Interests

"Interests" are a made in the USA concept. The only thing interesting is the cash up for grabs. They trump ethics.

We live in an age of.......

.....corn pone Fascism, where "might is right" and Herr Harper is telling all Canadians, he is the mightiest of all.

Enbridge is all about massive corporate profits, paid off politicians, and morally corrupt government. Paid off politicians, who lack any morals except for evangelical Christian morals (screw your neighbor before he screws you), will ensure massive corporate profits.

Enbridge and Herr Harper are laying the foundation for the breakup of Canada and I do hope that history, if there is any to be written, treats them badly.

Orwell warned us. Kafka wrote about it. Hitler tried to make it right but lost and Herr Harper is succeeding to make it right and win.

Come to Canada, the land of a kinder and gentler new-age corn pone Fascism.

If they throw a few crumbs

If they throw a few crumbs toward BC we are supposed to suddenly forget the issues that Rafe and others have raised.Let's not let it happen

national interest?

So let’s go with the argument that the Tar Sands development is in the “national interest” as stated by one of the panelists.

‘in the national interest” to me anyways, would mean that;

We build a refinery in the tar sands on already destroyed environment. Then, as Canadians require the energy, we extract the tar, process it ourselves, using Canadian labour creating jobs, and self sufficiency.

But this is not what is being presented to us. We are told that the tar sands must be sold to another country, so that all we have left is royalties. What do we have when the royalties are spent?

Corn pone

Grumpy made reference to this term that I had never heard before so I searched it and found this excellent piece by Mark Twain:

http://www.paulgraham.com/cornpone.html

The establishment has reduced most if not all things to a narrow, economic equation that most, it would seem, have come to accept as the way things are and the sole lens through which we must consider life itself.

I don't doubt that as the global economic strings are strummed, the marionettes among us will be swayed to accepting the crumbs that are being offered. Hard to say no when you are hungry and the sum of the equation is zero.

But if we stop to consider the full effect of what is being offered using a lens that focuses on our children and theirs - and on down the timeline - surely we will do what is required for all our sakes and find the means to cook up our own meals of choice, creating our own crumbs as a result.

I suspect that the crux of the problem for many is that they are caught in the swirling vortex of the modern equation and have no time to cook.

two points into the mix 1.

two points into the mix
1. There are a lot of Albertans with their butts in BC but their roots and politics in Alberta.
2. In 2013, BC will loose the HST, the decision on the pipeline is due, AND the province will be in election mode...

is there an opportunity for Harper to offer a bribe to influence this election?

It has been a long known

It has been a long known fact, even among some economists with brains, that economics and ideologies are not a sciences, but religions, based on installed and forced on beliefs, and not on facts.

Then we have the claims that "Canada" wants and demands this and that, when it is not "Canada", but some brainless and bought politicians who make the decisions in their countries' names.

It wasn't "Germany", or "Japan" that started WW2, but a couple of maniacs by the names of Hitler and Tojo. As we now have the crime waves against logic and the human race going on in Syria, Israel, Iran, Afghanistan, and all over , instigated and pursued by insane maniacs in control of billions of people.

Mostly in the name of religions, which include criminal economic theories. What percentage of people does the present, not "Canadian", but "Harper" government, represent and speaks for, yet it is the name of "Canada" that's being trampled into the dirt on account of their irresponsible, corrupt and stupid actions.

Watching them in the news is like watching some overgrown puppet show, without brains, pulled by strings..... from abroad, yet claimed to be Canadian.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2012/feb/20/canada-eu-tar-sands

Ed Deak.

Enbridge Pipeline

Still have not heard about whether China can actually process the bitumen from the tar sands. Does it have to be tankered to Texas first? We, the people of BC, will NOT allow this to happen! Period. So mr. harper and his "friends" need to find a Plan C. Foreign ownership has become a huge problem in Canada. Electoral reform must be a priority.
Greg Shea (Lake Cowichan)
P.S. I am now making my granola without wheat!

@ igbymac

No all governments are run by liars.

Dumb thing to say.

I know quite a few politicians on the left, and they care and try to make the world a better place.

It's a mistake to say the first nations is the front line in this battle as they will surely be bribed.

Oh, and what I want to know is where is the NDP on this issue?

I get the NDP e mails and not a peep about this subject, all you guys want is my money, it seems.

If the NDP wants to get anyone to work for them or give them money for the next election, I think it's time to get Dix to do some grandstanding.

Why do I keep getting the idea lhe provincal NDP is poorly run.

Yes I'm talking to you.

Ive been trying to give my sage advice to the NDP brass for years.

I was talking to the guy that seemed to be running the NDP office at the bottom of Lonsdale during the last election, I guess that would be Schreck's old riding.

You know what he told me.The only way to get through to the brass is, ''join the party, go on commitees,work your tail off for 25 years, then they might listen to you''

'bout right I think.

Get going guys, the election grows neigh.

Yet another good article Rafe.

It is a done deal!

I seem to remember we already have a law that allows government to override local authorities on exactly such deals: in the interest of the common good!"

In other words we are screwed, we can reject allwe care to, in the end they will invoke that law, and proceed regardless!

