Burnaby Mountain Unmasked

Greg Renouf has investigated and documented in minute detail what happened and who was involved in "protesting" Kinder Morgan's work on Burnaby Mountain.  He supplies pictures, videos and narrative.  He supplies the backgrounds of and links between the professionals protesters, the NGO's, the SFU academics and orgs, the Indians, the radicals, the extremists and the gullible useful idiots:

Part I: Is It Safe To Send Your Kids To SFU?

Part II: David Suzuki, Extremists And The RCMP

Part III - coming soon.

 Outstanding work, absolutely outstanding.

Climate hysterics provoke laughter from Australian scientists

Andrew Bolt quizzes a panel of Australian scientists on the validity of climate change statements made by then Aussie PM Julia Gillard and Canuk climate crackpot David Suzuki:

David Suzuki's Canada ...

... As expressed in his Canada Day message [plus by my comments]:

... Canada, ... to me meant Tommy Douglas and Medicare, Quebec, the National Film Board and CBC. [Who'd a thunk? But 'Quebec'? What about BC, Manitoba, PEI ...?]


... an inclusive and caring society, where education, public health, social programs and enlightened laws provide numerous opportunities. [Perhaps not realizing that it takes great wealth to afford all these things.]

... Canada is nature. And nature is life. [Well, not quite. Canadians may appreciate nature (from a safe distance in most cases), but Canada is really a nation of  free, wealthy, healthy people who got that way by taming nature, building towns and cities, developing resources, building roads, railways and pipelines, drilling oil wells, fracking,  mining minerals ...]

 But there's always a 'but') ...

... our leaders are rushing to scar the landscape with mines, roads and pipelines to sell our resources as quickly as possible to global markets. From tar sands expansion to fracking, federal and provincial governments are blindly proceeding with little thought about long-term consequences. [And David Suzuki, funded by foreigners (including Vladimir Putin?), is doing everything he can to halt Canadian resource development, the long term consequences of which will be to destroy Canadian jobs and wealth.]

...  [Stephen Harper is evil] ... our prime minister called climate change "perhaps the greatest threat to the future of humanity." Now he says, "No matter what they say, no country is going to take actions that are going to deliberately destroy jobs and growth in their country." [a realistic message recently echoed by India] ...  we can't hope for abundant jobs and a thriving economy on a planet suffering the ever-worsening consequences of global warming. [Except that, to the chagrin (or denial) of alarmists, the evidence all shows that the globe has not warmed in the last two decades] 

Now, the big question ...

What kind of Canada do you want? Do you treasure our spectacular natural landscapes, clean water and air and abundant natural resources? Do you value our commitment to fairness, enlightened social programs, education and public health? Do you believe we should do all we can to protect the things that make this country great?

[That's easy.  Yes to all of the above.  Plus the development of all those "abundant natural resources" so that we can continue to afford all the other good things. We can have it all.  But if we chose not to develop those resources, we'll have less of the other good things, much less.  What will Suzuki's beloved Quebec do without those massive transfers from Alberta, for example?]

Happy Canada Day!
 

Suzuki calls for "a war on cars"

there is no war on cars — but there should be:

... We can reduce greenhouse gas emissions by cutting back on car use, choosing fuel-efficient vehicles, joining a car pool or sharing program and reducing speed. ...

Hands up, how many think that Suzuki would actually do any of that himself?

The great Pete Seeger, like the great David Suzuki was inspired by junk science

In his tribute to the late Pete Seeger, David Suzuki says both he and Seeger were inspired by junk science:

... Like me, he was inspired by Rachel Carson's 1962 book Silent Spring to become a strong defender of the environment as well as human rights. In both social justice and environmental causes ...

He also admits to making mistakes:

... Like all of us who devote our lives to trying to make the world better, Seeger made mistakes along the way. But he was willing to admit when he was wrong and to change his views. [I'd be interested to know which errors he's admitted to].

... and in closing he likens Seeger (and by extension, himself) to Nelson Mandela (we mighta' known):

... Like Nelson Mandela ... Pete Seeger was a great communicator for whom principles mattered more than anything else....

Anti-pipeline ENGO thugs show utter contempt for democracy and the rule of law

Peter Foster:

... ForestEthics has muscled its way to a seat at the policy table by its thuggish tactics.

