Even the most conservative corporate interests come around when they finally understand that this will effect the bottom line more than just about anything.
Even the Canadian Council of Chief Executives is calling for absolute emission reductions AND endorses “environment taxes” e.g., our carbon tax…
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20071001.wrceos1001/BNStory/specialComment/
Climate change top issue, CEOs declare
From Monday’s Globe and Mail
October 1, 2007 at 1:52 AM EDT
OTTAWA — Canada’s top chief executive officers have reached an “unprecedented consensus” on the need to combat global warming and their obligation to do more to help.
Monday morning, the Canadian Council of Chief Executives is releasing a declaration calling climate change “the most pressing and daunting issue” today, and acknowledging the need for “aggressive” action including “absolute” emission cuts. It’s the clearest signal ever sent by a broad coalition of Canadian businesses that they embrace the fight against climate change and accept the need for emission cut targets.
Even more significant: the CEOs acknowledge a necessary part of the battle will be government intervention to raise energy prices as a means of influencing consumption. “We share the goal of slowing, stopping and reversing the growth of global greenhouse gas emissions over the shortest period of time that is reasonably achievable,” the 150 CEOs announce in a declaration obtained by The Globe and Mail.
They say they’re confident that technology investment – spurred by incentives – could help Canada become a leader in trimming emissions output. But the CEOs acknowledge that governments must step in with an emissions trading market or even something most of them don’t welcome: environment taxes.
They say even without government intervention in markets, consumer preferences are shifting toward more environmentally friendly alternatives, but market forces alone are unlikely enough to meet the challenge of climate change.”
The declaration is an attempt by the CEO group, whose companies generate more than $800-billion in revenue a year, to secure a greater role in the national debate on tackling climate change.
“It’s meant to go on the offensive in a positive way as opposed to being in a defensive position where I think the industry has been for the past [few] years,” said Thomas d’Aquino, Council of Chief Executives president.
A key goal in this public embrace of the battle against global warming is to forestall measures from current or future governments that would unduly penalize the Canadian economy.
Both Ottawa’s minority Parliament and provinces are divided over what sort of policies are best to reduce greenhouse gas output.
“Unless we pull together and get a degree of consensus in the country … Canada will continue to be mired in this highly destructive, non-productive debate that eventually will lead to – I don’t know – maybe Draconian regulations that make no sense whatsoever,” Mr. d’Aquino said.
However, there is still plenty of time to influence the direction of Canada’s climate-change abatement strategy because the Harper government is still in the process of assembling it.
After announcing that Canada could not meet the heavy emissions reduction obligations under the 1997 Kyoto treaty, the minority Harper government is trying to chart a new course to reduce greenhouse gas output over a longer period.
Once considered a global-warming skeptic, Prime Minister Stephen Harper appears more resolved to act now.
He told global leaders earlier this month that the “growing menace of climate change is one of the most important public policy challenges of our time.”
Is the author freaking kidding me? What a bunch of crap. No one in their right mind can actually think that Stephen Harper has any intention whatsoever of doing a damn thing about climate change.
The CEO task force that drew up the declaration, co-chaired by Alcan Inc.’s Richard Evans and Suncor Energy Inc.’s Rick George, also sounds the alarm about the lack of a coherent national strategy to combat climate change, saying it’s undermined by conflict between the provinces and Ottawa.
Finally, the CEO group cautions, if real gains are to be achieved on climate change, any long-term plan must include all countries that are major emitters.
More shocking news from Bush and Harper
http://www.thestar.com/article/261743
Bush’s green plan ‘disappointing’
Lacks any new domestic initiatives to curb greenhouse gases, environmentalists say
September 29, 2007
Tim Harper
Washington Bureau
WASHINGTON–U.S. President George W. Bush has called for an international fund to develop technology to cut greenhouse gas emissions, part of a White House bid to reshape the global environmental debate following the expiration of the Kyoto Protocol.
Bush, however, offered no new domestic initiatives in a speech to the world’s biggest polluters meeting here and appears to have only further isolated his government from the approach favoured by most of the rest of the world.
Bush will not endorse mandatory emission cuts and his speech yesterday was panned by many European delegates, environmentalists and even onetime allies.
“Our guiding principle is clear,” Bush said. “We must lead the world to produce fewer greenhouse gas emissions, and we must do it in a way that does not undermine economic growth or prevent nations from delivering greater prosperity for their people.”
That has essentially been the Bush policy since he decided early in his first term that he would not commit the U.S. to the United Nations-brokered Kyoto Protocol.
“I’m interested in … effective policies,” said Bush, who used most of his speech to recite a litany of existing U.S. policies. “I want to get the job done. We’ve identified a problem, let’s go solve it together.”
Environment Minister John Baird, who represented Canada at the two-day meeting of major polluters, said he sensed a new focus and urgency to the matter on the part of a Bush administration that has been roundly accused of dragging its feet on the issue. “Our emissions are up 33 per cent above Kyoto levels and the U.S. is only up 18 per cent, so I don’t think we’re going to get anywhere by lecturing or passing judgment,” he said.
Most thought Bush’s late conversion to the climate-change debate undermined any message he sought to deliver.
Samuel Thernstrom, the communications director at the White House council on environmental quality during the first Bush term, said the president missed a chance to offer a bold new initiative.
“You were left looking for a little more here, something that would make other countries sit up and take notice and say something is happening here,” said Thernstrom, now a scholar at the conservative American Enterprise Institute.
“He has disappointed before. I can’t say he hasn’t done it again.”
Philip Clapp, president of the National Environmental Trust, said Bush had an opportunity here to take some decisive action, but his lack of action had turned it into a “sideshow.”
“Despite a few hopeful signs that he had changed his mind, the president stuck with the shrinking group of climate change dead-enders who are still fighting against a new, binding treaty.”
