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Oil Pipeline, Tanker Spills not a ‘Risk’ but a Certainty

Mar 27th, 2013 by

This 2007 spill from Kinder Morgan's pipeline to Vancouver covered the streets of Burnaby in oil

This 2007 spill from Kinder Morgan’s pipeline to Vancouver covered the streets of Burnaby in oil

Whom the gods wish to destroy, they first make mad. It looks like the gods are doing just that with the Premier and her government.

What I’ve seen the past several weeks forces me to ask, Madame Premier: Is that thing on your shoulders just for photo-ops?

For starters. Is the Kitsilano Search and Rescue Centre really a bargaining chip with the federal government over the Enbridge pipeline proposal? Do you really believe that David Black’s proposed refinery is going to make things better? That 3 pipelines carrying bitumen are safer than two?

I’ve got to say it, Premier: you don’t know a damned thing about pipelines and tankers. Continue Reading »

 

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Finally Getting Serious about Fish Farm Dangers

Mar 24th, 2013 by

Sea lice on salmon fry. Apply the precautionary principle.

Sea lice on salmon fry. Apply the precautionary principle.

At long last, muzzled DFO scientist Miller gets mandate to deepen risks study.

Dr. Kristina Miller is the Department of Fisheries and Oceans (DFO) scientist that the DFO muzzled for the Cohen Commission. She is an expert if not the expert on the question of disease, its origins, and its impact on wild salmon. Well, you might ask why such an expert would not be encouraged by our paid employees in the DFO? Who wouldn’t want all available evidence available for Commissioner Cohen?

The answer is a simple one, repeated so often to have become old hat.

Please burn this onto the front burners of your brain. The Department of Fisheries and Oceans has a disabling conflict of interest. According to the Act they must protect our salmon while they are under government orders to promote aquaculture — and the latter trumps the former every time. Continue Reading »

 

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We Continue to go Backwards at an Unsustainable Rate

Mar 21st, 2013 by

Paul Watson, recently resigned from the Sea Shepherd Society

Paul Watson, recently resigned from the Sea Shepherd Society

Old men cannot help feeling sad – not just at the physical ramifications, the illnesses you know will come all too soon or the fact that the fateful day is not far off. It’s not even the mistakes made, the people hurt by what you’ve said and done or the opportunities missed. These things are balanced off by the knowledge that your fate is that of every living thing in the world and your family. To have the love of my life, four children (one deceased), eight grandchildren, and one great grandchild balances the unbalanceable equation.

For me the truly horrid part is to see that not only have humans learned no lessons, we continue to go backwards at an unsustainable rate.

We have freely elected governments in both Ottawa and Victoria that not only refuse to understand the consequences of their deliberate, greedy ways but actually believe that their actions are helpful to mankind. They have all, I assume, been taught to tell the truth but they consistently lie such that one cannot accept a word they say. Worse, they have created an atmosphere where everyone, especially big business, must also lie – although which came first I cannot say. Continue Reading »

 

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Christy Clark Must Resign

Mar 15th, 2013 by

Of course Premier Christy Clark must resign. This unholy bloody business called “ethnicgate” started and stayed in her office. The cabinet minister, John Yap, who ran up on his own sword, lied while doing so saying that none of this had crossed his desk.

Why did he lie?

Clearly because his knowledge as a member of cabinet would be imputed to the premier, his boss. His note cheering on his hired fixits could hardly be sent unless he had Clark’s approval.

The appointment of the premier’s deputy minister to investigate this matter was wrong from the beginning and his report bears that out – he did not interview any members of caucus, more importantly he didn’t interviews any cabinet ministers, most importantly, he did not interview the premier.

Mr. Dyble himself should have refused the assignment. If he took it, it had to have no strings attached – which there obviously were.

The constitutional practice over the centuries requires that cabinet ministers, including first ministers, must resign if they are under a cloud. That Premier Clark is under a cloud can scarcely be denied by her most loyal of Liberal friends.

The premier must do the right thing and do it now. Not to do so is not only dishonourable but she places herself and her party ahead of her sworn obligation as a member of cabinet and the first minister.

And that will be her legacy – a dishonourable woman who put personal and political considerations ahead of her duty.

 

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Premier’s Calculations for Pipelines, Fish Farms, Site C Dam Don’t Add Up

Mar 13th, 2013 by

Gary Mason’s column in the March 12 edition of The Globe and Mail, on Christy Clark, is very interesting. The premier is complaining about the lack of precision in the NDP’s plans and calls upon Adrian Dix to spell it all out.

What is most interesting is Ms. Clark’s position on issues and what she deems those issues to be. (Remember that the Liberals have raised the provincial debt and other taxpayer obligations by some five fold, which should limit the generosity of both leaders).

“So not only are the people going to compare me with Adrian Dix,” said Clark, “they will be comparing leadership with an absence of courage to tell people where his party where his party stands on things. If we get into a competition of ideas in this campaign, I believe we can win that battle because I believe the things I stand for are what British Columbians want: a strong economy, smaller government, jobs for our kids, a prosperity fund, lower taxes.” Continue Reading »

 

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Premier Must Have Known About Ethnic Voter Plot

Mar 9th, 2013 by

Dear Premier Clark,

You knew about “Ethnicgate” from the beginning. You had to.