Thanks Rafe.

I listened to the guy from Enbridge talk about all the steps they had taken to prevent any disaster. When he got down to specifics and what would happen on land and sea the details started to get fuzzy. As it always happens even accessing any funds set aside for a spill will be almost impossible with the lawyers resisting the flow of any monies. These folks are dishonest as hell and I don't understand how anyone would trust folks only worried about their bottom line.

The fatalists I hear on the subject still insist that Harper will ram this line through no matter what we say. That it is all a matter of more money on the table. I think the momentum is on the side of the good this time and Harper and the rest will pay dearly for any such arrogance.

Where is Adrian?

BC is the banana republic of the north where foreign investors steal our resources and pay us a pittance, while the local peasants scramble for crumbs.
Mr Dix seems to lie low on controversial issues like this, typical for a politician I guess. But wouldn't it be nice to get one one with some GUTS?

Bribes

It is extremely offensive, to offer bribes. This is like offering money for your organs. You might have a lousy quality of life, shortened life expectancy, but you have a few dollars in your pocket. There just is no way, we can afford to take the risk of a spill either in the mountain country or in the coastal waters. Just look at a map. A supertanker takes miles to turn or stop. Where the hell is the room in the Douglas Channel. The risks are far too great. When I was mining we had to put catch basins under fuel tanks and oil storage, so not to pollute. That amount of fluids is a mere pittance compared to a pipeline. Another job we used an air driven pump for our drill water supply. We had to switch to an electric pump, because the exhaust of that pump was contaminating the creek. I am talking traces of pollution. Are we to throw all our environmental safe guards out the window to supply China with bitumen.If the government of Alberta wants to wreck the environment, let them do it in Alberta and not in BC.

Who gets paid first?

If I were bribing (incentives...financial benefits...community investments...) I would start with people who have very little, people who are poor, people who have been (until the bribe) maginalized by everyone else.
If those people with nothing took the bribe, I would use them to lay a guilt trip on everyone else, suggesting that everyone else was 'I'm alright, Jack' and just continuing to deprive the poor of a piece of the pie.

I agree with what is the main thrust of the article, but often the 'bribes' tactics are attacked by those who already have enough.
( I think that in the 1970's some environmentalists in Colorado opposed having the Olympics in their state. A bumper sticker slogan attacking them was "An environmentalist is a guy who built his log cabin last year.")
I say all this as a sour reminder of a part of the pr to expect along with the bribes.

Not to worry, Rafe. I'm a 79

Not to worry, Rafe. I'm a 79 year old, low incole senior with nothing to lose. I will never let this pipeline go through BC.

Gateway pipeline

Yes the bribes will be coming as Rafe states... I'm worried that the native groups will roll over for money as they have in the past... Part of the (reverse) bribe is that oil prices in Canada will go UP $2/3 a barrel across Canada. We can build our own refineries in the north and do our own processing.
The shipping in the Kitimat channel... pure madness1 Once the inevitable spill occurs NOTHING can clean it up and in our less dense than the Gulf of Mexico waters, huge clumps of ugly raw oilsludge will sink to the bottom and forever pollute our waterways. why are we selling our future and that of our children for a quicl buck in corpoate hands and in the pockets of misguided government.. a shame

Good one Rafe

I've listened and read your comments for many years now and I can finally agree with one. You're spot on with this one. Keep your comments coming loud and clear.

You're dreaming in technicolor, Rafe...

This economy desperately, desperately needs this kind of project!

Does anyone here really understand where increasing societal wealth comes from? It doesn't come from more coffeeshops, higher real estate prices, more convenience stores or more domestic tourists. Nor does it come from more government spending, bond issuance, money-printing, deficit spending on "public works & infrastructure" or "stimulus"...

The size of the pie is, at root, only increased because we EXPORT. Wood, logs, coal, fish, food, gold, iron, copper. And gas and oil.

However, in Canada's collectivist la-la-land, where "rights" and "equality" and tree-hugging trump reason, where money is only an abstraction divorced from real production, and where the economy is a man-made construct that government can fine-tune to meet "social goals" that is all irrelevant.

However damaging and distasteful this kind of project is, it will soon be something that our debt-laden Ponzi Scheme of an economy has to beg for...

Kreditanstalt

Let’s go with your argument that we need this pipeline. Given the public’s resistance to this issue then why have Harper/Clark and the pro-pipeline crowd not offered a province wide referendum?

If they are so sure of themselves why not?

Let me help. It is because they will have their asses handed to them on a platter same as the HST that is why.

It is useless to come in here and spout the pro propaganda such as we need this pipeline. We don’t need as damn thing Canada is a rich country with a lot of resource that we should be using for our own employment opportunities not royalties for certain groups.

Try researching both points of view.

Wealth, or rather reasonable

Wealth, or rather reasonable survival, comes from becoming self sufficient to the highest degree by making things and exchanging products within our communities, with the resources available to us, as we were well on our way 40-50 years ago.

Not from selling the soil from under our feet. The sale of resources is the sale of capital, not an income, advocated only by fools and crooks.

