Made In Canada hypocrisy. There’s nothing more Canadian than the Conservative Party serving up the opposite of what it said it would do earlier. You can set your watch to the opposite of whatever time they tell you it is, so long as you wait a few weeks or a few years. Dependable.
Tides Canada, public enemy number one, according to our esteemed POS Ministers of the Crown. Well, that was after Baird said this about their money:
When a deal to protect B.C.’s Great Bear Rainforest was brokered in January 2007, one of Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s most trusted lieutenants singled out the environmental and social justice organization Tides Canada as being crucial in Ottawa’s decision to contribute $30 million to the plan.
John Baird, then Harper’s new environment minister and now head of foreign affairs, said the Harper government acted due to fear that the unprecedented $60-million contribution raised by Vancouver-based Tides – the vast majority from U.S. foundations – was in jeopardy of being lost to the total $120-million fund.
“I was tremendously concerned . . . that we could lose that, particularly the money coming from abroad, so we didn’t want to have that happen,” Baird said at a Vancouver event where he shared the stage with first nations leaders, and Tides chief executive Ross McMillan.
Baird spoke emphatically in Vancouver about the importance of habitat to 355 species in the 6.4 million-hectare rainforest. He also stressed his commitment to keep working with environmentalists and first nations.
“I hope that this is a beginning, not an end.”
Flash-forward to late 2011 and the world has turned upside-down.
Harper warned last November that “significant American interests” are funnelling [sic] money through “environmental groups and others” – presumably first nations – to stop Enbridge Inc.’s $5.5 billion Northern Gateway oilsands pipeline from Alberta to the B.C. coast, where huge tankers will cruise the waters near the Great Bear Rainforest.
Natural Resources Minister Joe Oliver followed a few weeks later with an open letter denouncing environmental groups as foreign-funded “radical” organizations determined to “hijack” Canada’s need to develop natural resources.
Tides was the only organization Oliver named in interviews.
Oliver, and his POS sidekick Kent, are the Minister of Threatening Canadians, and Minister of Turd Piles, respectively. Damn Internet! If only there was a way to control what people do there so they can’t use it to learn about blatant hypocrisy. That thought takes us to the next segment of this blog post…
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Stephen Taylor and random Blogging Tories are questioning why snark master Adam Carroll is apparently working for the Liberals again after being dismissed for his particularly awesome (but badly executed) stunt earlier this year just prior to the Robocalls scandal hitting the news. Carroll assumed the identity of Vikileaks30 to protest the ridiculous Vic Toews C-30 bill which was widely panned and promptly shelved.
If it’s such a big deal for a fired Liberal to end up working for them again, what do Conservatives think about rejected MP candidates winding up in the Senate, or working as shadow MPs on the public dime? Oops. At least the Liberals are paying for their previously rejected employee, who perhaps broke protocol for work computers, but did nothing illegal in exposing Toews’ sordid divorce details to bluntly make a valid point about the effect his bill will have on people.
If Sona is still not a CPC worker drone accused of working the phone, and rejected CPC MPs give up their Senate seats on the government teats, then the Cons can throw stones from their porcelain thrones.
