Canada Not Caving to Environmentalists

Joe Oliver is the Canadian Minister of Natural Resources which I suppose is the equivalent of our own Department of Interior. Unlike the jobs killer, Ken Salazar who heads Interior, Oliver is not all about green energy. In an open letter that has raised a good deal of anger and angst on behalf of the greens Oliver pretty much puts them on notice that he is on their to scheming and the jig is up.

Unfortunately, there are environmental and other radical groups that would seek to block this opportunity to diversify our trade. Their goal is to stop any major project no matter what the cost to Canadian families in lost jobs and economic growth. No forestry. No mining. No oil. No gas. No more hydro-electric dams.

These groups threaten to hijack our regulatory system to achieve their radical ideological agenda. They seek to exploit any loophole they can find, stacking public hearings with bodies to ensure that delays kill good projects. They use funding from foreign special interest groups to undermine Canada’s national economic interest. They attract jet-setting celebrities with some of the largest personal carbon footprints in the world to lecture Canadians not to develop our natural resources. Finally, if all other avenues have failed, they will take a quintessential American approach: sue everyone and anyone to delay the project even further. They do this because they know it can work. It works because it helps them to achieve their ultimate objective: delay a project to the point it becomes economically unviable.

It would be refreshing to have an American cabinet department head take the side of the public against the green movement. Canada was once the butt of jokes for its left leaning policies. The fact that Canada can reform itself gives one hope, even dreams. Dream of a Secretary of Interior Sarah Palin in a Rick Perry administration.