Nathan Cullen (Skeena-Bulkley Valley), the NDP environment critic, was meeting with congressional leaders while Baird was at the U.S. meeting and he said he came away even more convinced that the Bush conference was merely an attempt by the U.S. president to appear to be doing something.
“One can be forgiven for being cynical about this,” he said. “Why Stephen Harper is giving cover to a discredited administration is beyond me. He is using Canada’s good name to try to lend some legitimacy to a process which has none.”
Daniel Weiss, director of climate strategy for the liberal Centre for American Progress, said Bush was proposing nothing but a grab bag of small strategies dependent on waving “a magic technology wand.”
Yet another example of why I am embarrassed that Harper represents Canada on the international stage
I feel like I need to apologize for things like this:
http://www.thestar.com/article/261475
Canada defends presence at climate talks
September 28, 2007
Tim Harper
WASHINGTON BUREAU
WASHINGTON–The Bush administration has opened a two-day climate change conference here fighting off charges it is undermining the United Nations and choosing voluntary goals over mandatory cuts in a post-Kyoto world.
Canada was among 18 participants huddled for two days of talks at the U.S. State Department. Environment Minister John Baird said the meeting was key because it showed American engagement in finding global warming solutions.
Is this not the funniest thing you have ever heard? Like honestly, how can anyone, after the last 7 years of George Bush, and his Clear Skies Act and Healthy Forests Initiative, how can anyone claim that the U.S. wants to find global warming solutions. Sorry Mr. Baird, but this is nothing more than an outright lie.
But many critics suggested it was an 11th-hour bid for credibility on climate change from a lame-duck administration that has none on this issue.
Ya think?
“For so long, people said they wanted to see U.S. engagement. We’ve got U.S. engagement,” Baird said.
“Is it perfect? None of us around this table are perfect.”
Sigh….simply pathetic.
He said Ottawa was not throwing in its lot on climate change with the Bush administration, but was joining with the other participants, which comprise about two-thirds of the global population, produce 80 per cent of the global economy and are responsible for about 80 per cent of global emissions.
“Unless we get the active participation of the United States, China, India, this isn’t going to be successful at the end of the day,” he said.
Bush will address the conference today, but the meeting fired passions even in his absence.
Some 49 demonstrators were arrested yesterday and a Canadian environmentalist lashed out at Prime Minister Stephen Harper and Baird, telling international reporters the two did not represent the Canadian view on global warming and that the Prime Minister considered the Kyoto Protocol to be a socialist plot.
Very true, on both points.
Steven Guilbault of the Montreal-based Équiterre told a press conference organized by an alternative summit of international non-governmental organizations, that Harper and Baird are using dishonest base lines when they talk of cutting emissions.
“The truth for Mr. Baird and the Harper government is a very relative thing,” he said.
“I would invite delegates from every country in the world to put pressure on Canada. This government does not represent Canadians.”
Guilbault also said Harper believes NGOs had invented the climate change challenge and does not believe in the science of climate change.
Although Europeans were represented at this meeting, they brought with them much skepticism.
German Environment Minister Sigmar Gabriel told German radio he could not be too concerned about the Bush emphasis on green technology and “flexibility” among nations.
“We all know that they will be out of office in a few months,” he said of the Bush administration.
After the first day of the meeting, Gabriel tempered his remarks, saying it was positive that Washington was at least involved in negotiations.
In her opening remarks, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said the U.S., as a major economy and a major emitter, “takes climate change very seriously.
“Climate change is a global problem and we are contributing to it, therefore, we are prepared to expand our leadership to address the challenge,” she said.
But, she added that every country must deal with its own needs, its own interests, its own sources of energy and its own domestic politics.
“This is not a one-size-fits-all effort,” she said.
Baird said Ottawa is showing leadership, trying to bring other countries on board, because nothing can be done if not collectively.
“If we could get everybody to adopt mandatory targets, obviously that would be better,” he said.
“What is it going to do to engage other countries? It is not going to take a lot of rhetoric and bellicose (talk).
“It’s not going to be done by painting anyone into a corner.”
The U.S. talks came on the heels of the UN climate meeting Monday and aims to forge a global position beyond 2012, the expiry date of the UN-brokered Kyoto Protocol, which mandates greenhouse gas cuts by industrial nations.
Bush took Washington out of Kyoto.
Before the meeting, the Bush administration launched an aggressive effort to try to counter global suspicions and give its process some needed heft.
The U.S. ambassador to the European Union, Boyden Gray, wrote an op-ed in the The Financial Times saying Bush was trying to streamline a process at the United Nations which led to an endless series of international meetings that “produce no discussion or new facts.”
Bush’s man in Ottawa, Ambassador David Wilkins, used the pages of The Globe and Mail to argue that a “diversity of solutions” from the world’s major polluters could lead to a consensus that would speed the hopes of a broader agreement at the UN.
More on Harper and the environment
http://www.thestar.com/article/260167
Harper still off-base on environment
September 25, 2007
James Travers
Ottawa
Consultants, CEOs and, yes, Conservatives insist that you can’t manage what you don’t measure. But when it comes to climate change, Stephen Harper isn’t keen to measure what he prefers others to manage.
At the United Nations yesterday, as in Australia two weeks ago, the Prime Minister skirted hard facts in repositioning Canada from near bottom of the polluter pack to top of the heap of energy giants whose love of green extends beyond the Yankee dollar. That compliments his Canada Day claim that, in every way that matters, Conservatives are putting this country back on the world stage. Heck, it might even be tolerated as harmless hyperbole if so many scary measurements weren’t being reported even as Harper promotes the hee-haw notion of laissez-faire climate-change management.
For starters, it’s pretty darned certain that Arctic sea ice is going the way of cubes in a cocktail glass. And because the ecumenical National Roundtable on the Environment and Economy says so, it’s known that the Harper government is systematically exaggerating expectations for its latest, grudging, green plan.
