Wednesday, July 15, 2020

If It's a Scandal You're Looking For


If you think this "WE" business rises to the level of a scandal, you're wrong. Trudeau has apologized and let's move on.

There is another scandal involving the Trudeau government, one that's awfully horrific. It's about how Trudeau & Company have chosen to allocate their aid to the energy sector almost entirely to fossil fuel companies, giving the clean energy sector the cold shoulder.
Federal energy and environment officials were warned in late April that Canada's clean-tech sector was in danger as COVID-19 knocked the bottom out of the industry. 
Three months later, a new policy tracker on energy investments made by G20 countries finds Ottawa and the provinces have put very little on the table to help clean-tech companies directly, while targeting fossil-fuel producers with more than $16 billion in aid. 
Keith Stewart, a senior energy strategist at Greenpeace Canada, said the federal government has been "completely captured by the oil industry."
But wait. Didn't the Trudeau government proclaim we're in a climate state of emergency? Of course they did, right there on the floor of the House of Commons. Of course, less than 24 hours later they greenlighted the massive expansion of the bitumen pipeline to the west coast. And now they're snubbing Canada's fledgling clean energy industry in favour of the fossil fuelers.
The Winnipeg-based International Institute for Sustainable Development contributed to a new international energy-policy tracker, released Wednesday, which counted all the investments made by G20 countries in energy — both fossil fuels and clean energy — since Jan. 1. Across the G20, about $201 billion has been earmarked for fossil-fuel industries, and $119 billion for clean energy. 
In Canada, the difference between the two is much more stark, with $16 billion put down to support the oil and gas industries, compared with $300 million for clean energy. That includes Alberta's $1.5 billion equity investment and the $6-billion loan guarantee for the Keystone XL pipeline, and Ottawa's $750 million to help fossil-fuel companies cut methane emissions.
If you're looking for a real scandal, a betrayal of Canada and our people, look no further.

10 comments:

Anonymous said...

How does supporting fossil fuels make any sense? Economically, it makes no sense either since the government will never recoup the investment. In any case, most of the "energy companies," as they like to style themselves, are in US hands, so much of the investment leaves the country. Ecologically, it makes no sense at all, turning Canada into a pariah state of planet-killing, high carbon producers.

If Alberta and Saskatchewan were swing provinces, Trudeau's support for fossil fuel companies might make political sense. But those provinces consistently send Cons to Ottawa. So I'm stumped for a rationale. Does the US have a gun to Trudeau's head? I don't get it.

Cap

Trailblazer said...

Like him or hate him, PE Trudeau was special, an educated and dedicated man.
Justin and Margaret live off his accomplishments and reputation.
All too often the electorate vote and worship dynasties .
FFS the Americans would love a Monarchy!

As for the petro influence.
Since oil has been used as a strategic product the oil companies have had influence upon world politics with disastrous results to humanity and acclaim from the board of directors.


TB

TB

The Disaffected Lib said...

Now, Cap, you're attempting to discern logic in this. As Jason Kenney stomps his feet and spits flames, big investment houses (BlackRock) and insurance giants (Munich Re for one) are walking away from Athabasca sludge, recognizing that Mark Carney et al are right - bitumen is soon to be a 'stranded asset.'

Why did Trudeau dispatch Morneau to Texas with the government chequebook to grossly overpay for a pipeline that the Enron alumni had already chosen to abandon? Why, absent any demand for ever more bitumen, did the government drive through the Trans Mountain expansion even as it emerged they had underestimated the construction costs by 70 per cent?

Maybe they're insecure, fearful of exercising a bit of vision. This brings to mind Harper's 2009 "stimulus" budget that turned into one giant pinata party. Harper could have invested that stimulus in badly needed infrastructure that would repay dividends to Canada for decades but he just couldn't bring himself to take responsibility for such expenditures. No vision. Even Harper's former BFF, Tom Flanagan, said that Harper eschewed vision. He had no time for it.

Today we're in the hands of petit fonctionnaires, grey suits stuffed with wet cardboard. If you want something that's bound to reduce you to tears, read Mike Pearson's biography and then contrast Pearson with Harper or Trudeau.

https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/peace/1957/pearson/biographical/

The Disaffected Lib said...


Too true, Trailblazer - every bit of it. Thanks.

Purple library guy said...

It's a matter of loyalty. Justin Trudeau is unshakeably loyal to the funders of the Liberal party and the mass media's major advertisers.

Toby said...

@ Cap: "Does the US have a gun to Trudeau's head?"

I believe so. I think it's through NAFTA. I also think the various pipelines may ultimately be for water.

Whether I'm right or not doesn't matter. What does is that Canadians are kept in the dark about important matters.

Northern PoV said...

I certainly can't quibble with your point here, Mound.

However, before we consign the WE debacle to the dustbin of yesterday's milquetoast Canadian scandals, I think we need to use it to focus on the scam of tax-receipted charity giving. Like how food banks went from a temporary emergency response to an institutionalized part of our post-welfare state that assists large corporation to increase profits by essentially selling indulgences to sooth the angst of affluenza.

As usual, the esteemed Climenhaga points out a context for all this "Big Society" bs:
https://albertapolitics.ca/2020/07/from-us-to-we-the-dickensian-big-society-seems-to-be-back-again-if-it-ever-left/

We've seen many pics of both CONs & LIBs promoting these dweebs. (Apparently SK/Moe is proceeding with virtually the same deal with WE, that Jr is getting spanked for.)

WE is not a typical quid-pro-quo scandal
Rather, the distracting WE spectacle reminds us that rich-people-celebrity culture and the related charities they use to avoid, even, the very low-taxes we make them pay, is a form of civic vandalism.

If someone wants to give their AFTER-tax $$ to charity, I'm all for it. In the meantime, the charity industry is a scam that lets rich folks indulge in vanity projects while the services and infrastructure of the civic sphere withers and dies.

thwap said...

MoS,

This comment is really just an attempt to notify you that I made a post about a conversation we had recently and I was interested if you had a response to it.

The Disaffected Lib said...

Toby,there's no question that Canadians are "kept in the dark." I think that's a natural by-product of our compromised democracy where a 39 per cent share of the vote can deliver a powerful majority government. That weakens the bond between the public and their dubiously "elected" government. Until we have a better form of representative politics, we'll be ruled, not governed.

The Disaffected Lib said...

NPoV, Michael Harris attributes this lack of accountability to a general decline in ethics in the political ranks but also among the general population.

https://thetyee.ca/Analysis/2020/07/14/Why-Trudeau-Gets-Away-With-So-Much-Stuff/