Canadian Company contacts

Dynasty Metals & Mining
http://www.dynastymining.com/

Aurelian Resources
http://www.aurelian.ca/

It figures

Capitalism and democracy don't mix. Canada has no business being involved in Ecuador's political process.

Good luck to Ecuador. Good

Good luck to Ecuador. Good thing they don't have the rope of NAFTA like treaties around their necks and still have the hope to make decisions to help their own peoples.

Mining is an important industry, provided they abide by the strictest environmental laws and the minerals and proceeds are used for the benefit of humanity and not enslavement for profits, especially when they're taken out of the country.

These and most mining companies are parasites. The ambassador has no right to complain because their rights to steal the country blind may be hampered.

Ed Deak.

yup

Multinational companies will steal any country blind!
What happens in Equador also happens right here.
It is the bottomline that counts for these parasites and people are merely another commodity.
The problem is of course that the shareholders do not have to live in the devastated regions their greed leave behind!

ME2

I take it you disagree? Examples of money subverting, or attempting to subvert, the democratic process abound.

Corruption exists everywhere, the differences are only in degree. There's an organization that even attempts to track the levels of corruption in each country so as to compare them and I assume shame the worst ones.

Its bad enough we have to put up with it at home, both the blatant (the Legislature Raids in BC) and the subtle (politicians taking plum corporate positions after their public service), we shouldn't export it to other countries as well.

The idea of our ambassador endorsing a process whereby our mining companies will get Ecuadorean police and military support against Ecuadoreans that protest what they do there is ridiculous.

Our ambassador should tell Ecuador and our mining companies that we are there only at the invitation of the people of Ecuador and like all good guests we aren't going to make the rules or piss on their rug.

Ecuador is only the tip of

Ecuador is only the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the rape and pilage of South American mining resouces.

Chile and Peru have sold out thier resources to mining corporations and I assure you, neither the miners or local citizens of either country have seen much benefit.

I've had the benefit of meeting with miners from South America on several occasions and have heard first hand about the lack of regard for workers safety, the environment and the well being of the local population.

There have been many protests in both Chile and Peru recently, not surprisingly, our Canadian corporations are not listening. They continue to spout words about bring prosperity to all, but the only ones profitting are corportations.

In some instances entire towns are moved to accomodate mining interests, and many water ways have been significantly damaged due to mercury poisioining.

I'm not sure about Ecuador, but in Chile and Peru, miners are working at 15,000ft and suffering from high altitude sickness. Going from this level to sea level on a weekly basis is subjecting these men to illness and early death.

Our government and their corporate bosses are totally dispicable and shame our nation.

first the seal hunt, now gold mining

Is it any surprise that the Canadian government, which has been travelling around Europe of late lobbying against the EU-wide ban on the inhumane and unsustainable commercial slaughter of seals for the luxury fur trade, is now lobbying for the luxury gold trade and opposing environmental protection and human rights in South America? Canada's reputation as a peace-loving and caring country is being diminished by the greed of its officials.

Some food for thought

Without meaning to cast any doubt on the good intentions of the commenters here I'd like to suggest that this article and the comments it received reflect a worldview that is almost completely wrong.

Gold is not a luxury good: it's a form of currency. In the present environment it acts as the anti-dollar. It is a way for countries and individuals to at least partially escape the hegemony of the dollar standard, the system by which the world's economic surplus is returned to the US via purchase of dollar-denominated debt (mostly treasuries but also largely US mortgage debt.) Why do you think Cheney says (echoing Reagan) that deficits don't matter? It's because - net / net - the rest of the world is forced to swallow the extra debt created by US deficits or face rising currencies and falling exports. This means that, in effect, the rest of the world is paying for America's war to secure control over Iraq's oil! This is one of the reasons that the central banks of China and Russia among many others are adding to their gold stocks. A rising gold price and falling US dollar marks the gradual end of this system and is a particularly welcome development for world peace and shared prosperity in my honest opinion.

I strongly recommend to anyone that doubts the above the work of Michael Hudson. His interviews at Counterpunch are here:

http://tinyurl.com/5kkdqu

His website here:

http://www.michael-hudson.com/

sorry... long post

In a similar vein the coincidence of the rise of socialist movements in Latin America and the rise in commodity prices is linked. The power of these countries - Ecuador, Venezuela, Bolivia etc. - to renegotiate their terms of trade with the rest of the world so that they take an equitable share of the wealth has risen with commodity prices. This marks a large historical inflection point. The IMF used to be able to set terms of trade that heavily favoured the financial powers (read Anglo-world.) The ludicrous IMF-enforced mining policies that Ecuador is currently re-engineering are a good case in point. But the IMF is now basically broke. (Hurrah!) It only has a very small number of loans on its books to I think Turkey and Greece. It can't pay its operating expenses.

My point is that an anti-mining stance predicated on the dominance of western finance enforced through the dollar standard is simply hopelessly out of date. Why do you think that Correa - Ecuador's socialist President - is pro mining? (The fact that this is not even mentioned in the article is I think very telling.) Its because he recognises that commodity producers like Ecuador have the upper hand and that resource development can become a huge positive for his country on terms that Ecuadorians can themselves dictate.