If candour were to slow spin, the Prime Minister would admit that far from being back, Canada is backsliding in the international theatre where the climate drama is playing. Almost as disturbing, this country is keeping bad company.
With notable variation but shared purpose, Canada is advancing with the U.S. and Australia a post-Kyoto protocol that is more inclusive and accommodating by being less demanding. More than a rubbery response to a concrete threat, that relaxed approach to safeguarding humanity’s nest contrasts with the iron fist these countries are shaking at the far less existential danger of global terrorism.
Pity the former prime minister who has to autobiographically explain why compelling evidence of an environmental death spiral was ignored while the government was otherwise engaged in a war on a tactic that, no matter how vile, has no lasting power to knock confident democracies off course. It will be even harder to persuade grandchildren that their health wasn’t worthy of economic sacrifice or as important as protecting the ruling party’s resource-rich base.
Just catching up with consensus would make those apologies unnecessary. A poll published hours before Harper’s New York speech again shows government lags behind voters on climate change. Unlike Liberals who mostly limited their effort to signing Kyoto and Tories who hope new rhetoric will erase memories of climate-change skepticism, Canadians are serious about protecting the planet.
Climate change now looms larger than health care or Afghanistan. More disquieting still for politicians juggling competing interests and prospects, the issue is no longer abstract, it’s personal. Among the interesting findings of the Harris/Decima polls is that an overwhelming majority, 68 per cent, report experiencing the effects of climate change.
Politicians put themselves at risk by shirking responsibility when public concerns become personal worries. Harper took that chance in New York by casting his government in a supporting role, leaving the lead to technological advances and market forces.
No doubt both are essential. But this prime minister, burdened as he is with a spotty record and inclined toward the easy way forward, needs to prove before the next election that he’s willing to measure and to manage what Canadians agree is most important.
Harper tried to mislead on climate change. Are you as shocked as I am?
When will people realize that Stephen Harper is an enemy of the environment.
And Environment Minister John Baird, who I have known for a few years and who is very close to my in-laws in Ottawa, may believe in the environmental movement personally, but he has chosen to sell out and put his own political ambition ahead of his personal beliefs. There is no way that you can be the Environment Minister within this government and go along with what Harper demands, and still be committed to the environmental movement.
http://www.thestar.com/article/259339
PM’s climate plan `misleading’
Government accused of exaggerating its proposals for cutting emissions in report by advisory panel
September 22, 2007
Peter Gorrie
Environment Reporter
The federal government’s latest climate change plan is badly flawed and won’t help Canada to hit its international climate change targets, its own advisory group says.
All nine programs in the plan, unveiled last month after Parliament passed a law that ordered the government to comply with the Kyoto Protocol, won’t do the job, the National Roundtable on the Environment and Economy said yesterday.
“With respect to the realization of Canada’s Kyoto commitments, we conclude that the plan … will likely not allow Canada to meet those commitments,” the report states.
The highly critical report came just three days before Prime Minister Stephen Harper is to defend his government’s actions on climate change at a major UN meeting in New York.
The report accuses the Conservative government of using “systematic” exaggeration, “double accounting,” “not accurately reflecting” emissions reductions, “important inconsistency” and “overestimated” reductions to produce false conclusions about the effectiveness of its plan.
It concludes that of the nine federal climate-change programs it studied, the government had exaggerated the benefits of three and failed to produce sufficient information to support the other six.
In one example, the report says the government is wrong for claiming greenhouse gas emissions will be cut when companies that exceed pollution limits pay a penalty in a new technology fund. The fund is to invest the money in new, cleaner technologies, and the government assumes every dollar put in will produce a certain amount of reductions.
However, the Conservatives claimed a silver lining.
They noted that the 38-page report also concludes the government plan will, over time, result in significant emissions reductions. The Tories say greenhouse gas emissions will stop increasing by 2010 under their plan and will actually drop 20 per cent by 2020.
“What’s clear through this exercise is our government appears to be on the right track,” said Garry Keller, a spokesperson for Environment Minister John Baird.
What world is this guy living in? It’s truly scary how these guys can spin bad news into outright lies.
The Roundtable was required to issue its report by the Kyoto Protocol Implementation Act, enacted in June after the opposition parties pushed it through the Commons and Senate.
The Act gave the government 60 days to come up with a plan that would enable Canada to cut its greenhouse gas emissions to 6 per cent below 1990 levels by 2012.
Baird responded at the deadline, basically restating an earlier plan the opposition said was inadequate.
The Act then gave the Roundtable 30 days to report on whether Baird’s new plan was satisfactory. That led to yesterday’s conclusion that it does not comply with the Act.
Earlier this week, two environment groups filed a lawsuit in the Federal Court of Canada asking for a ruling to say Baird’s plan doesn’t comply with the law and asking for an order to comply.
Baird noted that the report criticizes the short-term focus on Kyoto in the Act and that it states climate change should be addressed in the medium- and long-term.
The government also noted that the document said the deadlines set by the Act were too short. The Roundtable went out of its way to complain that it did not have enough time to do a thorough study, Baird said. As a result, “they had to make a lot of assumptions.”
Well I see I’m not the only one to feel this way.
http://www.thestar.com/article/258857
The HPV vaccine is about preventing cancer. Period
September 21, 2007
Catholic schools debating moralissue of HPV shot
Sept. 19
In the current public debate about the HPV vaccine, the most crucial issue is getting lost. The HPV vaccine can prevent the cause of cervical cancer. We would like to put the emphasis back on preventing cancer and saving lives. Parents and their daughters need to know the facts before they make a decision about the vaccine.First, there is no evidence linking the initiation of vaccine programs for sexually transmitted infections to increased promiscuity. The human papilloma virus is a common sexually transmitted infection. The majority of sexually active Canadians are infected with HPV at some point. A small proportion of infections will lead to cervical and other cancers and non-cancerous warts.
