Anti-clean energy movement forgets about sick children in their ideological fog

A new report by the American Lung Association finds that:

"hundreds of infants' lives would be saved and millions of children would breathe easier across the US if the nation's power grid depended on clean energy and more drivers made the switch to zero-emissions vehicles."

While the anti-electric vehicle movement, which includes the current Premier of Alberta Danielle Smith, make a lot of noise about Elon Musk and the evil EV-industrial complex, what gets lost in this oft-ridiculous debate is that combustible car engines and dirty sources of energy pump out a constant stream of things that are really bad for our lungs.

The researchers estimate that there would be 2.7 million fewer asthma attacks among children and 147,000 less cases of bronchitis if the US had zero tailpipe emissions by 2035, as well as:

• 2.67 million less pediatric upper respiratory symptoms

• 1.87 million less pediatric lower respiratory symptoms, and 

• 508 less infant mortality cases 

Recently Danielle Smith announced new regulations that in essence put a halt to the construction of new renewable energy projects. The Alberta Premier followed that announcement up with a new tax on EV's that will disincentivize Albertans from buying an electric car.

These new Danielle Smith anti-renewable regulations make no sense in so many ways. But politically for Smith these backwards policies do get a small, but vocal contingent of voters who apparently value "pwning the libs" over their own children's health. With the way things are going for Smith in Alberta, she is no doubt taking the first step in damage control: secure your loyal base of supporters.

These anti-clean energy politics might help Premier Smith and other politicians pick up some votes here and there in the short-term, but for the long-term it means more sick kids and more asthma.

Danielle Smith, and all the other politicians out there who are thinking that an anti-clean energy, anti-EV campaign might be a political winner, need to know that blocking progress on clean energy and electric vehicles means more children with asthma and other serious lifelong chronic lung conditions.

We need to make noise. We need to make sure that every politician out there knows that if anti-clean energy policies might get you a few votes from the fringe-right, the vast majority of us will stand up and vote these degenerates out of office.

SHARE THIS: You can start by retweeting this (I know it's a small, tiny step, but it's a start!!)"

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Charlie Angus is right: fossil fuel greenwashing should be banned and you should let him know

Ever seen the ads cigarette companies ran back in the oldie times?

Here's one from the 1950's.

These ads are of course absolutely absurd in today's world where we are all very aware of the link between tobacco use and all sorts of horrible types of cancer.

In the early 1990's tobacco companies figured out that their "fake doctor" tactics were no longer working as scientific research became more conclusive around the addictiveness of nicotine and its links to cancer.

So the tobacco companies switched tactics.

in 1993, a PR agency called APCO Worldwide drafted a document for a new group called "The Advancement of Sound Science" or TASCC. The TASCC group was paid for by cigarette-giant Philip Morris, and the purpose of TASCC was to, "raise the awareness level of the use of unsound science in public policy decision making."

TASCC hired old-retired (sometimes very senile) "scientists" to tour around and get in the media downplaying the links between cigarette-use and cancer. Phillip Morris knew that if they used fake scientists and made-up third-party organizations like TASCC to spread their misinformation it would: a) give them a level of deniability, and (b) it would seem more credible coming from someone other than a cigarette company.

This might sound like a conspiracy theory, but sometimes conspiracy theories actually turn out to be true. In this case, all of the documents exposing this conspiracy were uncovered and made public as part of a multi-billion dollar lawsuit filed by the US government against major tobacco companies. You can see all those documents here in the Tobacco Archives.

If you do a search for "climate change" or "global warming" in the Tobacco Archives you will see a massive trove of documents in the results (3,138 on "global warming"). Weird right? Not so much, when see the title of the first result: "Global warming? Maybe Global Warming Apocalypse? Certainly Not. An Economist's View of the Past and Future Impact of Climate on Human Well-Being."

To quote: "Environmentalists who are predicting disaster due to global warming fail to take into account that 'history and research supports the proposition that a warmer climate is beneficial.'"

Crazy right?

This "Apocalypse" document is included in the Tobacco Documents (along with all of the other ones because many of the same people who worked on denying the link between tobacco and cancer went on to work on sowing doubt about the causes and enormity of climate change.

Again, not a conspiracy theory.

