Pipeline foes pushing Canada toward mob rule

Certain politicians pick and choose the laws they’ll obey

It takes some doing, coming second in a twohorse race against a good ol’ boy from Texas with the nickname Dubya, but somehow Al Gore managed it.

Maybe Al was too busy tinkering with that creation of his — you know, that internet thingy he takes credit for — to give his full attention to the race for the presidency of the United States. Or perhaps he was just saving energy.

Anyhow, the man with three luxury homes who loves hopping on a private jet so he can visit with the Bangladeshi prime minister and lecture him on being such a naughty boy in looking at coal-fired electrical power to help drag that poor country out of its misery, hasn’t forgotten us knuckle-dragging Albertans.

As they say, there’s no show without Punch, so it was inevitable “Inconvenient Al” would take to Twitter to entertain us over the Trans Mountain pipeline expansion.

“The Kinder Morgan pipeline carrying dirty tar sands oil would be a step backward in our efforts to solve the climate crisis. I stand with @jjhorgan, @MayorGregor, and all of the Canadians — including the First Nations — who are fighting to stop this destructive pipeline. #StopKM,” was Gore’s contribution.

A somewhat peeved Naheed Nenshi then reminded us why, in the end, Calgarians did decide to give a smart, local lad a third term in the mayor’s chair. “Last I checked, Mr. Gore has no regulatory authority in Canada; nor, obviously from that tweet, any actual knowledge of the situation. So it’s a shame that someone like that would comment on something they obviously don’t understand,” was his suitably caustic response.

Yet while Gore’s Twitter interlude into this

She, too, will get a slap on the wrist and a $500 fine.

increasingly divisive issue can be shrugged off as the vague musings of an elitist, well-heeled American who’ll salve his conscience by saving the world on someone else’s paycheque, the same excuse doesn’t wash for certain Canadian politicians who are now aiding and abetting breaking laws they dislike.

Take, for example, Vancouver-area NDP MP Kennedy Stewart, who this week pleaded guilty to contempt in protesting the pipeline by blocking access to the company’s main gate in violation of a court order to stay five metres away.

He had been joined in this little charade by Green party Leader Elizabeth May, who goes to court herself later this month on the same type of charge. No doubt she, too, will get a slap on the wrist and a $500 fine.

These people are elected to help shape the laws that govern this land. But now, if there’s a law or legal ruling they don’t like, it’s fine and dandy to simply break it.

So, if hotheads turn up on Stewart’s or May’s own doorsteps and harass them and their families because of their environmental views, what recourse springs to mind? Calling the police, perhaps?

But what if the police don’t feel that trespassing or uttering threats are laws they should bother enforcing any longer? When you encourage the rule of the mob, then the mob can come back to bite you.

Meanwhile, not content with being a House of Commons backbencher in opposition, Stewart has decided to run for mayor of Vancouver.

Perhaps he can kick off his campaign outside the Port of Vancouver. That’s the place exporting more coal than anywhere in North America. Get close enough to the $275-million expansion at Westshore Terminals and he might get arrested again.

It used to be mainly metallurgical coal used in steel making that was sent off to Asia, but lately, the thermal kind is on the rise. That’s the stuff burned for electricity and that gives off lots more carbon. Who knows, perhaps some of it will make its way to those Bangladeshi power stations, and then Stewart might qualify for an Al Gore tweet.