Cervical cancer is preventable. Yet year after year, about 400 women are diagnosed with cervical cancer and 150 women die from the disease in Ontario. Many future deaths can now be averted through vaccination. However, the vaccine is only effective if given to girls before they are sexually active and exposed to HPV. The vaccine has been widely tested and subjected to the same rigorous evaluation process required of all new drugs in Canada.
HPV immunization is a powerful new tool in the battle against cervical cancer, but it is not a stand-alone prevention strategy. It is not a substitute for cervical cancer screening. Because the vaccine protects against 70 per cent of the cancer-causing HPV types, women still need to receive a regular Pap test to detect changes in the cervix that might turn into cancer. Also, most women have already been exposed to HPV and need to be screened.
By adding HPV immunization to regular cervical screening, we have the potential to put an end to cervical cancer. We encourage parents to get the facts and discuss the HPV vaccine with their children.
Dr. Verna Mai, Director of Screening, Cancer Care Ontario, Torontohttp://www.thestar.com/article/258598
HPV furor a pain for politicians
September 20, 2007
Jim Coyle
This week, the Catholic board in Halton was the latest to wrestle with the HPV vaccination program for female students in Grade 8. It narrowly rejected a motion to ban from its schools a program offered by the province to inoculate against the virus that can cause cervical cancer and genital warts.
The program, opponents said, would promote promiscuity and premarital sex and contradicted Catholic teaching that sex is only appropriate within marriage. One trustee went so far as to suggest students not even be offered counselling or advice on the vaccine.
It’s easy to understand complaints that the program was rushed, or that boards don’t have enough information on the vaccine, or that parents should retain the right to approve such a vaccine.
What’s difficult to grasp is the connection between a properly explained preventive health measure and the transformation of righteous innocents into fornicating citizens of Sodom and Gomorrah.
It seems a bit like arguing against tetanus shots on the grounds that students who receive them will commence recklessly impaling themselves on rusty nails.
It seems unlikely, moreover, that at the pivotal moment, in the back seat of a car or wherever it is adolescents go about such business, the deciding factor in shedding one’s virginity will be what’s recorded on a vaccination card. And the Talibanesque notion of withholding information from youngsters striding into adolescence is as disrespectful as would be sneaking the vaccine into them on the desexualized pretence that it wards off bubonic plague or baldness.
Any faith-based education system fearing its foundations are so flimsy and its teachings so tenuous and its young so intellectually fragile that a lifetime’s ethical instruction can be undone by a couple of jabs with a needle is as good as declaring its own failure.
Good public policy, freed from religious influence, is based on a reasoned understanding of how the human animal actually tends to behave, not some idealized notion of how in a perfect world it should. We hope, after all, that everyone will at all times drive carefully. But we still make them wear seatbelts.
If nothing else, the HPV fooferaw demonstrates how the best laid plans of mice, men and campaigning politicians can go awry.
For a man branded the “Education Premier,” September must have seemed a smashing month to tour. All those school visits. All those fresh faces and fresh starts. Enthusiasm as yet undulled by tedious routine. Then this.
At a stroke, it probably makes clear the potential for neverending turbulence from the proposal by PC Leader John Tory to extend public funding to other faith-based schools. It certainly makes things more awkward for the premier’s defence of a status quo when Catholic board health policy seems sourced more from the Vatican than Queen’s Park.
http://www.thestar.com/article/258470
Girls’ health comes first
September 20, 2007
Catholic schools debating moralissue of HPV shot
Sept. 19
I can only laugh at the naiveté of Catholic school trustees opposed to the HPV vaccine because they think it means children are going to be promiscuous very early in their teenage years. Sexuality is part of a much larger (and natural) learning experience that includes influences from family, peers, schools and the media. I’d hate to think that we believe our children’s entire moral compass on such complex issues could be guided by the mere presence or absence of a vaccine.Although long-term studies should be conducted before we vaccinate an entire generation of Canadian girls, this is just one more issue that leads me to think it’s time to dissolve the Catholic school system instead of expanding faith-based school funding.
Jennifer Lemon, Angus, Ont.From a young age we steep our kids in a culture that glorifies lifelong promiscuity – from the magazines they read to the songs they hear to the TV shows they watch. From “hot” male models on billboards to “JUICY” printed across their bottoms, they’re bombarded with sexually stimulating messages.
To suggest the HPV vaccine will make them think premarital sex is okay is ludicrous. It also does a disservice to the intelligence of our daughters. I am raising my girls to avoid premarital sex, but I told them that I can’t do anything about the HPV status of the man they’ll marry. There’s no way I’ll let them get that gift on their wedding night.
Mia Andrews, TorontoOur public-health officials have determined that the HPV vaccine can save women’s lives. They also concluded that the most effective time to administer the vaccine is at age 13. Schools were the obvious choice for the administration of these vaccines. We now see that Catholic school boards are debating the vaccine on “moral” grounds.
The unwillingness of some Catholic boards to administer the HPV vaccine is yet another reason why faith-based schools should not receive government funding.
Mary Kainer, TorontoThe objections of some Catholic school boards to the HPV vaccination should make clear to voters the implications of Progressive Conservative Leader John Tory’s proposal to expand faith-based school funding. Why are boards spending their time and resources debating what is medically beneficial to children? This is not their job.
Allowing religious principles to guide the education system tragically misinforms students on important issues, stunting their ability to think critically.
Steve de Eyre, Cleveland Heights, OhioRev. David Wilhelm, a trustee on the Halton Catholic District School Board, believes that Catholic schools don’t have the right to deny the HPV vaccine to students, but the reality is they do. Should the public fund an institution that has the right to withhold a vaccine deemed safe by another publicly funded institution?