... Ben West ... Tar Sands Campaign Director of ForestEthics Advocacy ... declared “The Enbridge line will never be completed.”  ... clearly indicates his group’s utter contempt for legal and democratic processes.

... Surely there are more balanced voices within the ENGO community. What about the giant World Wide Fund for Nature, WWF? they are even more subversive when it comes to undermining democracy, and actually profit from ForestEthics’ anti-corporate antics. ... The head of WWF Canada, David Miller [mighta' known][declared that] Northern Gateway should be turned down whatever the NEB and the democratically elected government says.

Organizations such as ForestEthics, WWF, Greenpeace and the David Suzuki Foundation all despise short-sighted “ballot box” democracy because they claim to speak for the planet and future generations.  Significantly, neither entity is in a position to speak for itself. 

... The ultimate decision on Northern Gateway is, as noted, that of the federal government. That decision should not be subject to veto by a radical minority who are impervious to facts, logic or evidence, and whose careers depend on spreading alarm, threatening violence, and contempt for democracy.

Northern Gateway Pipeline approved with conditions

Financial Post:

In a decision that spans two volumes and nearly 500 pages, the three-member panel of environmental and energy regulators led by Sheila Leggett said the $6.5-billion project’s economic benefits outweigh the environmental burdens.

... approval includes 209 environmental, financial and technical conditions. Enbridge must set aside $950-million in liability coverage to cover costs of a potential spill, including at least $100-million available within 10 days in the event of a large rupture and $250-million of “no-fault” insurance, the panel said.

... Five conditions set by the B.C. government are still unresolved, and the pipeline remains deeply unpopular with some aboriginal groups and environmentalists. 

... Reaction from opponents was swift. Greenpeace vowed on Thursday to “do what it takes, from court cases to civil disobedience, to ensure this pipeline never gets built.” 

Vivian Krause shows that opposition to the NGP was largely the work of American ENGO, ForestEthics:

... a large percentage of the fuss over the Northern Gateway pipeline has been generated by a single, American organization: ForestEthics, based in San Francisco.... In its 2012 tax return ... ForestEthics claims credit for having generated fully 87 percent of the letters of comment sent to the National Energy Board regarding the Joint Review Panel for the Northern Gateway.

ForestEthics’s own words in its tax return: ... "... In the last six months of 2012, we amassed more than 25,000 new supporters for this campaign ... In August, we submitted to the National Energy Board 4,119 (out of 4,722 in total submitted) unique Letters of Comment on the Enbridge tankers/pipeline project, written by our supporters.”

... Since 2008, ForestEthics has been the workhorse of the Tar Sands campaign, co-funded by the Rockefeller Brothers Fund, the William & Flora Hewlett Foundation and the Tides Foundation.

 There are many hurdles still to jump, not least those set up by paid agitators and radical eco-fascists organized and funded by foreigners. Also, the BC NDP is still calling for rejection and then there's Christy Clark's "fair share" shakedown to consider.  Et cetera ...

Trying to appease anti-oil-sands thugs is a big mistake - sue the bastards instead

Peter Foster - Oil sands industry risks death sentence if it climbs into bed with its enemies.

The industry has been the subject of a global campaign of demonization, disinformation and intimidation, executed by a wide range of interlinked environmental non-governmental organizations, ENGOs.  That campaign has been based on false or grossly exaggerated allegations of toxicity, sickness and environmental destruction, in particular regarding the significance of the oil sands for global warming.

... Some are now proposing that rather than counter misinformation, the industry should legitimize it by sitting down with its ENGO tormentors. Even more bizarre is the suggestion that the industry might use the Canadian Boreal Forest Agreement, CBFA, as a model.

... The CBFA, does indeed offer lessons, but rather of which path to avoid. ...  the final months [of the agreement] were marked by ... Greenpeace’s assault on one of the corporate signatories, Resolute Forest Products.  Resolute fought back ... sued for “defamation, malicious falsehood and intentional interference with economic relations.”

Some shills for the ENGOs, such as Avrim Lazar ... suggest that it doesn’t matter how the ENGOs came by their power. Since they have it, they have to be dealt with. [Sure, ends justify means. It doesn't matter how the Mafia comes by its power - murder, extortion, drugs, prostitution, robbery - you still have to negotiate with and appease them.]