I was there, Ms. Clark, and know how government works – especially when the civil service is involved in politics. With a program this size – in the hands of your senior adviser; with the complexity involved, meaning the number of people in the know; and given the channels through which this sort of plan (or should I say plot) must pass, even if you had not wanted to know, you still would be have been informed.

That’s what Premiers are all about.

If – and I say this couldn’t happen – you didn’t hear or say anything, then your incompetence is beyond belief (actually, come to think of it, there’s plenty of other evidence on that point). If this is the case, then you must resign.

If, on the other hand, you knew what was happening, Premier, then you must also resign. Continue Reading »

 

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Under the Radar: Howe Sound Gravel Mine an Environmental Catastrophe

Mar 6th, 2013 by

McNab Creek, which flows into Howe Sound 22 kilometres southwest of Squamish, is the site of a gravel mining proposal from Calgary-based Burnco Rock Products Ltd.

McNab Creek, which flows into Howe Sound 22 kilometres southwest of Squamish, is the site of a gravel mining proposal from Calgary-based Burnco Rock Products Ltd.

There is a new axiom in BC, evidently, which says, ‘You can’t be against EVERYTHING.”

Unhappily, this had led the NDP and Energy critic John Horgan to support Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) plants in northwest BC for export. This is turning out to be an unmitigated disaster and my prediction is that there will be no LNG plants in BC thus no market.

But this new axiom, so critical to those who would take away our heritage, is also permitting a gravel pit to be developed in Howe Sound at McNab Creek. This is not for want of private opposition – it is alive and very well indeed. What it’s lacking is public awareness.

Howe Sound is a world-class area. It’s taken a hell of a beating since my Dad, Mom and I fished it back when if you didn’t get a fish you must have forgotten to put a hook on your line. Eagles have returned to how they were in the days when I was a boy and so have porpoises. Whales are being sighted again. Salmon runs, except the ones dependent on the Ashlu, which has been ruined by a private power company, are returning. Howe Sound is for boaters, canoeists, and a paradise for kayaks, as it may well become again for fishermen. Continue Reading »

 

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Could Clark Quitting Revive Liberal Chances?

Mar 5th, 2013 by

Realistically no. Only the NDP can make the NDP lose now.

Let me state my own political position. Since I have one, you’re entitled to it. I will support the NDP and hope the Liberals only get sufficient numbers to form a decent opposition. If we had proportional representation I would support the Greens.

I am not now nor have I ever been a member of the NDP. I ran against them (twice, winning both times) and if Bill Bennett were still premier with a party that made a centre-left Red Tory person feel comfortable, I would be with him again. If you’re in any doubt about how good Bill Bennett was, just look at what we’ve had since.

And if you give a damn, when my deputy minister, Tex Enemark, and I teamed up, we completely overhauled consumer and business laws. Premier Bennett backed us, as he did when we made the new wine change from dreadful rot gut by licensing and financially supporting the cottage wine industry. As environment minister I brought the ranchers (most of whom were Socreds) to mouth-foaming anger by stopping the wolf kill. I put a moratorium on uranium mining and saved the lovely Skagit River from being made into a huge lake by the City of Seattle raising the Ross Dam as they were entitled to by a 1941 agreement with the province. Continue Reading »

 

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Christy Clark’s Implosion, Spying on Fracking Opponents

Mar 4th, 2013 by

Today, a twofer.

First, I feel sorry for Christy Clark. She is, no doubt, a very decent person and mother.

Her mistake was assuming that she had the ability to govern. She’s scarcely the first person to make that mistake, nor will she be the last.

I know “I told you sos” are not popular but I have to say it: I told you so. Clark had been a mediocre cabinet minister at best. She chose to sit out the rotting Campbell years and had no noticeable power base.

To make things worse, she won with but one member of caucus supporting her and when she awarded him a cabinet seat this was resented by more obviously qualified backbenchers. In short, damned near her entire caucus has, if not a death wish for her, at most taken a luke warm “let’s wait and see” approach. Continue Reading »

 

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LNG ‘Prosperity’ Will Always be Just Around the Corner for BC

Mar 3rd, 2013 by

In assessing Premier Christy Clark’s political sins, add one other: irresponsibility…big time.

In the Sun of February 26, on the business page, is an excellent article by Scott Simpson on natural gas prices and their uncertainty. In it you will see that exports of natural gas, in liquefied form (LNG), to Asian markets are scarcely a slam dunk proposition. Gas prices in most Asian markets are controlled by governments and the private sector in a number of cartels, with the idea of maintaining high prices. But, to say the least, the matter is in a state of flux.

Getting ordinary facts on this situation is a crap shoot. Christy Clark tells us that China will be our next big customer. On the other hand, we hear that China has discovered its own massive shale gas reserves – while yet other sources warn this gas will be a challenge to access. Russia sits on the world’s most plentiful conventional gas reserves and is developing a plan to venture into shale gas. The US is awash in the stuff. Continue Reading »

 

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