Economies built on exports, in other words, relying on others for survival, are also economies of fools and crooks, cheating people of their birthrights and enslaving them .

Ed Deak.

Let me quote a paragraph or two...

..from Tim Jackson's book, PROSPERITY WITHOUT GROWTH.
"By the end of the century, our children and grandchildren will face a hostile climate, depleted resources, the destruction of habitats, the decimation of species, food scarcities, mass migrations and almost inevitably war."
"So our only choice is to work for change. To transform the structures and institutions that shape the social world. To articulate a more credibile vision for a lasting prosperity."
"...we have to establish ecological bounds on human activity."
The philosophy that Jackson promotes throughout his boot, is that we need to curb our consumerism, our need for always having the latest technology (TV's, comuputers, automobiles), and to curb our "illiterate economics of relentless growth."

To me, one phrase describes it all: We need to control "GREED!"

"The size of the pie is, at

"The size of the pie is, at root, only increased because we EXPORT."

Kredit, is this some kind of joke? Can you really be so poorly informed?

Buckminster Fuller said it well: wealth is the resources of the planet multiplied by the intelligence of the people. "Export" has nothing to do with it. Like Ed says...

Ok Or, good quotes, but it's

Ok Or, good quotes, but it's all been said before and many many times.

Be careful of the "we". It's not our fault and we can stop chastising ourselves and lay the blame where it's deserved. Name the beast and call him out. The bankster elite, the psychopathic, evil, fascist elite who control the money supply, who are above government and control government. Somehow we must be rid of them, they who have foisted this heinous system upon us.

Keep trying to abolish the profit motive...

For argument's sake, I'll buy the idea that we can all be better off by trading stuff with each other ("self-sufficient"). Apart from the problems that will crop up when we need coconut milk for cooking or microprocessors for computing, it might be difficult to increase societal wealth by washing one another's laundry.

Or are people still supposed to be willing to open new businesses, employ people and create value, extract resources and pump oil ONLY for Canadian dollars? How are you going to enforce that? Capital controls? Bans on exporting? More laws against "sending resources out of the country"? Way harsh...!

And those Canadian dollars: they're paper. I guess they'd be something like the old Soviet rouble or Yugoslav Dinar - unexchangeable and good only behind the Maple Leaf Curtain?

What about inflation? Are we still going to have a fiat paper currency whose supply is constantly growing as new loans are made? Or perhaps you'd like the government to print the "money", as much as it needs? Or would you trust them to stop printing?

Economics trumps all, guys! It does so because it IS a reflection of people's buying and selling choices, scarcity or abundance of resources and demand & productivity. The economy is NOT something that a government can change or tinker with to promote "social justice" or equality or "fairness" or some social goal.

As much as Tyee readers would like to pretend that magic unicorns will poop out goodwill and we can all live in a future world of harmony, caring and non-exploitation, that is not the real world.

Nobody will produce the stuff the needy in society "need" for less than what the market will bear. Not a penny less.

What are you planning to do? BAN international trade? Start selling things to one another & washing that laundry. But my bet is you'll see a vast explosion in the money supply in your closed, planned economy coupled with raging inflation.

To Kredanstalt:

"For the record, the oil industry is not a jobs machine. It is the world's most capital-intensive industry and earns more than 10 per cent of the world's GDP. But it only employs less than one tenth of one per cent of the world's workers. In Canada it accounts for but 1.8 per cent of the workforce."

~ Andrew Nikiforuk in The Tyee

"In a detailed analysis submitted to the National Energy Board, Robyn Allan, the former president and CEO of the Insurance Corporation of British Columbia, concludes that "Northern Gateway is neither needed nor is in the public interest."

Moreover the project, if built, would raise the price of every oil barrel by $2 to $3 dollars in Canada over the next 30 years, and thereby create an inflationary price shock that would have "a negative and prolonged impact... by reducing output, employment, labour income and government revenues."

~ From a Tyee article by Andrew Nikiforuk

Cynic.....you`re right, but

Cynic.....you`re right, but the main problem has always been the millions and billions of suckers who believe history`s crooks.

We went through hell in our childhoods and teens and never believed any of them again, but spent our years to build up the greatest degree of self sufficiency for ourselves and now are doing very well, in comfort, give away a lot of things to help others, on incomes most people starve on, because they have to buy things we can grow and make.

Of course, we all have to rely on others, so are communities and the whole world, but the important thing is to reduce the degree of reliance, as much as possible, by all those who can achieve it.

Not by "specialization", as demanded by so called "economists", but by local diversification at home and within our communities, as we once used to have it to a great degree.

When I had my shop on the lane at 7th and Cambie and later on Powell and Victoria, in Vancouver, in the 60s and 70s, I could find other shops and small manufacturers, within a few blocks, where we could produce a great variety of things for our customers and each other.

Now we have "free trade" , everything we buy is Made in China, from resources we send them. Not for their own use, but so that we can buy them back in the form of products we used to make, and have their lordships come over to buy up our country with the money we send them.

But for our "conservatives" and "economists" this is "wealth creation".

Ed Deak.