Few Catholic school graduates will thank their school board or parents for withholding the vaccine when they contract cervical cancer.
Neil Hollands, Torontohttp://www.thestar.com/printArticle/258471
More faith needed in teens
September 20, 2007
Catholic schools debating moralissue of HPV shot
Sept. 19
As a former Catholic elementary school student, I was appalled to read that some Catholic boards are deciding not to let their students and parents make the ultimate decision on whether girls receive the HPV vaccine. It seems kind of contradictory to me, since students receive the vaccine for hepatitis B. Does this not also promote “promiscuity” and/or drug use?Catholic school boards need to look beyond the immediate picture and see that this vaccine is very effective when given to a girl before she starts having sex. Just because she gets the shot does not mean she is going to think she is free and clear from all sexually transmitted diseases and decide to have wild sex.
At the same time, Catholic boards need to put a little more faith in their teens. Since the Catholic Church preaches abstinence, give girls the benefit of the doubt that they will follow their faith.
Sarah Millar, Torontohttp://www.thestar.com/article/258472
A case of ostrich syndrome
September 20, 2007
Catholic schools debating moralissue of HPV shot
Sept. 19
As a Catholic educator, I was both saddened and troubled by the report on the actions of some Catholic school boards. At least one board has delayed the implementation of the new HPV shots on “moral grounds.” The logic goes like this: Giving female teens a shot to prevent a cancer that may be contracted through sexual activity is the same as endorsing premarital sex.Do I want my 14-year-old daughter or son to have sex? Of course not. And I hope that the values they learn at home, church and school will help them decide not to become sexually active as a young teen. However, in 2005, Statistics Canada reported that one in eight 15-year-olds was sexually active. By age 17, that had risen to 28 per cent. So does teaching abstinence work? Clearly not. Or do these boards believe that their students aren’t represented in these statistics?
Do I support celibacy outside marriage? Absolutely. Do I want to see teens denied a simple cure to a deadly disease due to fuzzy logic and a failed plan? Absolutely not.
Peter Monahan, Alliston, Ont.http://www.thestar.com/article/258465
Vaccine is not about sex
September 20, 2007
Catholic schools debating moralissue of HPV shot
Sept. 19
It saddens and horrifies me that someone with as weak a grasp on logic and reality as Huron-Superior Trustee Regis O’Connor has anything at all to do with the education of children. “As a Catholic school board, we are very, very aware that this is a vaccine for a sexually transmitted disease and that giving it means children are going to be promiscuous,” he said.Somehow he expects us to believe that protecting our children against four strains of a sexually transmitted disease is going to cause them to run out and have sex, ignoring all of the other consequences. That’s ridiculous and offensive. It’s also offensive to imply that the 400 women who die every year in Canada from cervical cancer are dying because they were promiscuous.
I sincerely hope that not a single daughter of a parent who refuses the vaccine is ever faced with a spouse who had a few youthful indiscretions. I also hope that none of them is ever sexually assaulted by an infected attacker. However, the world being the way it is, both hopes are probably in vain.
Promiscuity is not required to get the human papilloma virus. All that’s required is for one partner to have the virus, and that one partner could be a woman’s husband.
Adrienne Dandy, St. Agatha, Ont. http://www.thestar.com/article/258249
Voices: STD vaccinations
September 19, 2007
We asked you whether you think it is appropriate to vaccinate Grade 8 girls against sexually transmitted diseases. Here’s what you had to say. As sorry as I am to have to say this to the august Bishops of the Catholic Church, we don’t all live in their utopian fantasy world. Denying Catholic children this vaccine will just leave them exposed. A large number of their kids will have sex out of wedlock whether they like it or not. Common sense has to prevail in matters of public health.
Peter Reynolds, Toronto
Seems like this is a great example of why Ontario needs to stop paying for the spread of religious ideals in schools and concentrate on a strong public education system. For the Catholic school boards to interpret the immunization of children against a prevalent strain of cancer as some kind of “immoral undertaking” is as puzzling as it is ignorant. This the health program is about battling cancer.
Brian Carleton, Toronto
For the Catholic school boards to say that they preach against promiscuity and fear that vaccinating teenage girls will promote sexual activity is like saying they preach against dangerous driving and fear that providing seat belts will promote recklessness. Naturally, no parent wants a promiscuous daughter but to deny them a potentially life saving vaccine is, in my view, irresponsible.
Jonathan O’Mara, Whitby
At a cost of $400 per person, perhaps our health-care dollars can be better spent on increasing the number of hospital beds or rebated from health premiums. This vaccination is a luxury item as HPV is only transmitted sexually. I think we should be putting health-care dollars to diseases in which people have little control over.
Trevor Carneiro, Toronto
As parents in this day and age, are we really naive enough to think that our children, during their teenage years, are never going to have any intimate contact? It is our responsibility as parents to protect our children from anything we can possibly protect them from. I only wish there had been that same vaccine about 14 years ago, when I was young.
Christina Leighton, Ajax
I knew this was going to come up sooner or later. High school kids – Catholic or not – are likely to have pre-marital sex no matter what the schools are telling them is the right thing to do. Giving them the option to have this vaccine is preventative and it’s definitely a good thing. Get off your high horses, Catholic schools.
Kerry Chan, Markham
A vaccination does not promote sexual promiscuity. Perhaps a more comprehensive education would help to dispel the myths surrounding the use of vaccinations as well as the influence of media and the pre-existing human disposition for sexual relations.
Bianca Williams, Toronto
I think it’s horrible that Catholic school boards are taking away the chance for these girls to be protected from HPV due to the fact that it promotes promiscuity. It’s ridiculous. A girl who may remain abstinent until marriage could contract the HPV virus through her spouse and then be at greater risk for cervical cancer. Even if the school boards do not support the HPV vaccine, ultimately it should be up to the parents and the girls.
