Getting hot over green

So, in the spirit of breaking us all up into little groups and categories, the Uniter‘s dutiful writers all had to pick a subject to commit to in these bi-weekly blogs of ours.  And yours truly ended up picking the buzz word of the day, the environment.

The environment… Hmm, what is there to say about the environment nowadays? The trees are growing, my tomato plant is in full bloom and that seems pretty much all there is to it. Of course, there is that pesky matter of the environment as political spin, in which anyone who wants a seat in the great green office on Parliament Hill seems to be throwing nature-related commitments around. With all the talk of global warming, global cooling, air and water pollution and the simple destruction of fertile lands in favour of new economical developments, is there anything left for our political candidates to really sink their teeth into?

I guess so. At least it seems like the only way to explain the multitude of environmental experts that seem to be popping up all across the ideological spectrum, debating not just the right of women to speak in political gatherings or Harper’s piercing blue eyes, but the oil, soot and water that is typically the subject of fringe environmental blogs and university Forestry departments.

Unfortunately, most of what our wannabe-leaders have to say about the environment is downright ridiculous. Or at least hilarious in its naïveté, I’ll leave it up to you to decide.

Here is a quick run-down of our politicians’ latest environmental statements (mind you, only the most interesting ones have been selected - I’m sure there were some other mentions of carbon taxes that I slept through):

- “The world will not be nice for the free-riders of climate change,” Stéphane Dion explains the new delineation of good and evil to residents of St. John, New Brunswick (Link)

- “As always, Canada continues to work collaboratively with our global partners through the United Nations and other bodies to find real solutions on climate change,” says Environment Minister John Baird, completely forgetting how he snubbed the youth delegation to the 2007 United Nations conference on climate change in Bali, or how Canada backed out of its Kyoto committments. Canada’s totally with you, UN, unless you ask us for something that goes against what we feel like. Real solutions, eh? (Link)

- “We know from over a century of northern resource exploration that there is gas in the Beaufort, oil in the Eastern Arctic, and gold in the Yukon… and countless other precious resources buried under the ice, sea and tundra… But what we’ve found so far, is merely the tip of the proverbial iceberg. As I’ve said before, ‘use it or lose it’ is the first principle of sovereignty in the Arctic,” Harper shares one of his latest ideas, a $100-million boost to detailed geo-mapping searches for minerals and oil and gas deposits in the Arctic. And what about the environment, you ask? Gee, I don’t know, maybe this is one of those ‘real solutions’ Mr. Harper is working on - destroying the Arctic land bit by bit, so that if we can’t have it, no one will. ( link)

These statements are just the tip of the melting iceberg, but they showcase the breadth of senseless environmental initiatives and statements our potential politicians can offer us - is anyone biting?