National Security

Canadians must realize that the always-thorough Harper Cons have dealt with the "national security" issue ... by recently getting rid of any definition of this concept in our Investment Canada Act. Check out articles by Terry Glavin in the Ottawa Citizen ... and weep!

Fiat lux,

Two questions for you...

a)Shouldn't we all, as consumers, have the choice of buying Chinese-made stuff if we so want? Perhaps you propose removing this option through import tariffs, higher taxes on imported stuff or outright bans by force of government?

b)Similarly, do I or do I not have the right to export the produce of my labour? What if I wish to export gas, oil, wood, fish, coal or copper? Gold? I've done the mining, fishing and cutting; I've put my capital at risk to do so...do the resources belong to those going to the trouble of extracting them or to "the public" or to some government?

In other words, do you believe in private property?

Feverish

Thanks for the great link to Mark Twain re: corn pone.

It's an interesting commentary considering the historic circumstances of the time with the advent of compulsory public schooling being imposed on the masses.

Well...

Nobody prevents you from buying Chinese made crap. It is the loss of Canadian manufacturing that determines that you must buy Chinese made crap because there is no other option. Why is that? Government policy and obsession with free trade with the U.S. A. who buy the same economic theory you do that is flood the country with cheaper crap and expect Canadian manufacturing to survive.

Oil is not the produce of your labour. It is taken from the earth and from future generations. The same right-wing ideology that the government pursues makes the ownership to those who have money. It belongs to the people not you. Export your labour if you want to but the government should not facilitate your efforts by passing trade laws that are harmful to everyone else.

Resources don't belong to a few. That the government lets you mine, drill, do whatever and leaves the risk and clean up to everyone else is criminal just as those who think it is their right.

Lawrence

@ igbymac
No all governments are run by liars.

Dumb thing to say.

I know quite a few politicians on the left, and they care and try to make the world a better place

First off, it was a quote.

Second, your politicians on the so-called 'left' are not running government.

Third, if you think government, run by the select people, is an honest broker of the social contract, you are beyond naive.

But carry on, keep the faith in your overlords.

The Peeping Cons

Add to the Investment Canada Act that Kathleen O'Hara mentions in her comment above:

The labelling of environmentalists as terrorists, the silencing of federal scientists last fall, the shutting down of parliamentary debate, the recent advancing of invasive internet legislation, "Bill 1984", and the subsequent smearing of all who disagree with this intrusion against our private rights and liberties as thus being "with the child pornographers" .

What is interesting is, and as we all know, sexual abuse is really about control and power, not sex. It's about dysfunction, manipulation and terror.

The legislation now being proposed to supposedly catch the bad guys "abuses" all our freedoms and rights, including the future freedoms and rights of our children (those Bill 1984 is supposedly protecting) through the same kind of dysfunctional use of manipulative control and power. So who are the real pornographers?

This may appear to be off topic but I don't think it is, not if you really think about it.

Valuable article, Rafe.

Kredit.... if you could read,

Kredit.... if you could read, you might have noticed that I've been a property and business owner in BC since the 50s, and demand the same right to anybody living in this country, or in others of their won.

But logic is not something one could expect from the communist and conservative brotherhood, as they're selling their peoples to each other.

The idea of private property is not the right to steal the properties of others, but to use our own for our own and the benefit of others, without hurting each other or the environment we live in.

We could always buy products, all over the world, made in other countries, but they had tariffs on them to protect the properties and property rights of their citizens.

I've been captain of the Nissan factory car rally team in the 60s and people were buying the cars. I've exported my products to the USA and the customers paid the necessary duties and tariffs, just as visitors to my home are expected to behave in a civilized manner and not claim property rights to take over after having been invited once for dinner .

I realize that logic is a difficult concept for "conservatives" to understand, but next time you drive on the road, try it on the left side and go through red lights, claiming it your "property right" to do anything you please.

The same applies to so called "economics" and the right demanded by some to ruin other people's lives with their insatiable greed and demands, as our governments are doing it now to their own citizens.

Ed Deak.

@skywalker...

The corollary of believing in the right to hold private property is that the profits from exploitation of a resource belong to those able & willing to do the work to extract them.

In the same way, the Homestead Act allowed the user and occupant of land to claim ownership and the holder of a mining claim to reap the rewards in return for completing demonstrable annual improvements to the claim.

You don't overturn centuries of common law practice, with such a 360-degree policy U-turn, merely by edict of some government.

And it really sounds like a lot of commenters here wouldn't stop at just banning imports outright Scary & authoritarian...almost NEOCON.

Because at root this is all about the loss of individual liberty, not "Canadian values" or "Canadian benefit" or "national interest".

BTW, if not wood, minerals and oil, what do you propose Canada could profitably export (and find markets for) given the absurdly high wage and tax costs here?

Any number of other countries with lower debt levels and more reasonable standards of living vis-a-vis productivity could best Canada price-wise...

Kreditanstalt

Does anyone here really understand where increasing societal wealth comes from?

You might want to define (1)'societal' (2)'wealth' first. Otherwise, I think your question is meaningless. Harper seems to think the meme 'national interest' should suffice which, as far as I can figure, only means the retaining elite control of power and wealth.