Melanie Coulas, Ottawa
While cervical cancer may not be as prevalent as breast cancer, any preventative course is the only responsible act a person can take. Explain to your child as she lies dying of cervical cancer that it is her fault for being a loose woman. While a woman may be abstinent prior to marriage, her future husband might not be.
Tanya Quaestor, Toronto
If the concern over the HPV injection is side effects or safety, that is reasonable. To assume that Catholic teens are any less sexually active than any other group of teens is naive. You can be sure the Church won’t pick up the tab for the medical care of these girls if they get cancer in the future, nor will it provide financial support for the children they may leave behind.
Kim Darby, Burlington
Abstinence is only as good as both parties agree. Some girls will wait until marriage, but did their partners? This disease is preventable with this vaccine. It is abusive to deny any girl the right to prevent cancer in her body.
Brenda DelPozo, Toronto
This vaccine is approved for use in females aged 9 to 26 years. I don’t think this is advocating sexual activity in prepubescents. Regardless of when you think it is appropriate to allow your child to be vaccinated, the onset of sexual activity is something you can neither predict nor control. Shouldn’t the overriding concern be to prevent a disease that may one day harm or kill your child?
Christine Lyons, Toronto
I am firmly opposed to this vaccination both on moral and on fiscal/political grounds. It seems to me that an awful lot of money is going to be wasted so that Merck can line their pockets with our tax dollars. Compare this with this incidence of prostate cancer in this country. It is a major adult male killer and yet the $25-35 test is not deemed worthy to be covered by provincial health care. Parents who wish to protect their pre-sexually active daughters against a largely unknown virus by using a largely unknown and untested vaccine should do so out of their own pocket (at their own risk) and not the public purse.
Nestor Komar, St. Catharines
The fact that moves are being made within Roman Catholic school boards to suppress this important public health initiative on grounds of religious morality is compelling evidence — if any more were needed — of why public money should not be used to finance faith-based schooling of any kind.
David Mayerovitch, Ottawa
It’s extremely difficult to fathom anyone putting a young girl’s future health status at risk for the sake of making a dogma-based non-sensical moral argument. Parents need to decide whether they want to follow their Church’s teachings or save their daughters from experiencing a preventable cancer. The choice seems rather simple.
Robin Kelly, Toronto
It isn’t the vaccines which promote promiscuity, its raging teenage hormones and the lack of education and open discussion inside the Catholic school boards. By restricting discussion to abstinence you mystify and poorly prepare youth for life.
Geoffrey Peart, Milton, Ont.
In this day and age, everyone needs to be educated against STDs and anything that can help in the spread of them helps. I have some concerns about the long-term effects though. Do we know enough? That being said, STDs are for the most part preventable with education.
Charlene Smith, Woodstock, Ont.
The truth is, at some point, teenagers will be having sex. Not every Grade 8 girl is off to the nunnery. The larger issue is just how much do mom and dad know what their precious little kids are doing? It’s a safe bet that many kids are only telling part of the story to mom and dad, and they are probably not talking about the one thing that does promote promiscuity: alcohol.
Trevor Wedgewood, Toronto
Yes, it is appropriate to vaccinate young girls against sexually transmitted diseases. Young women (and young men) will make their own decisions about whether or not they want to wait for marriage to become sexually active. A jab in the arm doesn’t suddenly make people want to do something they didn’t want to do before. Getting your tetanus shot doesn’t encourage you to go step on rusty nails, does it?
Jeff Zarnett, Toronto
Is it morally appropriate not to prevent our future generations from a virus that afflicts so many women in this country?
Sha Skel, Toronto
A wicked and perverse generation should be preaching the virtues of abstinence, rather than promoting another “condom” for the number of risks associated with premarital sex.
Robert Baker, Toronto
Huron-Superior trustee Regis O’Connor’s comment that “…we are very, very aware that this a vaccine for a sexually transmitted disease and that giving it means children are going to be promiscuous” is insulting to say the least. Even if the girls (for they are the ones at risk, not the boys) meet his standards and are chaste until marriage, who is to say their future husbands have been? Should these girls have to pay for their husbands’ sexual partner’s disease? Mr. O’Connor – and apparently the Halton-Superior school board – must have very little faith in the success of their teachings with girls (and boys too, I guess). Perhaps their program needs to be changed, but this is a health issue, not a morals issue.
Cynthia Lagueux, Uxbridge, Ont.
Finally, our medical system has a vaccination that prevents cancer. Cervical cancer is now a totally preventable disease yet some people have their heads buried in the sand thinking their “teens” aren’t sexually active. Would there be this many outcries if there was a vaccination against colon, or breast cancer? I doubt it. It is because of the perception that HPV is solely contracted through promiscuity that people are opposing it.
Mike Eliadis, Toronto
As a health care professional I don’t see how this vaccine is any different than the Hep B vaccines being provided to students already. How else do they feel teenagers are exposed to Hep B? Blood transfusions? Sharing needles? Let’s be honest, if Hep B is being acquired by teenagers these days it’s most likely through sexual exposure.
Danielle Porter, Newmarket
After reading the article in The Star, I am amazed at the narrow-minded view of the Catholic members that providing a vaccination program will promote promiscuity. It is time the members of the Catholic Society realize that humans will have sex before, during and after marriage. It is our nature and should not be illustrated as something evil or unnatural. If someone chooses to abstain then they should also be respected for their decision. The decision of the HPV vaccination should and must rest with the parents, not a religious doctrine.
David Kowch, Courtice, Ont.
It is entirely appropriate to vaccinate girls against this disease. If this was for a disease that affected men only, the Catholic Church wouldn’t be saying a word.
Ian Graylish, Scarborough
This is so infuriating.
