Earth Day and the Harper Cons

I spent a really quiet Earth Day. Paying homage to the sun, using as little energy as possible, and wishing I was in Montreal. 

A sea of people gathered in downtown Montreal for the annual Earth Day rally, under heavy police presence.

The march was so massive that, more than two hours after it began, a large crowd was still waiting to begin at the starting point. 

For this is my old neighbourhood...

And I would have given anything to be there today.

But then my warm glow faded, when I thought of Stephen Harper running around the Big House putting on all the lights. Even as his government moves to suppress any opposition to its pipeline projects. 

The government is poised to introduce legislation as early as this week that will revamp its environmental assessment process and turn over many reviews to the provinces. Among the changes is the move to give the federal cabinet power to overturn any decision by the National Energy Board to reject a project on environmental grounds.

And muzzles its own scientists. 

Media instructions, which are being described as a heavy-handed attempt to muzzle and intimidate the scientists, have been sent to the Environment Canada researchers attending the International Polar Year conference that started on Sunday and runs all week.

And I thought isn't it great to live in a country where Big Oil meets Big Brother?

Then I read about a little tribe in the Amazon that is being driven to extinction by those who would destroy the rain forest.

"This land is mine, it is ours. They can go away to the city, but we Indians live in the forest. They are going to kill everything. Everything is dying. We are all going to go hungry, the children will be hungry, my daughter will be hungry, and I'll be hungry too."

And I realized that it's all the same battle. To save humanity from those who would torch our future. 

And that in Canada, if we want to save the world, first we must defeat the Harper Cons.

Don't you hate those ugly planet destroyers?

Don't you love this beautiful world?