Canada is emitting enough greenhouse gases without additional hot air from NDP leader Jack Layton.
At the beginning of November, Jack Layton threw a parliamentary life-line to Stephen Harper. He met with the prime minister after threatening that the NDP was prepared to introduce a motion of non-confidence in the Conservatives if they did not show flexibility on the issue of climate change. The maneuver was designed to resemble the NDP’s ultimatum to Paul Martin’s government in 2005 on the issue of the Liberal budget.
The difference was that the challenge to the Liberals bore fruit. Real changes were made to the budget that benefited ordinary Canadians. The ultimatum to Harper won’t end up reducing Canada’s greenhouse gas emissions by one ton.
Following his meeting with Layton, Stephen Harper announced that the government would send its Clean Air Act to a parliamentary committee prior to second reading. The NDP backed away from its threatened confidence motion and sent out a release headlined: “NDP achieves victory on climate change.”
“This breaks the parliamentary logjam,” declared Jack Layton. “What has been achieved over the last 48 hours means that this minority parliament will move forward on vital climate change legislation. This is a victory for all Canadians.”
Just what victory has been achieved “for all Canadians”?
A recent public opinion poll released by the CBC and Environics revealed that 71 per cent of Canadians believe the Conservatives’ Clean Air Act is not tough enough. On the issue of climate change, the Conservatives have become a bad joke. Defending the government’s phony mid century targets for achieving emission reductions has made Environment Minister Rona Ambrose a national embarrassment as she takes to the world stage at the UN conference on climate change in Nairobi.
So along comes Jack Layton to ease Stephen Harper’s pain. He meets with the prime minister, declares victory and today he fails to show up with Bloc Leader Gilles Duceppe and Interim Liberal Leader Bill Graham at a joint news conference to condemn the Conservatives for their disgraceful environmental policy.
Instead of forging a united parliamentary opposition to Stephen Harper on climate change, the NDP plays its own game, whose cynical goal is all-too-obvious. The NDP hopes to make Harper look better than he really is, and wants to make the Liberals look worse than they are now prepared to be. This has everything to do with setting the stage for Jack Layton’s next election campaign and nothing to do with achieving real action on climate change.
Everybody knows that the late Liberal government had an abominable environmental record during its thirteen years in office. But anybody who has been watching the Liberal leadership contest knows that the four leading candidates are all committed to serious action on climate change. There has been a sea-change in the urgency with which Canadians now approach this question. If Stephen Harper is driven from office in the next election, climate change will be the first item on the new government’s agenda, whoever is installed at 24 Sussex Drive.
Meanwhile Stephen Harper, whose image is being air-brushed by Jack Layton, is the one national leader who is solidly committed to doing nothing on greenhouse gas emissions. Has the NDP forgotten that the Conservatives are the party of, by and for Big Oil? This is the party that advertises Canada as the most secure source of petroleum for the United States. Stephen Harper and his friends in the oil patch are dedicated to ramping up the production of oil from the Alberta oil sands as rapidly as possible. There are billions of dollars to be made from this.
Present oil sands technology involves the use of clean natural gas and enormous supplies of water to produce dirty oil. While oil sands production is transforming much of northern Alberta into a lobotomized lunarscape, greenhouse gas emissions are skyrocketing. The plain fact is that as long as this country fails to face up to the consequences of its position as the number one external supplier of oil to the U.S., it cannot play a positive role on the issue of climate change.
Stephen Harper may shift his rhetoric a little to help the NDP keep its share of the non-Conservative vote, but he will never budge on his commitment to Big Oil.
Who is Jack Layton trying to kid?
At the beginning of November, Jack Layton threw a parliamentary life-line to Stephen Harper. He met with the prime minister after threatening that the NDP was prepared to introduce a motion of non-confidence in the Conservatives if they did not show flexibility on the issue of climate change. The maneuver was designed to resemble the NDP’s ultimatum to Paul Martin’s government in 2005 on the issue of the Liberal budget.
The difference was that the challenge to the Liberals bore fruit. Real changes were made to the budget that benefited ordinary Canadians. The ultimatum to Harper won’t end up reducing Canada’s greenhouse gas emissions by one ton.
Following his meeting with Layton, Stephen Harper announced that the government would send its Clean Air Act to a parliamentary committee prior to second reading. The NDP backed away from its threatened confidence motion and sent out a release headlined: “NDP achieves victory on climate change.”
“This breaks the parliamentary logjam,” declared Jack Layton. “What has been achieved over the last 48 hours means that this minority parliament will move forward on vital climate change legislation. This is a victory for all Canadians.”
Just what victory has been achieved “for all Canadians”?
A recent public opinion poll released by the CBC and Environics revealed that 71 per cent of Canadians believe the Conservatives’ Clean Air Act is not tough enough. On the issue of climate change, the Conservatives have become a bad joke. Defending the government’s phony mid century targets for achieving emission reductions has made Environment Minister Rona Ambrose a national embarrassment as she takes to the world stage at the UN conference on climate change in Nairobi.
