Rona Ambrose: Super Brain or Mere Prop?
Steven Guilbeault, [states the article] a climate change campaigner for Greenpeace Canada, said normally one of the first things a new Environment minister would do is receive a number of briefings. "Once they've been appointed they would have briefings on various portfolios or various files within their portfolios, you know, clean air, toxics, nature, climate change. This is an absolute minimum," he said, adding that he suspects that the minister has chosennot to be briefed by her Department's scientists.The Upper Canadian's astonishment that the central issue of this minister's portfolio, the issue driving Canada's New Improved Government's enviromental policy, has somehow escaped the Minister's attention, leads us to formulate several theories to account for this apparent lapse:
A) Rona Ambrose has a computer-like superhuman brain, assimilating facts and theories at will, thus eliminating the redundant prattling of scientists whose intelligence pales before Her Mighty Cerebrum. (This is the meme Conservative party apologists are promulgating, along with Stephen Harper: Party Animal and All Around Fun Guy)
B) She doesn't care. (Climate change is boring and I'll be dead anyway.)
C) She thinks winter getaways on Great Slave Lake are a good idea. (I have 50 acres of waterfront 80 kilometers east of Yellowknife.)
D) She's been too busy, what with the the new environmental policy, and Clean Air Act and . . .
Oh right. Doesn't global warming have something to do with that? The Prime Minister appears to think so:
"[The Clean Air Act] will set in motion Canada's first comprehensive and integrated approach to tackle air pollution and greenhouse gases and in doing so deliver better air quality and address climate change . . . Canada's Clean Air Act wasn't developed on the fly at a press conference. It wasn't written at an international meeting held in an exotic location. And we're certainly not going to hire a comedian to promote it."
Actually, what you do is hire a telegenic minister to act as a prop to your policy announcements which were apparently formulated on a serviette in the Chateau Laurier coffeeshop, and you need something, anything to feed the media hounds nipping at your heels. Because the science of global climate change is the artifice of the devil, destroying capitalism as we know it, and depressing the Calgary real estate market besides.
Which leads us to the theory that the Upper Canadian favours: Rona Ambrose is actually a cleverly constructed cardboard cutout, programmed to suitably appear over Stephen Harper's right shoulder as needed and controlled by a secret electronic device located somewhere in the PMO. This accounts for the briefings, or lack of them. Cardboard cutouts don't need briefings. They don't need to speak at all.
posted by Michael at 11:15 a.m.|
2 Comments:
Whooee! Well HereHere, here's a little more from that Hill Times story --
"The Hill Times spoke with a well-connected source who asked not to be named and who supports the science of climate change, and as of the week of Oct. 9, the source said, Ms. Ambrose (Edmonton-Spruce Grove, Alta.) had not been briefed by the Environment Department's scientists specializing on climate change. "It's shocking, isn't it?" the source said.
"I would find that astonishing," Matthew Bramley, climate change expert at the environmental pressure group the Pembina Institute, told The Hill Times. "There's the fact that the government itself has said this is an important issue, and given that the international scientific community has delivered numerous calls for urgent action."
Another environmental advocate, John Bennett, executive director of the Climate Change Action Network, said that conversations with "science people" in the Environment Department have also suggested that Ms. Ambrose had not been briefed. "That's our understanding. We can't verify it," he said.
Shannon Haggerty, a senior adviser in Ms. Ambrose's office, did not respond to a request to comment on whether Minister Ambrose had been briefed on the matter. Opposition critics have criticized Ms. Ambrose for what they say is a failure to fully understand the science of climate change, but her supporters say the minister knows the issues well."
There's a whole buncha others besides the one Greenpeacer sayin' Rona ain't been briefed an' sum sayin' it don't matter if she's been briefed or not on accounta she's so smart an' informed she don't need t' hear what sum dumb ol' scientists who work fer the Gummint o' Canadee have t' say.
I reckon us taxpayers is payin' fer Environment Canadee's egghead scientists an' if nobuddy's lissenin' to 'em, we might as well fire their sorry asses an' save sum dough.
Yores trooly,
JimBobby
Your idea has merit, and I'd like to subscribe to your newsletter, as the great Homer might say.
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