According to those who track the affiliations of voters with environmental
concerns, if they were to vote along strictly partisan lines,
IF THE ELECTION WERE HELD TODAY:
If we split our votes:
Conservative 135
Liberal 83
NDP 37
Green 0
Bloc 51
IND 2
BIODIVERSITY 0
But on the other hand, if “we” who cared about climate change cast
aside our traditional love toward our favourite party and voted for that
party best able to defeat the Conservative in our own riding, the result
would be a parliament with only 75 Conservatives but 123 Liberals, 52
NDP, 55 Bloc, 1 Green and 2 IND . http://www.voteforenvironment.ca:80/
Kevin Grandia and his campaign to vote strategically
against the Harper government is based on the fallacy
that the opposition parties do not share the government’s
ecologically suicidal commitment to economic growth.
Growth which is fuelled by runaway immigrant driven
population growth and per capita consumption. The green
coalition which Kevin works to fashion in fact favours 38%
higher immigration levels than the Conservatives, which
would result in 38% more GHG emissions, and about
29% of what the tar sands are putting out now.
And since neither Layton nor May would actually decommission
the tar sands but only stop its further expansion, and Dion will
continue it but vaguely promise to make it “green”, then
immigration is what separates the opposition and the government.
The decision goes to Harper on climate change, although neither
deserve accolades.
But climate change is only the flavour of the month, the loss of
biodiversity services is more pressing and its relationship to population
growth is more obvious to most than global warming. When biodiversity
services are undercut, when 24% of 12 of its vital services are compromised
our survival is imperiled. As it stands, 536 of Canada’s species at risk
lie just at the margins of those cities bulging with immigrant growth.
Those who advocate such growth, the fastest of all countries in the G8
group, are sitting in all 308 seats in all four parties on both sides of
the aisle in the Canadian House of Commons. How, then, as environmentalist
Brishen Hoff asks, can we vote for the environment?
For all intents and purposes, we live in a Growthist one party state.
The contest Kevin describes, between corporate climate changers vs. noble
climate saviours is a sham. We don’t need a change in government. We need a
change in the SYSTEM of government. Direct democracy. And a change in
mindset.
Comments
James Sinnamon
Mon, 2008-10-13 16:53
Permalink
Removal of Australia's equivalent of Harper was essential
Tim,
I am not an expert on Canada, but if we had not removed John Howard Australia's equivalent of Stephen Harper, this country would effectively be a dictatorship today. That creep squandered over AU$120million in taxpayers money in order to indoctrinate Australians into accepting the his slave labour (so-called) Work Choices legislation that he had not even put to them in the previous 2004 elections. Had he gotten away with this and won the 2007 elections an unbelievably dangerous precedent would have been set (and this is only one of a large number of examples I could give). It may well have undermined the morale of grass roots activists for years and his power would have been entrenched practically forever.
Obviously Kevin Rudd leaves a great deal to be desired and his raising of immigration levels was particularly concerning. Nevertheless, having asserted in 2007 the principle that corrupt incompetent governments prepared to spend almost unlimited amounts of taxpayers' funds to keep themselves in office can indeed be thrown out, we are in a much stronger position to stand up against high immigration and other anti-environmental policies of this Government. Indeed Rudd is considering at this moment cutting back immigration, due in part to the fact that he is a little more vulnerable to activism than a re-elected Howard/Costello dictatorship would have been.
So, I suggest you think very carefully about what is at stake in these elections in Canada. If Harper is anything like our former Prime Minister John Howard, then Canadian democracy itself may be at stake, and if you lose that then you lose any ability to control your population. (Clearly Canada's totally brain dead first-past-the-past voting system doesn't help either. Its replacement with some form of preferential voting system, that at least makes far less likely the possibility that a political party opposed by the majority of Canadians will able to form government, must be fought for as a matter of utmost urgency.)
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tim
Tue, 2008-10-14 13:09
Permalink
A Vote for the Opposition is an Endorsement of Growthism
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