Kreditanstalt

"You don't overturn centuries of common law practice, with such a 360-degree policy U-turn, merely by edict of some government."

Overturning centuries of common law is precisely what provides the foundation to our commercial-contract law governing banking. Without it, banking would be a criminal activity, and easily recognized by all.

And surely you mean 180-degree?

I like the "absurdly high

I like the "absurdly high wage and tax costs, here" ,claim by our friend from the Stone Age.

Wages and taxes in any civilized, democratic society must reflect the cost of living, to give citizens the right for a comfortable, secure life and rights for survival.

And not for some foreign ruling class of aristocrats to come and take it all.

Wage and tax costs reflected reasonable standards 40 odd years ago, when people were able to own homes, vehicles, and feed their kids on the wages of one breadwinner per family. Even under Diefenbaker.

The country and BC had no debts until the present neoclassical theory was forced on us by big business buying up the universities and governments, selling their criminal theories.

We could live very well on 60-80 bucks a week, but now under this great "wealth creating, property rights" capitalist rule, even we, a couple of old people, with all kinds of self sufficiency, need $ 500 + per week to survive on, while the taxes of the high and mighty are cut, Canada and BC are drowning in deficits and debts.

So, let's hear the "conservative" solution on how much the "absurdly high wages and taxes" could and should be cut to bring us "prosperity" and "competitiveness" ?

Ed Deak.

Same Crowd

Anti-oil pipeline that is. Usually anti-everything.

Likely had the same crew in the 1950's opposing the Trans-Mountain pipeline. BTW, that pipeline also carries bitumen and traverses the Fraser River watershed. Why aren't people here blockading that!

Or the Alaskan oil-laden super-tankers traversing the west coast of Vancouver Island (since 1977), into the Juan De Fuca Strait and Georgia Strait for the Anacortes and Cherry Point refineries. Right on our door step.

Go get your rubber dinghy folks and set up a blocade. Ya talk the talk ya better walk the walk.

Interesting to note recent BC public opinion, though, from 2 different polling polls:

Fer: 44%
Agin: 36%

http://abacusdata.ca/wp-content/uploads/2012/01/pipeline.jpg

Fer: 48%
Agin: 32%

http://ipsos-na.com/download/pr.aspx?id=11270

Cool Hand

Public Opinion polls are laughable since almost everyone will believe anything fed to them, particularly if it comes from a 'reputable authority'. Rephrase the question, exact same topic, and the answer easily changes. But mostly, these polls are used to further shape public opinion itself.

And shaping 'public opinion' is the unseen bayonet of our culture. It's why we have compulsory schooling and a convergence of mainstream media -- the two obvious 'public opinion bayonets'. Its why so many people earnestly propagate the insane ideas that they do.

You rights under private property?

The rights under private property do not include the right to put at risk the livelihood or quality of life of any other property owner. Therefore you don't have the right to transport through another property nor should you expect to do that without the people in another jurisdiction giving approval.

So really it has nothing to do with property rights?

Back to Rafe. "Have we as a

Back to Rafe. "Have we as a people lost our moral compass? Are we prepared to condemn our heritage to death over large chunks of lucre? Do we not care about losing the soul of our beautiful but prefer obeisance to Mammon?"

No to all three. Again, it's not "we". It's them, they who must be rejected and outlawed and removed from power. They are sick, they need help, but first they must be stopped.

Kreditanstalt

First big mistake is assuming there is such a thing as "societal wealth" - at least from a self-proclaimed anti-socialist. There can only be (according to capitalist assertions) personal wealth.

Next thing ya know, y'all be saying "from each according to his ability; to each according to his need"!

Another religion

"do you believe in private property?"

Er, no. I believe that everything that runs through your hands is your 'property' in the sense that you have the power to dispose of it as you see fit. But 'property' in the sense of 'for always', no, that wuld be precluded by the fact that we won't be here 'always'. And, running the risk of cliche, I would say, we can't take it with us. I believe the only thing we ever really 'own' is our own destiny, such as we relate to it and help shape it. We may be assigned stewardship of something that is larger than us, a plot of land or living beings we take care of. But we do not 'own' these items. Rather, they tolerate us. What is it about ownership? We bask in 'things' and 'assets', but do we ever really take ownership of ourselves? If we did, we would not be bribeable. And, I would say, bully for those who worry that aboriginal people may take a bribe. We always had the choice of treating them decently. Let that be a lesson.

BTW....

Andrew Weaver just handed Harper a "big stick" by proclaiming that, should the entire minable oil in the tarsands be consumed, it would only add 05 degrees to global warming. Now Harper will surely have one of his minions strut to the media and proclaim that China MUST buy environmentally benign tar sands oil and quit using all that coal (which, should it be enitely consumed, wolld add 15 degrees to global warming).

But this isn't the first time Andrew Weaver has passed the "enemy" ammunition. He sided with Campbell's carbon tax in 2009, quite possibly helping to put the man into his third majority.

Say -- now that oil has been determined to be "benign", while coal has shifted definitively over to the dark side, will the Campbell Carbon Tax now be struck from oil, and shifted to coal?

OOPS!