Why are Catholic school boards even allowed to debate something like this? Religious beliefs should not affect decisions of public health. What these people don’t realize is that this vaccine should be given to grade 8 girls, not because they may be sexually active, but because medically speaking, it is the most effective time in a woman’s life to receive the vaccine. A woman may not have sex until she is married, and her husband may pass on this virus to her. If she has been vaccinated, then she won’t get cervical cancer. Seems pretty simple, and yet the ignorance that comes out during this debate is astounding. My favorite line is from Huron-Superior trustee Regis O’Connor, “As a Catholic school board, we are very, very aware that this a vaccine for a sexually transmitted disease and that giving it means children are going to be promiscuous” Is he insane? That is one of the most ridiculous things I have ever read. As if a girl, in the heat of the moment, would base her decision on whether or not she has been vaccinated. It is truly frightening that this man has anything to do with educating children.
This is simply another reason why the government should not be funding faith-based schools.
http://www.thestar.com/News/Ontario/article/258142
Catholic schools debating moral issue of HPV shot
Catholic school boards across the province are facing growing complaints that the HPV vaccination program promotes promiscuity.
Last night, the Halton Catholic District School Board narrowly rejected a motion to ban the program from its schools this year and the Toronto Catholic District School Board is to vote tonight.
The Huron-Superior Catholic District School Board decided unanimously last week to delay the program in its schools until it receives more information from the Ministry of Health.
The board believes the vaccine will give students a signal of support for premarital sex and the Ontario Conference of Catholic Bishops notes in a Sept. 13 letter to parents that sex is “only appropriate within marriage.”
Absolutely absurd.
The vote by the Halton board, after lengthy debate, was four to three in favour of retaining the vaccine program to protect girls from cervical cancer.
Oakville Trustee Anthony Danko, whose motion had sought to ban the program, had also asked the board not to offer counselling or advice to students regarding the vaccine on school property during the 2007-08 school year.
Why is this man involved in teaching children when he is advocating ignorance for students?
Another trustee, Rev. David Wilhelm from Milton, spoke out against Danko’s motion, saying it was too strong and that parents should have the ultimate decision to decide whether their children would have the vaccine.
“We don’t have the right to take that away,” Wilhelm said.
Three Halton student trustees weighed in against the program, although they were not allowed to vote.
One was Erin Gamble, 16, from Oakville, who spoke in favour of Danko’s original motion.
“I’m taught every day to save myself for marriage and practise abstinence,” she said. “Giving the vaccine to Grade 8 girls contradicts what I have been taught.”
Drink some more kool-aid, Erin.
Trustees in favour of Danko’s motion said they were concerned the province implemented the vaccination program too quickly before there was enough research to prove the vaccine was safe and effective.
They were also concerned students would be able to opt for the vaccine against their parents’ wishes. But Rev. Wilhelm printed the letter from the Ontario Bishops, which said the parents had the right and the responsibility to decide whether their daughters should have the vaccine.
“And I don’t think any of us have the right to take that away as difficult as that may be,” the priest said.
After the narrow vote defeating Danko’s motion, Burlington Trustee Bob Van de Vrande proposed that the regional health unit also provide an information package to parents and that it include a letter from Hamilton bishop Rev. Anthony Tonnos.
Van de Vrande’s motion also wanted the region to ensure the vaccine will not be administered to a student unless parental consent is obtained in writing.
The board carried Van de Vrande’s motion by a five to one vote.
The Ontario bishops ask that parents remember that “infection with HPV or other sexually transmitted diseases can occur only through sexual activity, which carries with it profound risks to a young person’s spiritual, emotional, moral, and physical health.”
The Huron-Superior trustees have reservations about allowing the vaccine in their schools, said trustee Regis O’Connor.
“As a Catholic school board, we are very, very aware that this a vaccine for a sexually transmitted disease and that giving it means children are going to be promiscuous,” he said.
“We teach abstinence outside marriage.”
Even if the school board receives more information from the Ministry of Health, O’Connor said he is unlikely to vote for the HPV vaccine.
Again, how stupid do you have to be before you are no longer allowed to affect education policy? O’Conner and his board have asked the Ministry of Health to provide more information on this vaccine, at taxpayer expense, and he is saying ahead of time that even if he gets the information, he’s already made up his mind and will be voting against it. There is just so much wrong with this one statement that it nearly makes my head explode.
In July, the Ontario government announced that all Grade 8 girls in the province would have free access to Gardasil, a $400 three-shot vaccine that can prevent HPV types 16 and 18, which are responsible for 70 per cent of cervical cancer cases. Nearly 400 Canadian women die of the disease each year.
Dr. Bob Nosal, Halton’s Medical Officer of Health, said the bishops’ letter is factual in its description of how HPV is transmitted and points out it is a voluntary program.
“This is a safe, effective vaccine that works,” said Nosal. “This will – and should be – offered to all Grade 8 girls and it’s up to parents and to the child themselves whether she has it.”
Halton launched the vaccination program in public schools this week, offering it to the region’s some 3,000 Grade 8 girls.
Halton’s Grade 7 students take part in the immunization program for Hepatitis B, a disease that can be sexually transmitted.
“I’m struck by how I don’t get a hue and cry about the hep B vaccine, but I’m hearing about the HPV vaccine,” he said.
“For those who want to be protected from at least two strains that cause 70 per cent of cancers, this vaccine works.”
Liberal Premier Dalton McGuinty said the government would like to conduct the vaccination program through the schools because of convenience for parents and children.
“But if we run into a lot of resistance from a particular school board, we’ve already thought this through – we can do it through public health,” he said.
“We have to wait and see how many boards are going to say no before we pin it on one particular board, but … my advice to the board is the single most important issue here is the health of our young women.”
Progressive Conservative Leader John Tory said he hoped all Ontario schools, including Catholic ones, adopt the new program.
“I would like to hope all school boards will co-operate in making sure these vaccines are available and that if there’s anybody that doesn’t want to have the vaccine, that’s a parental decision,” he said.
