta, though at 75.2 per cent agreeing, opposition to the concept is still rather marginal. 

Also, just under 68 per cent of respondents agreed that there’s a collective moral duty to future generations to not destroy the environment further, even if it means paying more taxes in the short term. As with the other responses, support was highest in Quebec (70.2 per cent), above the national average in B.C. (71.5) and Ontario (69.9), and lowest in Alberta (53).

These are not good issues for Liberals or Conservatives. In this election they may be hurdles Trudeau and Scheer cannot clear.