So along comes Jack Layton to ease Stephen Harper’s pain. He meets with the prime minister, declares victory and today he fails to show up with Bloc Leader Gilles Duceppe and Interim Liberal Leader Bill Graham at a joint news conference to condemn the Conservatives for their disgraceful environmental policy.
Instead of forging a united parliamentary opposition to Stephen Harper on climate change, the NDP plays its own game, whose cynical goal is all-too-obvious. The NDP hopes to make Harper look better than he really is, and wants to make the Liberals look worse than they are now prepared to be. This has everything to do with setting the stage for Jack Layton’s next election campaign and nothing to do with achieving real action on climate change.
Everybody knows that the late Liberal government had an abominable environmental record during its thirteen years in office. But anybody who has been watching the Liberal leadership contest knows that the four leading candidates are all committed to serious action on climate change. There has been a sea-change in the urgency with which Canadians now approach this question. If Stephen Harper is driven from office in the next election, climate change will be the first item on the new government’s agenda, whoever is installed at 24 Sussex Drive.
Meanwhile Stephen Harper, whose image is being air-brushed by Jack Layton, is the one national leader who is solidly committed to doing nothing on greenhouse gas emissions. Has the NDP forgotten that the Conservatives are the party of, by and for Big Oil? This is the party that advertises Canada as the most secure source of petroleum for the United States. Stephen Harper and his friends in the oil patch are dedicated to ramping up the production of oil from the Alberta oil sands as rapidly as possible. There are billions of dollars to be made from this.
Present oil sands technology involves the use of clean natural gas and enormous supplies of water to produce dirty oil. While oil sands production is transforming much of northern Alberta into a lobotomized lunarscape, greenhouse gas emissions are skyrocketing. The plain fact is that as long as this country fails to face up to the consequences of its position as the number one external supplier of oil to the U.S., it cannot play a positive role on the issue of climate change.
Stephen Harper may shift his rhetoric a little to help the NDP keep its share of the non-Conservative vote, but he will never budge on his commitment to Big Oil.
Who is Jack Layton trying to kid?
8 comments:
Layton's working
Who is Jack Layton trying to kid?
Who are you trying to kid about the Liberals?
Has the NDP forgotten that the Conservatives are the party of, by and for Big Oil? This is the party that advertises Canada as the most secure source of petroleum for the United States.
Have you forgotten Frank McKenna's recent 'renewal report'--commissioned by the Liberal party--that echoes the Canadian Council of Chief Executives' call for the creation of a US-Canada 'Resource Security Pact' that would 'include agricultural products, forestry products, oil, gas, electricity and minerals. It would provide security of supply and access and enable global supply chains to function as they should.'
Yes, that's Liberal Frank McKenna echoing the CCCE's call to secure Canadian energy for 'North American' (read=US) interests.
Oh, and who formed the North American Energy Working Group with George Bush and Vicente Fox back in 2001 in order to better 'to enhance North American energy trade and interconnections.'
That would be the Liberals again.
And what about March 2005, at the launch of the 'Security and Prosperity Partnership,' when Liberal Paul Martin was 'advertising' the tar sands to George Bush, and energy reserves in the Beaufort Sea as well?
(Bush, needless to say, was quite thankful.)
It's a serious mistake to think the Liberals would be any less eager than Harper to turn Canada into a 'secure' source of energy for the US.
Of course, all throughout these various stages, the Liberals have always talked about sending energy south in a way that respects the environment.
Just as the CCCE has done.
Neither is credible.
The plain fact is that as long as this country fails to face up to the consequences of its position as the number one external supplier of oil to the U.S., it cannot play a positive role on the issue of climate change.
The plain fact is that the Liberals' history, as well as their current 'renewal commission's' recommendations on energy relations with the US, suggests they are determined *not* to face up to the very thing you say the nation must address.
Frankly, I think you're seriously mistaken to believe any comments by Liberal leadership hopefuls represent the prospect of a real change of direction on energy and the environment from that political quarter.
The NDP are actually doing something useful, rather than just talking big.
Canadians are tired of Liberal outrage in defense of progressive social policy - that never seems to translaste into actual progressive social policy. Unless forced into a corner by minority government of course.
Oh it would help the currently leaderless and incohate Liberals if the NDP weren't so rude as to actually attempt address issues for the Canadian people right now?
Yeah,we'll definitely take that under advisement.
Your criticism is premature. If the committee the bill got referred to doesn't manage to come up with anything decent, then you can say this was a waste of time.
If the New Brunswick Liberals are any indication, I'm quite optimistic about the federal party on the environment.
I share some of your views. I am very upset that the party I work for, support and otherwise go to the wall for is behaving in a way I simply do not understand. I am very annoyed and down right ticked off that Layton is supporting Harper in this way. The Liberals are coming off smelling like roses with Dion at the helm and the Green Party a group that is simply conservatives dressed in green is creeping up on Jack and he says nothing. Where is the sense in this. Jack is spouting entirely too much hot air. Does this mean I have to vote left leaning liberal? What a disappointment in the fed NDP.
