editorial: Harper and kyoto
camerontech @ Thu Feb 01, 2007 3:41 pm
http://www.torontosun.com/Comment/Comme ... 97399.html
$1:
Given yesterday's Decima poll that found Canadians aren't buying Stephen Harper's conversion to being green, here's our advice to the PM.
Tell the truth -- that you misjudged the level of public concern about the environment, but you get it now and you're going to do better.
Then you don't have to worry about people saying you used to be against the Kyoto accord and now you're for it -- which is true.
In fact, we think Harper should still oppose Kyoto.
We agree with his 2002 assessment that "Kyoto is essentially a socialist scheme to suck money out of wealth-producing nations." Exactly.
Kyoto will extract billions of dollars from first world countries like us. We will pay these monies through various environmental schemes, and schemes they are, as reparations to the Third World. Kyoto's logic is that evil Westerners (us) must make amends for contributing 85% of the man-made greenhouse gas emissions now in the Earth's atmosphere.
Meanwhile, China, for example, which is exempt from Kyoto's targets, is set to build 562 new coal-fired generating plants over the next few years. This alone will wipe out all greenhouse gas reductions called for by Kyoto.
Here's Kyoto supporter Tim Flannery writing about the UN treaty in his best-selling book, The Weather Makers: "Perhaps the most damning criticism of Kyoto is that it is a toothless tiger. And that is indisputably true, for the momentum of climate change is now so great that Kyoto's target of reducing (carbon dioxide) emissions by 5.2% is little more than irrelevant."
Flannery admits Kyoto is flawed, but says it's all we've got and we have to make it work. We disagree.
Harper should lead us out of Kyoto. It is a wealth redistribution program masquerading as an environmental one. It will unfairly penalize Canadians and it won't work -- which the Grits only realized after they signed it. That's why they never implemented it.
Instead, Harper should introduce a law setting realistic, enforceable emission reduction targets.
But it must also address other concerns Canadians have -- smog and toxic chemicals in the environment, to name just two. In other words, Harper and the Tories should re-introduce a made-in-Canada Clean Air Act. Only this time, they have to mean it.
Tell the truth -- that you misjudged the level of public concern about the environment, but you get it now and you're going to do better.
Then you don't have to worry about people saying you used to be against the Kyoto accord and now you're for it -- which is true.
In fact, we think Harper should still oppose Kyoto.
We agree with his 2002 assessment that "Kyoto is essentially a socialist scheme to suck money out of wealth-producing nations." Exactly.
Kyoto will extract billions of dollars from first world countries like us. We will pay these monies through various environmental schemes, and schemes they are, as reparations to the Third World. Kyoto's logic is that evil Westerners (us) must make amends for contributing 85% of the man-made greenhouse gas emissions now in the Earth's atmosphere.
Meanwhile, China, for example, which is exempt from Kyoto's targets, is set to build 562 new coal-fired generating plants over the next few years. This alone will wipe out all greenhouse gas reductions called for by Kyoto.
Here's Kyoto supporter Tim Flannery writing about the UN treaty in his best-selling book, The Weather Makers: "Perhaps the most damning criticism of Kyoto is that it is a toothless tiger. And that is indisputably true, for the momentum of climate change is now so great that Kyoto's target of reducing (carbon dioxide) emissions by 5.2% is little more than irrelevant."
Flannery admits Kyoto is flawed, but says it's all we've got and we have to make it work. We disagree.
Harper should lead us out of Kyoto. It is a wealth redistribution program masquerading as an environmental one. It will unfairly penalize Canadians and it won't work -- which the Grits only realized after they signed it. That's why they never implemented it.
Instead, Harper should introduce a law setting realistic, enforceable emission reduction targets.
But it must also address other concerns Canadians have -- smog and toxic chemicals in the environment, to name just two. In other words, Harper and the Tories should re-introduce a made-in-Canada Clean Air Act. Only this time, they have to mean it.
Patrick_Ross @ Fri Feb 02, 2007 1:02 am
Hmmm. Interesting. And I partially agree.
In my opinion, the problem with Kyoto isn't the targets... the problem with Kyoto is the treaty. There's no reason why we shouldn't meet or exceed Kyoto's requirements -- but realistically we may have to do so outside of the treaty's timeline.