Archive for the ‘USA’ Category

If anyone had read the ads and watched them (see their website here for details) they’d know that the hullabaloo created by Californian politician and a randomly called environmentalist and anti-corporation group by the name of Corporation Ethics International (CEI) spouted lies. Big lies.

Not only big lies, but giant whoppers of lies.

First up:

Travis Davies, a spokesman with the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers, the country’s largest industry lobby group, said the [Rethink Alberta] ads distort basic perceptions of the oilsands industry by claiming that an area twice the size of the United Kingdom is being strip mined when in fact mining is limited to an area smaller than most American cities.

And it piles on, and on, and on. The CEI has had their credibility seriously undercut by their rampant abuse of the facts.

Still, as a guy who has friends working in Fort McMurray and in the oil patch, as an ardent environmentalist, and someone who has a balanced perspective between these two sometimes aligned but sometimes opposed ‘sides’, I’m more than pissed with the CEI. Probably more pissed than the regular blogger and media commentators out there because I know that the CEI is engaging in self-sabotage for the environmental cause in North America. There is nothing that undermines the improving of the oil sands than rampant, non=factual propaganda that smears rather than educates. The CEI has undercut any actual attempts at improving the environment for the next few years, harms the people who are behind the greening of the oil sands in Alberta, and sets back the environmentalist agenda for years. I’m pissed because it draws attention away from the almost awe-inspiring reclamation work that Syncrude is doing now (some of the best work in the world, by the way), hurts local environmentalists because of the blowback that’ll be felt against any legitimate criticism from the oil sands, and the entire fiasco oozes with an American-styled political attack job.

It’s combative American politics. One that the Wildrose tried to get Alberta firing back with, war-room style. This would have been a doozy if Ms. Smith jumped onto a podium and began denouncing CEI and likely spilling over with her criticism to other environmentalist groups. And that would have created an emotionally charged situation that’d kill off the chance of the facts being pre-eminent–the point that Mr. Davies pointed out at the beginning of this post–in favour of a good guy vs bad guy media feud where Alberta, in the end, only loses. We’d all be painted as big-government, big-corporation, anti-environmentalist, and the cascading effect of the CEI’s allegations repeated ad nauseum every. single. time. someone writes a story above the ‘big bad Albertans’ versus a green group of California, the ill-informed message would only spread.

Ed Stelmach was right to play it easy and calmly. An emotional reaction would have garnered the group more attention than it was worth and, in the end, the facts have spoken for themselves–with both the CEI and environmentalists taking a gargantuan hit to their credibility over the CEI’s abuse of facts and the truth. If Ed Stelmach followed the Wildrose’s advice the facts would have been rail-roaded in favour of the combative storm that would have arisen between “big bad Bush-like gov’t” vs “environmental good guys”. It was a good move.

A good move like when David Swann headed down to the city of Bellingham to hash things out person-to-person when that city boycotted Canadian oil from Alberta. (The Bellingham city council’s resolution can be found here.) It’s straight to the people, diffusing the situation coolly and quickly, and avoiding the fist pumping, chest pumping, fact dumping, and political campaign-esque creature that would likely have been birthed by the Wildrose.

Thank heavens cooler heads prevailed and that the Wildrose were shunted off into a corner both in that case and in the current Rethink Alberta case. Hopefully this smear campaign will be over and done with soon.

I can picture you removing me from your bookmarks as you read the title. Please reverse that urge and listen to me on this point: I can back this up. Bush can be considered one of the biggest green leaders in the United States in most recent history. I can say this for three reasons.

(1) As governor of Texas he signed and pushed a plan that required a portion of the electricity generated by the utility companies in the state had to be from green sources. He increased the tax credit for windmills, provided training, and helped start an industry where there was none before. It’s to the point now that the mandate can be tossed away because wind power has been so wildly successful in Texas.

(2) As president Bush secured the most area for environmental protection than any other president before him.

The three areas — totaling some 195,280 square miles — include the Mariana Trench, the deepest spot on earth at 36,000 feet below the sea.

(3) De-regulated the energy sector in such a way in the state of Texas to allow for start ups to start filling out niches in the market place in terms of transmission lines to rural Texas and in power generation. In his gubernatorial reign Bush Jr. created a framework that allowed for investors to work together, invest into a region, and serve the public morally, sustainably, and, of course, more than adequately.

Watch the reasonings and methods above: it isn’t a mandate that all electricity should be created vis-a-vis new technologies. A base requirement was set, a financial system of support was made to start the change, and, finally, the market place was not demonstrably changed but adjusted to suit the needs of the people and business.