Link to Andrew Weaver's conclusions:
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/canadas-oil-sands-not-so-dirty-after-all/article2343985/

The colour of money is the same as puked-up pea soup.

First, Alberta should refine the bitumen, then pipe it to Ontario. Never mind what the bean counters say. Sometimes national security trumps accounting.

Am I the only person who remembers the National Energy Policy? This is Alberta's chance to shove the oil down Ontario's throat in revenge for billions of dollars in lost revenue. I would have thought they would jump at it.

the government already

the government already subsidizes the natural gas needed to produce the tar sands, to make it PROFITABLE for those companies. AND THIS IS TARS SANDS THAT ARE EASY TO PRODUCE.
How much will it cost us to make it PROFITABLE after we are locked into 20 YEAR DELIVERY SCHEDULE?

How to diagnose Harper's

How to diagnose Harper's mentality? On the one hand, he is opposes communists (even socialists) and lectures the Chinese on how they should behave. On the other, he welcomes BILLIONS of Chinese dollars (controlled by members of the Communist Party, and owned by the Communist Chinese state) to buy an interest in Canada's tar sands, and pipelines to transport the unrefined product for processing in China (not Canada). Is he literally insane? or am I missing something?

The communist and capitalist

The communist and capitalist leaderships are the same. They're quoting different prophets and waving different flags, to mislead the suckers, but they're brothers under the skin, who are working toward dictatorial world control with the collectivization of economies into the hands of ruling cliques.

The communists have done it with bayonets, the capitalists with the perceived power of imaginary capital "created" form the air, enslaving and murdering millions every year with starvation, bad waters and easily preventable sicknesses.

China is the best present example of their brotherhood. Could be with Vietnam and North Korea next.

Ed Deak.

RickW EDIT

I think you erred in citing Marx. ;) It's closer to the Joe Stack Manifesto:

From each according to his gullibility, to each according to his greed

We can't afford to sacrifice the economy

The attitude of Alterta's politicians (an BC's politicians for that matter) is the same as big business. Some have been quoted as saying that we cannot afford to sacrifice the economy for the environment.

It's an ugly little turn around in coining a phrase, but it is the mentallity of many.

The tree huggers (are they still around) can hug their trees and the the trees are still there for generations to come. It does not hurt us to let the tree stand as a tree can always be turned into a log, but a log is always a log - or less than a log.

The economy will always go up and down and there will always be another monetary crisis blown out of proportion, and the people that scream the loudest are the ones that already have the most.

The poor of this nation will never see an inheritance from selling off the resources, and they know this.

Bob Dylan said it with the words, "When you aint got nothin' You got nothin' to lose."

oldstyle, Bob Dylan also said ...

"steal a little and they throw you in jail, steal a lot and they make you King"

To Coolhand...

Concerning your opinion poll results about the BC folk who are in favour of a transmountain pipline:
Fer: 48%
Agin: 32%
There is somewhat of a correlation here between the number of seats won by the Federal Conservatives in BC last election:
21/36 for 58%
Not to give those people who voted for the Cons a bad name, but perhaps the same people that voted for Harper voted in favour of the pipeline. Take your pick -- either 48% or 58% of BC voters are ??????? :))

To Dorothy: Your analysis of private property is 100% correct. Very few people would admit to not owning the lot on which they built their house. In fact, the government owns it, and if it wants it, it can take it away from you and bulldoze a roadway through "your" property and give you a few paltry dollars in exchange. You might want to watch them doing it with the Enbridge pipeline through First Nations and any "private" property in their way.

@ Kreditanstalt and CoolHand

If I produce a product on my property that threatens the environment for my neighbour and puts all the risks of transporting it onto my neighbour as well, then whether I own the property doesn't make one bit of difference. In fact then my neighbour would have every right to prevent me from transporting the product across his private property. That is my point.

As for CoolHand's Enbridge poll, if you poll 1000 people across the province 800 of them will be from a region so far removed from the critical area, they might as well live in Alberta. Most of those folks think Hope, B.C. is in the North as they have never been passed the town. They believe the entire North exists to supply them with the raw materials to live and they wouldn't understand if you told them that Vanderhoof is the geographic centre of B.C. That means there is as much area north of Vanderhoof as there is too the south. Those of us that live in the area at risk are not going to bend over so the southern urbanites can screw us over again any more than we sure are not going to do it for a bunch of Albertans cozying up to the Chinese communists and Sinopec.

Up yours...

Every time they up the bribe I will deepen my resolve...
If this was a good thing we wouldn't even be having these discussions....

We should have a burger-vote on this issue:

If you support the Northern Pipeline, ask a Harper burger.
If you don't, ask for a Suzuki burger.
Who would sell most burgers?

Gateway

The Gateway pipeline must be stopped. Debating the fine points is all very well, and I guess i could spend a couple of hours a day doing so, but no matter how long we discuss it, the facts of this pipeline, and what it carries........the size of the tankers, and the twists and turns reality of the B.C. fjords make it brutally clear.

This death snake must not be built.....bitumen cannnot be exported in the raw state. Its too noxious, toxic and unforgiveable when it spills over the landscape.