Does the industry really want to sit down with these judges and negotiate its own death sentence?

Let's hope the oil industry unites and shows some backbone.  Resolute Forest Products has shown the way for it to fight the ENGO thugs.  Sue their asses off for “defamation, malicious falsehood and intentional interference with economic relations.”. Surely the entire oil sands industry can come up with the bucks needed to fight that war.

A phony poll to boost a fraud's image

Ezra Levant shows how a poll manipulated by a PR flack at Angus Reid got David Suzuki to the top of a "most admired" list:



Update: Ezra's column.

Ezra Levant gets in David Suzuki's face

Ace reporter and pundit, Ezra Levant, attended a Suzuki anti-oil media event and produced this brilliant episode of The Source:




Peter Foster also attended. He opines on Suzuki's "Carbonist Manifesto" and on Ezra's role at the event:

The occasion was a photo op ... at which Mr. Suzuki would reveal his “Carbon Manifesto” and generate publicity for his upcoming “trial,” an event due to take place at the Royal Ontario Museum on November 6.

... His Carbonist Manifesto, however, amounts to a plan to wreck the Canadian economy. Oil exploration has to stop at once. Seventy per cent of energy has to be generated from renewables within a generation. A carbon tax of $150 a tonne must be applied immediately.

... Usually ... Mr. Suzuki expresses his wacky beliefs within the safe and scripted confines of the CBC, not with Ezra Levant in his face.

The problem, however, is that the photo-op event to promote the mock trial had already been hijacked by Mr. Suzuki’s nemesis, Sun TV’s Ezra Levant.

Mr. Levant, whose persona might be described as somewhere between a steam roller, a legal pitbull and a right-wing Jon Stewart, has been a relentless critic of Mr. Suzuki ...

... Mr. Suzuki fled, with the Sun TV mic hounding him all the way to his waiting Chevy Volt. ...

... I asked Laurie Brown, the “veteran” CBC-er whose brainchild the trial is, what would happen in the unlikely event that Mr. Suzuki were found guilty. Would there be a sentencing?

Sure she said with a laugh, they’d take him outside and hang him.

Maybe they should have had a gallows at the photo op. I’m sure Mr. Suzuki would have had no trouble imagining Mr. Levant swinging from it.

Update:  The two Suzukis - Saint Suzuki and Secret Suzuki

David Suzuki, a national embarrassment

Ezra Levant continues his outstanding exposé of David Suzuki and expresses gratitude to the Australian Broadcast Corporation (ABC) for doing what the Canadian media has failed to do for over 40 years - a professional job of interviewing their celebrity guest, exposing him to real questioning by experts in their field.  Suzuki is revealed as an out of date, out of touch huckster and mystic with some truly kooky ideas:





Bravo to Ezra for a fantastic job!

FYI, here's the entire ABC program complete with viewer comments. It seems Suzuki has many uncritical Aussie fans.

David Suzuki's ignorance and extremism exposed by Aussies' tough questions

Ezra Levant: " Suzuki was on Australian television and was asked hard questions from scientists in the audience.  Questions he would never be asked in Canada.  Watching an unscripted David Suzuki ... reveals how misinformed and out of touch he is. ... "

David Suzuki: Alberta floods may not be due to global warming ... but

 David Suzuki, writing in the Huff-Po, tries to appear even handed but inevitably blames "climate change" absolutely:

"... caused by global warming? Maybe not but we can say we should expect more of the same - and worse if we don't do something to get our emissions under control."

Thanks to the likes of Suzuki, "climate change" has become the go-to excuse for all bad weather and related damage (it would never be mentioned in connection with a bumper crop).  Last night, for example, CTV's National news story on the Alberta floods had an 'expert' opinion from hydrologist, John Pomeroy, who predictably pointed his finger explicitly in that direction.

The worst of it is that "climate change" has been so thoroughly drilled into the public consciousness by an uncritical media and academia that it's accepted "wisdom" at all levels of government where you would be hard pressed to find a single plan or program that doesn't address it as a key issue.   Any citizen who tries to object or criticize is met by  'officialdom' with anything from a blank stare to the derision due a "denier".
 
Getting rid of this mass psychosis is going to be a long uphill grind.