What Bush did with his reorientating of the Texan marketplace was simple: he set a minimum, pointed in a general direction, gave a few financial incentives for some of the “hows” and a far away “when”, and let the innovators/investors decide their own “hows” and surpass the “when”. The free market is an amazing tool to serve people and society if we can just facilitate the right incentives, push the right people, and invigorate a portion of society to contribute their skills/resources.

One thing I noticed when talking to people is that they disconnect the interests of business with people–and it’s completely the wrong way to think about things. Not only do interests of business and people overlap, people make businesses! When the oddball communist spouts off about corporate fascism or a left-wing environmentalist talks about uncaring corporations there’s an issue with their line of thinking because each corporation is not just a piece of paper or an organization… there are people within that organization, people that write that paper, and people that make the decisions.

Corporations are not soulless, mindless profit seekers. The people in these organizations can be guided, if given the chance. If the path is laid, opportunity given, and a base minimum set, the achievements unlock-able by public and private policy can herald something new and unthinkable previously.

One thing that I have noticed through business (my family’s) and through careful study is that once the financial hangups and problems are dealt away with the basic human instinct to do good tends to overpower any other urge. If Canada could emulate this facet of Bush policy, set up a regime conducive to green investment, and support businesses as they transition, well, there is little doubt in my mind we can move forward into the actual next generation of green economies.

And all it takes is leadership–a strong vision.

This video is currently at 4,000 view. From what I can see it will likely jump to a couple dozen thousand over the next week.

It summarizes quite quickly what’s wrong with the Tea Party south the border.

Update: The youtube video has just touched 200,000 hits. Err, it has gone viral. I’d like to think I helped it (I wrote this comment up last night when it was at 5,000 views) but, err, this video/ad did it all by its lonesome.

I disagree with Mr. Dale Peterson of Alabama on most, if not all, of his policies but there is one thing we can say: this is a good ad.

First of all, there is a core understanding that needs to be understood in terms of communication and argument creation. All ads can be broken down into three pieces: ethos, pathos, and logos.

Ethos is the society/base to which a person formulates an argument from. This would be like positions held, like priest or war veteran, to establish credibility and am ethical, supportive basis.

Pathos is the line of argumentation that pulls at the emotional strings of an audience.

Logos is logic, with reasoning and thought placed in such a manner to convince a viewer to side with the presenter.

This ad by Peterson showcases this trifecta in spades.

The Scene: Note the scenery that it begins in. It’s blue sky farm country, and he’s on a horse. He has a cowboy hat. He is no bullsh*t. And he gets right to the point: he wants your support to run, and this is done in the first 5 seconds into the ad. Bam–ethos and pathos in the first five seconds.

He then establishes ethos vis-a-vis his jobs that he has held–war veteran, cop, farmer, and businessman, etcetera–showcasing his smarts and ability. Logos and pathos right here.

Going along with this trend of setting himself up as a respectful, blunt guy, he hits his nameless opponents.

Watch the split here: it is both a positive, intellectually pushy, quick, and negative ad. It does everything in one go, and at the end you get the feeling of being overwhelmed. However, after watching it a third and fourth time (which is likely in the TV-centric world of the Americans south of the border) this overwhelmed feeling will likely lead to a familiarity and eventually an appreciation of this politician.

He then hits the issues, which a forefront to current American politics: immigration and the economy. And then he returns to how he can solve it, followed by how his opponents are corrupt (and bragging about it on facebook).

Amazingly, he turns his position he is running for (something that I had never heard of before his ad) into an argument against his opponents. That’s creative and another draw of the piece of ad work.

And it concluded with calling his opponent a “dummy”, which is classy in a sort of old fashioned way. It will appeal to the GOP base (which he is aiming for in the primary he’s in) and likely be a solid continuing theme from now until election day in November.

But then he wraps it up by emphasising three points: (1) silently showcasing his support of gun owners, (2) calling upon Tea Partier to vote for him along with other stakeholders in the GOP through including the constitution not once but three times during the entirety of the ad, and (3) then saying that Republicans should be “better than that”. It’s a call to arms to be better, to vote better, and expect better, while at the same time establishing a core principle and understanding of both him and his electorate.

Peterson has values, commitment, a bluntness that can be appreciated by his electorate, and several visual cues setting his viewpoints quickly/effectively for his audience. For a minute and 11 seconds this is a fabulous ad and, even though it can be viewed as a tad bit corny, it will likely proof effective.

As a side note, the ad also has this quick choppiness about it. It is fast, forces attention on him, and grabs one into his arguments. This is useful to gathering the attention of the voter for the first time (although it is a small bit disorienting) and making his points over and over again simplified/quick.