Right now, here in BC,

Right now, here in BC, claims can be recorded by email, without the knowledge, or approval of the owners of the land.

We had a lot of discussion on this criminal action on this blog some time ago.

So, how deep down do we own our lands? And if we own only the surface, what right do mining companies have to touch it ?

Who owns the water in our wells, or the crap in our septic tanks?

Ed Deak.

Fiat Lux

Hey Fiat Lux,

I'm intrigued by your comments. Regarding the question of resources being equivalent to investment in some way:

"It is not money that "creates jobs", but the resources and when you have resources, you have the necessary investment to develop them to the benefit of the country and not for some foreign, multinational corporate mafia."

Well, doesn't it require both? The only sense that I can make of this is that you are arguing for a change in the dominant money system so that governments spend money into existence and break the hold over minting money that the world's (mostly private) central banks have had. It seems to me that only in this context and with nationalised industries do you have a situation where the difference between resources and the capital required to develop them can become unimportant enough that it can be almost disregarded. Is this what you mean?

Ed Deak

Regarding ownership, isn't the real question whether there is some limiting factor on individual ownership rights. Take a dam project. Let's assume for a second that the project is environmentally sound and that it is receives general support of the population. The individuals displaced in its construction obviously will be harmed and their individual ownership rights overidden if it goes forward. Is there not a large body of law that deals with this limiting of individual ownership if the case is compelling that its in the greater good? Is this not the basic situation with mineral rights? Now obviously you could say that government is acting as industries handmaiden here if the development is private. But wouldn't essentially the same issues arise with publically owned corporations or ministries?

Dog-gone

Which locals? Isn't that the question? If I told you that Dynasty Minerals enjoys strong community support would that constitute them "asking for our help?" Or if a government encourages mineral exploration because it believes they need foreign expertise and capital to develop the industry, doesn't this represent a local viewpoint. Granted it depends on how legitimate the government is. In the case of Correa's government I would say it is very legitimate as it has enjoyed enormous popular support. What makes you so certain that the environmental movement is more legitimate than either the locals around the Dynasty operations or the popularly elected government?

The Creature From Jekyll Island

You will find the cause of the global financial crisis in the book "The Creature From Jekyll Island" by G. Edward Griffin.
I can only hope the "people" of South America do not let their leaders unilaterally push them over the economic precipice, as our leaders of late have done to Canadians (NAFTA). The national governments are bailing out their respective "private" central banks (FDIC). Due the steady production of fiat money, the taxpayers are ultimately going to be repaying the governments through taxes, and the hidden tax of inflation. Since money is no longer bases on gold. Oil, Gold, Groceries are not increasing in price, it is the continued devaluation of the dollar, by the Federal Reserve that hits us in the wallet.

Oddlots....I'm a dedicated

Oddlots....I'm a dedicated private enterpriser, self employed and a business owner in BC since 1957.

But what I can see today is the destruction of real private enterprise by artificial capital, "created" by some bank from the air, for the purpose of forced collectivization and colonization all over the world, into the hands of a multinational carpetbagger mafia, out to steal the world blind.

The dream of Stalin and Mao, who tried to do it with bayonets and who now are rolling in their graves for not having thought of this excellent racket, called "globally competitive free enterprise". Yes, free to screw anybody and I could tell you a bookful of stories on what I have seen and experienced on my own skin, by these goddamn crooks. Even now controlling the world's food supplies, stealing from producers and consumers alike. Look up the powers and actions of Cargill alone.

The biggest problem and crime wave are the globally ruling neoclassical market economy theory, combined with the deregulated money creation power of the banks.

All we'd need to start curing this are the return of regulated money creation we used to have before 1991 in Canada, the enforcement of the long existing anti cartel,trust, etc. laws controlling the size and powers of, especially, multinational corporations, the enforcement of strong environmental protection and getting the hell out of the NAFTA, WTO and IMF,all of them criminal organizations.

Money may have been once but no longer capital. Wit deregulation it has become a licence for the control of energy and resources, now issued by a special interest sector for its own benefit and to enslave the world with.

The real capital are the resources. As a businessman with some experience, I know that their sale is not an income, but the sale of capital, which is bloody stupid, even if brainwashed economists and bought politicians call it GDP.

When you have resources, you have capital and I have used this fact for many years.

We have a long string of Arrow Transfer trucks carrying BC's wealth from the Polley Mtn. copper/gold mine, to the ports, on a road, within 1 km from our house.

Of course, the workers are happy to get good paychecks, but how much of that real capital is enriching others, called "investors" in some other country, who're sitting on their asses and blessing the stupidity of Canadians for allowing it.

Of course, if Canadians want to rape other countries, they have no choice but to allow the rape of their own.

Ed Deak.

Legacy of poison

How can you blame Equador?I don't understand the reversal.Don't they have a current lawsuit against Shell for destroying huge swaths of jungle and leaving?Mining for gold and copper is extremely damaging and as arsenic,amongst other things is present you can bet the situation will wind up equally as dire.It's exploitation of resources that has been the dominant policy these people judge us by.Small wonder they have such a low opinion of North Americans.