[Via]

Big Wind is hiding the slaughter

Canada Free Press:

Since the early 1980s, the industry has known there is no way its propeller-style turbines could ever be safe for raptors. With exposed blade tips spinning in open space at speeds up to 200 mph, it was impossible. Wind developers also knew they would have a public relations nightmare if people ever learned how many eagles are actually being cut in half – or left with a smashed wing, to stumble around for days before dying.

.... Not only has the wind industry never solved its environmental problem. It has been hiding at least 90% of this slaughter for decades. In fact, the universal problem of hiding bird (and bat) mortality goes from bad to intolerable beyond the Altamont Pass boundaries, because studies in other areas across North America are far less rigorous, or even nonexistent, and many new turbines are sited in prime bird and bat habitats.

The real death toll, as reported by Paul Driessen and others, is thousands of raptors a year – and up to 39 million birds and bats of all species annually in the United States alone, year after year! This is intolerable, and unsustainable. It is leading to the inevitable extinction of many species, at least in many habitats, and perhaps in the entire Lower 48 States.

And what do the eco-freaks at the David Suzuki Foundation think of all this.  Well, predictably, they just love wind power.  And, no surprise, they just love birds.  And of wind machines killing birds? Not a peep.

This is all very characteristic of the true believing "climate change" crowd.  Their practice in dealing with information that contradicts or harms "the cause" is, rather than being open and honest about it, to go out of their way to hide it, suppress it or deny it; and if anyone dares report it, theyll mercilessly attack the messenger.

[h/t]

David Suzuki funded by Canadian billionaires

Peter Foster's excellent column today covers David Suzuki's efforts to silence "deniers" including his recent  robo-email campaign urging people to write to the Senate protesting certain Conservative senator's alleged attempts to silence "...those who don't share their positions."

I wasn't aware of this:

... Mr. Suzuki is also heftily supported by Canadian Establishmentarians such as the Bronfman family, Power Corp., Jim Pattison, and Gerry Schwartz.

Peter asks some pertinent questions:

Do these leaders and scions of capitalism grasp that they are supporting an anti-development fanatic who believes that anybody who doesn’t think like him on climate science is evil, mentally defective or a corporate shill? Do they agree with his 2008 suggestion that apostate politicians should be put in jail? Do they go along with his admiration for totalitarian Cuba’s “sustainability?” Do they support child-scaring propaganda such as his recent Christmas campaign based on “saving” Santa’s North Pole workshop? Do they fail to register that he demonizes “corporate profits and interests?” ...

It's time to start writing to these Suzuki-Kool-Aid guzzlers and get some answers.

Also, it's worth revisiting Ezra Levant's deconstruction of David Suzuki's 'virtual classroom' last November:

David Suzuki Foundation: Charity or Lobbyists?

Calling Canada Revenue Agency!

Disgusting: David Suzuki and NFB indoctrinating school kids

Yesterday and today the National Film Board and David Suzuki were given exclusive access to thousands of school kids across Canada to spread Suzuki's radical environmental and political propaganda:

As many as 12,000 Canadian high school students and their teachers will have real-time access to renowned scientist Dr. David Suzuki on November 1 and 2 through a new virtual classroom experience. The virtual program is being delivered through a partnership between the National Film Board of Canada and the David Suzuki Foundation....

Ezra Levant featured video clips of the Suzuki 'education' session on The Source today.  Suzuki openly stated that he is deliberately targeting impressionable young students because (paraphrasing) 'their dimwitted, dinosaur parents aren't getting the message'.



This is a disgusting travesty!  The schools that permitted this one-sided, dishonest, hypocritical indoctrination should be ashamed of themselves.  They should be raked over the coals and forced to apologize to parents and students alike, not to mention to taxpayers who fund the NFB.

McGuinty's Ontario entitled to it's entitlements

Have-not province Ontario's premier Dalton McGuinty has been at a premiers' meeting in Vancouver this week bragging about his costly green energy plan and justifying equalization payments to help pay for it:

...It started with a stroll through Stanley Park with David Suzuki, who warmly endorsed his government’s green plan...

...McGuinty claims that green plan has vaulted Ontario past British Columbia to the forefront of action against climate change...