So suck it up albertans....if you want to extract this guck from the earth...you have to refine it in your own territory Get the Cninese authoritarians to help you if you wish....but sweet light crude has presented enough of a problem for land and water wherever it leaks or blows. Bitumen is an utter end game, and Canadians are not going to let you play it.......in other people's backyards.

Besides....in the end you'll make more money and be more self sufficient if you build those refineries you're trying to fob off on other people. Unless there's something about the expense of refining bitumen that you aren't telling us?

What's the rush to ship raw materials to foreign corporate interests who do not have Canada's national interests at heart?

Bribe, Rafe?

Yes, I agree that proponents of the pipeline are spinning the story to suit themselves as fast as they can. Yes, they are prepared to "bribe" interested parties with profits and ax dollars that already belong to us as citizens, had we the wits to grab the levers of power and bend them a little more to suit the interests of the people at large.

All this, Alberta and Saskatchewan are just now beginning to find out, now that there's no National Energy Programme to blame any more. So they resort to whatever spin they can purchase, and I'm not surprised you were reduced to spluttering on CBC.

But when you say things like "How can we make the Great Bear Forest hostage to money in the short term and catastrophe in the future?" to reasoned individuals such as read this site, I have no hesitation in pointing out how manipulative you're being.

Whatever the "Great Bear Forest" is, it's no legal construct, no well-delineated, ecologically distinct land, and it's certainly not "unspoiled", cut as it is by roads, a railroad, mines, forest cutblocks, farms and a few tiny industries in one-horse towns like Hagensborg.

That term Great Bear Rainforest is a piece of marketing spin created by major enviornmental NGOs to artificially inflate the value of ecological preservation far above its real value by linking it with a cuddly teddybear.

It's the same game Alison Redford is playing, using different money. And it ill-behooves you to use that currency when talking to reasoned people about something they should all value for well-founded reasons.

Not ignorant Walt Disney ones.

BIG OIL -- small minds

How much longer will it be, before everybody knows, that BIG OIL is really bad news when it comes to the environment and peoples' lives!
There is no one more callus then BIG OIL! Just look around and remember all the promises broken and damages done - lives lost and nobody gave a flying d**n.
Wake up people and let us put our collective feet down with an unequivocal NO!
NO PIPE LINE ACROSS BC AT ANY PRICE!
What part of NO don't you understand, Harper?

zalm

Curious Q: Have you ever been up into that specific wilderness area, or along the Douglas Channel?

igbymac

Never been any further north than Williams Lake or Prince George. Or Cape Scott provincial park.

There are three pipelines on offer

What many forget is that there are three pipelines before the National Energy Board: Northern Gateway; Keystone XL, and Kinder Morgan. Given that the Kinder Morgan proposal involves using an existing right-of-way and adding an additional pipeline, should we advocate this? I'm realistic enough to know that at least one pipeline will be built. To me, the KM option is least damaging.

Further, given all the money poured into the money pit known as North-East Coal, British Colombians should be wary of projects which require huge investments which may become stranded costs. Just look at how quickly 'tight' gas from shale formations (i.e. fracking) has changed the whole natural gas market and pushed down prices.

Like with North-East Coal, both tar sands and LNG customers have a number of suppliers vying for business. I think KM is the lowest-risk route if this is going to happen.

One thing I've learned from all the debate about Northern Gateway is that at least 80% of the refined petroleum fuels we buy in BC are derived from tar sands synthetic crude.

@ igbymac

there are two types of government here.One is friends of developers and big business.I call that the ''right''
Then there are the other guys, they are just trying to do a reasonable job, I call them the ""left''
So igbymac, who's running Vancouver? Not the NPA.Who's running North Van? not the right.
Lions Bay, not the right. So you see there are good honest people running communities all over BC and ya know what? It's unfair to call them liars

Lawrence

I know first-hand that NDP Libby Davies is an honest, intelligent, quality character working in government. I've watched and communicated with her since the mid-1980s. And she's worked in many levels of government.

So clearly anecdotal stories of government workers not being liars are available to refute my quote that ...all governments are run by liars.

But the truth remains ;)

not bribery

More like extortion. Emma Pullman has done some very good research on Ethical Oil Institute and it's server connections to everything conservative, like how ethical oil was incorporated into levants lawyrs law firm,how hamish marshall husband of kathryn marshall who replaced alykhan velshi who went to work in pm as dir. of planning or how joe oliver appointed rumina velshi(alykhan mom) to nculear safety commission. GoNewClear Productions, check out how much conservative lobbyists and members are listed, along with many lobby groups totally associated with it.

dave49

Re: Kinder Morgan
From the Tyee's own archives:
http://thetyee.ca/News/2005/08/23/KinderMorgan/

Fair enough RickW, but which one would you pick?

Fair enough RickW, but which one would you pick? As much as I'd like to see things go a different direction (e.g. more refining capacity in Canada, shipping bitumen to eastern Canada and refining it there, Canadian self-sufficiency in Canada), my research suggests the NEB has never turned down a project. I dread the thought that all three will be built and we lose the opportunity to step back and develop a sensible energy policy to guide Canadian energy decisions for the next 20 years. Why the fuss about the oil we export being more 'ethical' than Middle East and African suppliers when half our country is supplied by those same 'unethical' sources?