I don't entirely disagree

I don't entirely disagree Ed. I highlighted much of the same issues with regard to the IMF and the importance of the dollar standard in enforcing western dominance over developing economies. But two things: 1) I still can't get my head around what "legitimate" development would look like in your eyes. 2) My argument was that neo-classical market economics have been discredited in South America and you now have, in Ecuador's case, a socialist president trying to develop the country. Why doesn't that make a difference to you?
With regard to 1) reading your comments it would almost seem like any development of a resource constitutes "rape." I think I know what you mean both about how easily we in Canada (or our government) is bought off with "economic development" (short term jobs) while depleting non-renewable resources. This tension exists to be exploited by "hard done-by" investors in any resource development question. Canada is particularly meek in this respect from what I've read (contrast Norway which has generous royalty provisions.) But my point would be, isn't this a difference of degree not of kind? There must be a percentage of revenue that would legitimise this process. Is it 100 %? What would that mean? Mining by a ministry? Aren't we better off keeping regulatory function hived off from operations and simply receiving as citizens a "fair percentage" of revenue as a no-risk, carried interest? If so, what is that percentage? If not, what would legitimate development mean? On another note, your comment about investors sitting on their ass trivialises the question. No doubt the "fat cats" exist. But what if you were to imagine instead a pension fund manager trying to earn a real inflation adjusted return on your monthly contributions so that whatever public or private plan you contribute to can make good on their commitments? Why does the "fat cat" issue de-legitimise the latter's efforts?

Legacy of poison

Who's blaming Ecuador? The question is does the world need copper and gold and under what conditions will mining these be both tolerable and beneficial to "locals" at the minesite level all the way up to the national level. This is the debate that is occurring in the country right now. There are big risks with mining such as depletion of water resources and potential groundwater contamination. This is enough to make the vast majority of people shy away from the issues. But the issues will return because the world needs these commodities. Russia recently announced that they were earmarking 30 billion of public funds for investment in a more efficient electrical grid. Is this a bad development? I would suggest that it isn't. Where is the millions of pounds of copper required going to come from? What is the least environmentally damaging way to source this supply? This is, in a sense, exactly the debate that is going on in Ecuador. The debate is highly strategic and politicised but at least all positions are represented, from investors through the pro-development government to the arch-environmentalists. The debate here seems to be about whether any resource exploitation is beneficial or legitimate which seems to me a little constrained in its outlook on the issues.

odd.....I started reading

odd.....I started reading economics in 1982 and by 1985 realized that the whole "science" was a bloody, criminal fraud. Spent the next 6 years on developing the correct definition of economic efficiency copyrighted in 1991, to establish the date, not for monetary purposes. Remains unbroken and unbreakable.

The biggest problem facing humanity today are the fraudulent definitions of economic efficiency as "the biggest profits for the least monetary inputs", the GDP, Growth and Productivity figures, totally meaningless, faith based crap the lot.

An economy should work like a road system where the safety and property of all users, regardless of size, is protected by laws and enforced by an independent authority.

The present, neoclassical system is the biggest crime wave in human history that destroys more ecology and people on a long term, yearly basis, than both world wars and the death camps of Stalin, Hitler and Mao put together.

WW2 killed 65 million in 6 years, mostly civilians, but the neoclassical system does it in 2 with destitution, starvation and easily preventable illnesses. And this is being taught in our universities as a "science" and "wealth creation".

Economic efficiency must be defined the same way as physical efficiency: "The most work done with the least physical inputs", or by Funk and Wagnall:" The ratio of work done, or energy expended to the energy supplied in the form of food or fuel"

"Monetary values are not realities, but often violence induced, temporary perceptions, therefore can not be used in economic calculations" My definition.

As to what constitutes "legitimate development", again it must be based on physical inputs and what the development is used for?

As I wrote in my 1991 definition:

12. "Our economic system are based on the misuse of concepts, mathematics and accounting. No sane person wishes to go back to primitivism, or muscle power, but there must be new, democratically controlled determination of when, how far and for whose benefit convenience may, or must overrule the concepts of true efficiency within the recovery capacity of the environment and humanity"

In short, you can not replace 50 humans with 1000 horsepower of electric, or oil energy and call it efficient, or GDP, just because somebody makes huge profits from it. And as we can see in the case of Ecuador and other places, people are beginning to wage up to the crimes committed against them in the name of economics and imaginary, monetary values.

Let's hope, the people of Canada may also start waking up one day and do something about the robbery of our resources going on all around us.

Now I have to go and build by new sorting corral for our cattle, so the "wealth creating multinational corporations" in charge of price fixing can steal them from us at .75 cents a pound, about half of what we were getting 10 years ago.

Ed Deak, Big Lake.

Another Reason

I really hate what the Conservative government has done to Canada. It seems like every day there is a new reason to feel ashamed of what they are doing in the name of this country. Why must we be more like the U.S. in this?