...despite having the second-highest average wages in Canada, Ontario is now officially a have-not province. This year — its third on the dole — it will get $ 2.2 billion, more than any other province except Quebec...

... Three years ago... McGuinty argued that the program should be scrapped. “ To speak of ‘ have’ and ‘ havenot’ provinces in 2008 makes no sense....

... He still doesn’t like the term, but he has come to like the way equalization works, threatening to “ flex our elbows and assert ourselves” if anyone tries to mess with Ontario’s entitlement....

Exactly, McGuinty wants federal pogey to pay for an insane green energy plan that is costing $billions:

...Billions are wasted buying subsidized wind and solar power that ends up being exported [dumped] at fire-sale prices.

More in the National Post editorial today:

...If the Ontario Liberal party truly had the courage of Dwight Duncan's anti-equalization convictions, it would refuse to accept the transfer payments, adding moral weight to claims that the system is broken and obsolete. ...

Come October let's hope that Ontarians come to their senses. Ontario's "vaulting past BC" in plans to save the world from global warming is nuts - and BC Liberals having put us near the forefront of the same messianic nitwittery are no less nuts.

Junk Science Week

The 13th Annual Junk Science Week kicks off with Terence Corcoran:

... dedicated to exposing the scientists, NGOs, activists, politicians, journalists, media outlets, cranks and quacks who manipulate science data to achieve their objectives. Our standard definition is that junk science occurs when scientific facts are distorted, risk is exaggerated and the science adapted and warped by politics and ideology to serve another agenda. [Last night Lloyd Robertson and his CTV News crew of lazy, scientific illiterates indulged in the pesticide scaremongering featured in this column.]

[...]

and Vivian Krause:

... before the end of this month, an expert panel appointed by the Alberta government is expected to unveil recommendations for a “world-class” system for monitoring the environmental impact of oil sands on the Athabasca River basin.

... It all began to escalate in 2008 ... CBC documentary for The Nature of Things with David Suzuki, fuelled in part by a media-hyped visit by Avatar director James Cameron...

... what we have here isn’t a case of bad science. On the contrary, this is a case of how bad media happened to good science, or at least relatively sound science. The heart of the matter is how — and why — the media blew up a small but reasonable study that produced little new information into a major international scandal.

... U.S. tax returns show that the Sea Change Foundation in 2009 paid the Tides Foundation $2-million “to promote awareness and opposition to tar sands.”

... the Oak Foundation, another U.S. foundation, paid the Tides Foundation $700,000 “to conduct research to determine whether tar sands mining is adversely impacting the Athabasca River of Canada and its tributaries, and to report the findings.” A second goal of the same grant was “to raise the visibility of the tar sands issue and slow the expansion of tar sands production by stopping new infrastructure development, supporting policy reform in the U.S. and Canada, and reducing future demand for tar sands oil.”

What an incestuous circle-jerk. A mainstream media that is simultaneously gullible, scientifically illiterate and headline-seeking promotes the junk science of Rick Smith's Environmental Defense who in turn takes money from murky foreign foundations and environmental scaremongers.  You get the feeling that the last things they give a damn about are the environment or science which, as they practice/promote them, are turned into junk.

David Suzuki debates Vivian Krause

My post below  was about Vivian Krause's article exposing those, including the David Suzuki Foundation, who have been campaigning against the Canadian salmon farming industry.

Yesterday, the Suzuki Foundation responded to Krause's article, denying her claims and accusing her of being a shill for the salmon farming industry.

Today, Vivian's response to Suzuki is a highly detailed rebuttal including:

... You note that I used to work in the salmon farming industry. That's true. That was in 2002 and 2003, eight years ago. I also did two short consultancies in 2007. For those, I was paid $10,000 and $7,750, respectively. As I've said many times, since July of 2007 I have not worked for the salmon farming industry in any paid capacity. In January, I was the keynote speaker at the Nova Scotia Annual Aquaculture Conference but apart from my airfare and hotel costs, I was not paid. Over the years, I have also tried to support the Aboriginal Aquaculture Association in small ways but I have not been paid.

To be clear, if anyone has reason to be an adversary of the salmon farming industry, it might be me. After all, I was fired.

The debate score (scale of 0-10): Suzuki - zip, Vivian Krause 10.

Keep up the great work, Vivian.