Oil companies paid third-party groups to attack the science of climate change because they knew that the pollution from their industry was warming the planet. The City of New York went as far as filing a lawsuit against ExxonMobil, stating that Exxon, "... systematically and intentionally misled consumers about their products' role in causing climate change."

But here we are in 2024, where the scientific predictions from as far back as the 1950's that burning fossil fuels would lead to extreme weather and catastrophic events are now no longer predictions but the reality.

Oil companies knew that to deny the realities of climate change in the face of mass drought, floods, hurricanes, famine and resource-wars was a losing battle. So they switched tactics.

What we are now seeing is "greenwashing" defined as:

"A form of advertising or marketing spin in which green PR and green marketing are deceptively used to persuade the public that an organization's products, aims, and policies are environmentally friendly."

And so NDP MP Charlie Angus introduced a Private Member's bill (Bill C-372) that proposes to penalize oil companies for greenwashing, for attempts by industry to persuade the public that an organization's products, aims, and policies are environmentally friendly.

I would encourage people to read the bill itself instead of relying on mainstream or social media analysis. It's short, to the point and an easy read.

The Angus Bill C-372 is much more narrow in scope than what some alt-right media outlets and social media pundits would have you think.

Bill C-372 is quite clear in its purpose, to regulate through the law attempts by industry: "to promote a fossil fuel or the production of a fossil fuel in a manner that is false, misleading or deceptive with respect to or that is likely to create an erroneous impression about the characteristics, health or environmental effects or health or environmental hazards of the fossil fuel, its production or the emissions that result from its production or use."

In other words, oil companies and third-party groups cannot spend millions on ads across social media, cable TV, streaming services and podcasts to downplay the environmental impacts of their polluting products.

Sound familiar?

This is the very thing that had to happen to stop tobacco companies from lying about cigarettes and cancer and the exact same thing New York City is suing ExxonMobil over.

Maybe Charlie Angus is ahead of his time?

Or maybe with the volatile and warm weather on the East Coast will help the electorate wake up to what is happening and what the oil and gas companies are doing to make it worse. Or maybe it will be this summer when our forests are a blaze and cities are choking in smoke. Maybe it will be this year's hurricane season, which researchers are predicting is going to be absolutely devastating.

Or maybe, if enough of us stand up and support what Charlie Angus is doing, this will be the year that fossil fuel companies are put on notice and held to account for their past and current misdeeds.

I know this turned into a little bit a long screed, but I am passionate about this issue and it is frustrating to see the right-wing press and social media controlling the narrative around this proposal by Charlies Angus.

If you share in my passion do something about it.

You can start by sending a note to Charlie Angus telling him you support what he is doing. Let Charlie know that there are thousands of us who know what he is doing and why and that we support him for taking a stand and raising awareness around these deceptive activities.

SHARE THIS: Canadian anti-government activists sure love career politicians

Career politicians: there is no better way to describe the last three leaders of the Conservative Party of Canada.

"Creatures of government" is also apt.

In general, right-wing activists and conservatives hold a great disdain for anything government and this has only gotten worse as American politics slowly seeps into our national identity.

Seems strange (Alanis Morrisette might even call it 'ironic') that such an anti-government crowd would be so equally passionate about a string of conservative party leaders that have been creatures of government for the vast majority of their careers.

Stephen Harper has worked fulltime in government and political parties for over 37 years. Harper actually began as an organizer for the Young Liberals, then jumped to the Reform party. His only "real world" experience is a stint as president of the right-wing think tank National Citizens Coalition. Other than that he has worked as a party organizer, political assistant and a Member of Parliament until he left the House of Commons in 2016.

Andrew Scheer has worked fulltime in government for the past 20 years. According to his Wikipedia entry he may or may not have been an accredited insurance broker in Saskatchewan prior to his career in government, but the Globe and Mail revealed that there was "no evidence he was accredited." Scheer was elected as a Member of Parliament (Regina-Qu'Appelle) in 2004 and has never looked back.

Pierre Poilievre was first elected to the House of Commons at the age of 25 and has never looked back. While his Wikipedia entry tries to play up his early careers, including a job as a paperboy, Poilievre has been collecting a taxpayer's paycheck for the last 20 years.