I must say James, and I intend to democratically seed my comment at the appropriate posts throughout your site, that your recent rants regarding the NDP are bizarre, and the group of Liberal losers you have supporting them are a laugh. They often, as with the ill-informed Lib who did not seem to realize that that the NDP was the ONLY party to vote against the government on all three confidence motions, seem determined to find some obscure moral justification for voting Liberal while pretending that doing so makes them still progressive.
Well, to paraphrase your recent rubbish in the Globe, that it simply a fiction.
One could go over the same old tired but true territory that the Libs ran the most right wing government since the end of the second war when they felt no threat from the left. (The 95 budget being one of the great disgraces of modern Canadian political history... but hey as long as they are not Tories in name I guess you don't care if they are Tories in deed).
One could point out that, your silly attack at Layton to the contrary, the ONLY reason the NDP had to try to work with Rona Ambrose as environment minister was due to the fact that the Libs had refused to vote against her as environment minister when the NDP proposed a Bloc backed motion to do so. (But to you and other Lib apologists it is always tactical when the Libs betray promises, the public trust, etc...when the NDP do anything tactical to advance the interests of Canada's socialist movement it is somehow a "betrayal". This is hypocritical crap, two-faced, and pure proof that the real objective is to serve as an apologist for the Libs. How about ONE SINGLE article critical of Lib positions and self-serving actions. Till I see one I must say that your whole line is a little hard to take seriously.)
One could point out that the Libs have consistently put short term political goals ahead of the interests of the Canadian working class, native peoples, women, gays, even your own personal bugaboo of nationalism (never did renegotiate that free trade agreement did they?), but you only ever seem to notice what you perceive as the NDP putting their political interests first. Well, political parties exist to win elections to advance the interests they support and while you seem to accept this when the Libs do it (and I will come back to this) you reserve all your scorn for the NDP. Why not stop pretending, just join the Liberal Party.
Why not? Well you would lose all that left wing credibility you feel you have built up. So, without having actually done anything politically for years you take cheap shots, dripping with psuedo-leftist sanctimony, at the only political movement that makes this country worth living in, heaping scorn in the process on tens of thousands of actual activists who are the real bulwark that keeps this country out of the union to the south.
One could point out that while you say that the NDP was duped by the Tories, it was really your tired old vision of a 70's nationalism that has duped you into supporting Libs at the expense of Canadian children, social programs, NDP provincial governments, transfer payments, health care, the environment, etc...out of the vague belief that doing so would somehow bolster Canadian nationalist interests by keeping the Tories out of office. Well done. All those who stayed silent during the Liberal majority years as they ripped the heart out of the post war consensus and damned a million Canadian kids to poverty on the backs of fiscal responsibility sure managed to keep this country strong by getting so enraged by the NDP standing up to this same regime after 13 years. Frankly maybe a few too many years of academics has made you lose touch and forget why we are fighting this fight. In this new era your old lines of demarcation are particularly wrong.
One could say all these things, and more (and I will be happy to follow up on any brave bloggers who are so certain to change the world glued as they are to their laptops and poli-sci classes)but in fact the most obvious indication that your approach hides a whole tapestry of hypocrisy can be exposed by bringing up your own son.
Michael, if I am not mistaken, ran against Jim Karigyanis ( I may have got the name wrong, but we all, sadly, know who I mean) in Scarborough in 2000 ( I think he also ran for the party in 2003 provincially). He did not do well, but hey, why should you Lib lovers care? But he did run hard against one of the ugliest, pro-life, pro-death penalty, anti-gay, mean spirited and plain old useless Lib MPs out there. A man even the Star said was a horrible MP. By your own logic he either should not have run, or he should have only attacked his Tory and, at that time, Alliance opponents, despite Jim K.'s disgraceful record.
Were he to run again against Jim K. would you support him? Wouldn't doing so aid the Tories?
This is the huge flaw in your logic. Many great NDP candidates, like your own son, are undermined and destroyed by the strategic voting logic. While you may say, hey I didn't mean it to apply to "bad" Liberals, in the public’s mind it always will. And well you may say, my son had no chance so go ahead and vote for him, your logic defeats many candidates who did have a chance like Sid Ryan. Instead, what you have to live with, as Dion affirmed by once again proving Lib gutlessness and allowing a free vote on the gay marriage issue, is that you have laid with a group of people who, unlike the NDP, will tolerate the Jim Ks, the Tom Wappels, the Dennis Lees and the countless other right wing, anti-gay, pro-life, pro-death penalty and, on a constituency level, useless MPs that populate the Liberal ranks.
Which brings us to a final point. For all your crap about the NDP putting seats first, when the time came to stand up for gay rights the NDP threw Bev Desjardins out of caucus even though this doomed them to lose a seat they otherwise would certainly have won. The Liberals, in a policy reasserted by Dion, tolerate all levels of such bigotry in their ranks so as to keep a few seats here or there safe for vile, bigoted candidates who will, in the end, vote for a Lib Budget. What a principled bunch of folks they are!
Frankly, I would rather vote for your son.
Post a Comment