According to Paul Wells in the current Macleans, this whole push to sell oil and other resources to China is all about Stephen Harper being able to trumpet his economic development success and crushing the opposition [http://www2.macleans.ca/2012/02/17/chairman-harper/]. Stephen Harper is a young man. Do you really want him as Prime Minister for 20 years?

"A kind of modern alchemy is at work. We send pork to China. In return, they send us laptop computers. This, Harper said in the news release that followed, is how Canada is using China “to open markets and create jobs and economic growth back home.”"

When I was growing up, exporting high-value goods was a sign of a developed industrial economy. I thought the goal was to move the Canadian economy forward. Exporting pork and raw materials makes me think we are becoming a third world country.

Back to pipelines. Realistically, at least one of these pipelines will be built. I'm going to stick my neck out and say I rather it be Kinder Morgan than Northern Gateway. It's the lesser of two evils.

My ex-brother-in-law used to justify voting Socred by saying you vote for the bad thing you know rather than the bad thing you don't know. I see KM as the bad thing we know.

dave49

I think the Enbridge/KinderMorgan "options" are smoke screens. The XL will go ahead.

oil sands

When the oil runs out,it`ll be back to punchin cows.

Pipeline leaks

Just got back from Edmonton where one of the metallurgical firms was investigating a dribble from an Enbridge pipeline put in over 60 years ago before they inspected every single cm of all the pipes radiographically.

It's been fixed with no problem.

The Exon disaster was made a disaster by the clean-up crews raking the oil sludge into the intertidal area when, had it been left alone (according to the late world expert on intertidal life, Dr. D.B. Quayle) at the time from Pacific Biological Station in Nanaimo. Had it just been left alone for nature to clean up, the problem would have been entirely minimal and gone!

This hype about "rupture" and words like "irreversible damage" are as charged and meaningless as those used by politicians, who also know nothing of the sciences involved.

Intelligent conversation ceases when both sides of any matter are saying "don't confuse me with facts, my mind is made up."

Transport Canada...

... has just approved Enbridge's supertanker routes along the BC coast to Kitimat. Enbridge has now overcome that hurdle.

http://www.canada.com/business/Transport+Canada+approves+Enbridge+supertanker+routes/6200099/story.html

Tyee: "Alberta Premier Alison Redford stated in a recent speech that her government is looking to "clear a path for the oil sands through British Columbia by upping the economic benefits for its western neighbour -- including the option of paying to modernize and expand West Coast ports."

Hell, milk that for what it's worth! Capital investment and economic opportunity is always welcome. It also provides employment opportunities and additional revenue to guvmint to pay for services that everyone else demands.

Cool Hand

Isn't that "bribe" what the article and this discussion is all about? Assurances from Transport Canada are worth about as much as assurances from Harper and the Alberta Government. When a spill occurs you won't see any of them.

Al Can

"This hype about "rupture" and words like "irreversible damage" are as charged and meaningless as those used by politicians, who also know nothing of the sciences involved. "

It's got nothing to do with the science and everything to do with the business of it. Of course, the science is there to detect and fix leaks before they become big ones. It wasn't the science that was at fault in Kalamazoo - it was the politics of business. Someone was too cheap to properly take care of their pipeline. Now they lost a million dollars worth of product, several million dollars worth of business while the line's shut down, and several hundred million dollars worth in lawsuits and insurance premium increases.

Bad business model, eh? Wouldn't it have just been cheaper to shut the line down for a couple of weeks every year to properly check the line for strains and pinholes?

Yet many businesses don't do that. Most businesses are run by politicians-in-waiting who figure the technocrats "don't know nuthin' 'bout runnin' a business" and refuse to allow profits to be sliced by proper maintenance and inspections.

And when they're caught, they move on somewhere else. We've already talked about those type of people - psychopaths - on another thread. If we could just leave the operating side of business up to the technocrats and the administrative side of government concerned with administering regulation, we'd probably be alright.

But as soon as you let politicians and the psychopaths who are running the big businesses into the actually "business" of running a pipeline, you start the timeclock on the next big disaster. Afterward, it's only fingerpointing. And yours are pointing the wrong way.

Still think there's no politics in pipelines? Well, given that Enbridge is looking at declaring a loss of several tens of millions of dollars on the Kalamazoo leak alone, how much have you heard about cutting their dividend? Earnings may actually go negative, depending on when they account for those losses.

But no, it wouldn't do for the company not to declare a dividend for a quarter to restore the company to financial health - they'd rather go into debt to pay a dividend on a profit they didn't earn.

Good business? No, just politics.

Northern Gateway

If any oil company has ever acted in the best interests of any country or its population then I will allow them a fair hearing. But their entire approach has been to have closed door access to natural resources they neither truly pay for or take legal responsibility for. The governmental system no longer works for the taxpayers. We now pay to be used and abused and we don't even know about it until the damage is done. We need to take back our taxpayer rights because voting never covering the issues and policies to come until after the elections are over.