Wild Rose Denialism

Jason Kenney has sure got his dainties in a bunch over the decision by Teck Resources to back away from the Frontier bitumen mega-mine.

To hear Kenney tell it, it's all Justin Trudeau's fault. Even though Teck backtracked less than a week before Ottawa was to announce its decision on the Frontier mine proposal, that week must have been more than Teck's nerves could bear - at least if you believe Kenney.

So this is all Ottawa's doing. Justin Trudeau is to blame.

Conspicuously absent from Team Kenney's explanation are all the recent telltales that bitumen is fast becoming a stranded asset as far as the financial sector is concerned. BlackRock, which manages a $7-trillion fund ruled out high-carbon investments. It named names - coal and bitumen. Then JP Morgan announced it wouldn't be lending to companies that had even a small investment in the Tar Sands. Big insurers such as America's, the Hartford, followed suit.

No that couldn't possibly be it. It was Trudeau's doing.

It couldn't have anything to do with the foreign energy giants who have left Athabasca in droves or the quarter trillion dollar outstanding tab for site remediation.

No, pretty sure that wasn't it. It had to be Trudeau.

It definitely couldn't be explained by the chronic decline in world oil prices that, alone, made the Frontier mine economically unviable or the 900 million write down Teck just endured on its Fort Hills mine investment.

Maybe, but no, no, no. It was Trudeau.

It can't be any of these other, logical factors because, if it was, that puts the blame squarely at the feet of the succession of Alberta governments post Peter Lougheed who have acted recklessly and squandered the wealth they did manage to garner out of the Tar Sands. 

No, let's blame it all on Trudeau and then speak no more of these things. That's not to say that Jason's followers won't buy his feeble excuses but, if they do, they might be dumber than Donald Trump's base and that's really, really dumb.