What? John Howard, George Bush and Stephen Harper would try to undermine global climate change treaties? I don’t believe it…
Greens criticize ‘fraudulent’ APEC deal
Canadian Press
September 11, 2007 at 1:18 PM EDT
OTTAWA — Prime Minister Stephen Harper reached a “fraudulent” agreement on climate change with his fellow Asia-Pacific leaders, the leaders of Green parties in Canada and Australia said Tuesday.
APEC leaders agreed Saturday to a so-called “aspirational goal” of slowing, stopping and eventually reversing greenhouse gas emissions.
But the APEC meetings have always been about trade, Canadian Green Party Leader Elizabeth May said.
By trying to set the rules on climate change, the APEC leaders were attempting to circumvent United Nations talks on the environment, Ms. May argued Tuesday during a news conference.
“This is a direct effort to sabotage the upcoming meetings in Bali, Indonesia, at the 13th conference of the parties on climate change,” she said.
“(That’s) where negotiations belong, within the United Nations system.”
Ms. May and Australia’s Green party accused Mr. Harper, U.S. President George W. Bush and Australian Prime Minister John Howard of trying to diminish global efforts to fight climate change.
Australia’s environmental party, known as the Australian Greens, issued a statement Tuesday calling Canada and Australia spoilers on climate change, suggesting their governments are being swayed by the energy and logging industries in both countries.
“Prime Minister Harper is desperately trying to renege on Canada’s commitments under the Kyoto Protocol,” said Greens spokeswoman on climate change, Senator Christine Milne.
“So it’s no wonder he feels at home with Prime Minister Howard, who is equally keen to avoid any binding targets or real action to reduce emissions.”
Mr. Harper has said the Sydney declaration brings together a divided world on the issue of climate change.
Both Mr. Harper and Mr. Howard stressed that the real significance of the APEC statement was that the world’s biggest emitters – China, Russia and the United States – signed on after finding common ground.
Without specific targets or timelines, however, the declaration was immediately panned as a political stunt.
The declaration said APEC member countries would try to improve energy efficiency by at least 25 per cent by 2030.
It also called for forest cover to be increased by at least 20 million hectares by 2020 as a way of fighting climate change.
If that were achieved, the additional trees could store about 1.4 billion tonnes of carbon, equivalent to about 11 per cent of 2004’s global emissions, the statement said.
Terrifying and maddening at the same time…if you needed any more understanding of why the oil companies dispute global warming…note the minor, insignificant little detail at the end…
The Svalbard archipelago near the North Pole is already seeing the dramatic effects of global warming: the mercury is rising twice as fast as elsewhere on the planet, posing a serious threat to the ecosystem.
The Arctic sea ice has never been as small as it is now. This year, it shrank to less than 1.93 million square miles – a grim record for the planet.
“And there is still a month of melting in September,” says an alarmed Nalan Koc, head of the Norwegian Polar Institute’s polar climate program.
In Svalbard, a Norwegian territory twice the size of Belgium which is home to the northernmost permanent population in the world, the effects of climate change can be seen with the naked eye.
For the past two years, the fjords on the west coast have been totally ice-free, even in winter.
Pretty scary, right? Actually it’s a rather infuriating article. The Discovery writer makes sure to say that we can’t really know whether this kind of drastic change is due to global warming. And hey, even if it is, it could be a boon to business:
By 2050, the ice cap may have entirely disappeared in summer.
The melting ice is a blessing for oil companies which see a potential treasure opening up before their very eyes.
According to the U.S. Geological Survey, 25 percent of the world’s undiscovered oil and gas is thought to lie under the Arctic seabed.
The melting ice could also open new maritime routes, such as the Northwest Passage, to year-round international shipping, offering a much shorter route than the Suez and Panama canals.
Great! but then there’s this pesky fact:
But the change would be a catastrophe for many Arctic species and risks disrupting the entire ecosystem.
For a less corporate-focused attempt at “balance”, look for “The Eleventh Hour” near you.
Sometimes the rightwing nutjobs are off-the-charts crazy
Granted this is the US, but this is just really out there…and no this is not something satirical written for The Onion, but it is meant as a serious paper.
After posting it, they tried to take it down, but luvky for us Google has it cached:
http://64.233.167.104/search?q=cache:cnnnSRimWmcJ:www.familysecuritymatters.org/index.php%3Fid%3D1208571+%22president+for+life+bush%22+site:familysecuritymatters.org&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=3&gl=us&client=firefox-a
While democratic government is better than dictatorships and theocracies, it has its pitfalls. FSM Contributing Editor Philip Atkinson describes some of the difficulties facing President Bush today.
Conquering the Drawbacks of Democracy
By Philip Atkinson
President George W. Bush is the 43rd President of the United States. He was sworn in for a second term on January 20, 2005 after being chosen by the majority of citizens in America to be president.
Yet in 2007 he is generally despised, with many citizens of Western civilization expressing contempt for his person and his policies, sentiments which now abound on the Internet. This rage at President Bush is an inevitable result of the system of government demanded by the people, which is Democracy.
The inadequacy of Democracy, rule by the majority, is undeniable – for it demands adopting ideas because they are popular, rather than because they are wise. This means that any man chosen to act as an agent of the people is placed in an invidious position: if he commits folly because it is popular, then he will be held responsible for the inevitable result. If he refuses to commit folly, then he will be detested by most citizens because he is frustrating their demands.
When faced with the possible threat that the Iraqis might be amassing terrible weapons that could be used to slay millions of citizens of Western Civilization, President Bush took the only action prudence demanded and the electorate allowed: he conquered Iraq with an army.
This dangerous and expensive act did destroy the Iraqi regime, but left an American army without any clear purpose in a hostile country and subject to attack. If the Army merely returns to its home, then the threat it ended would simply return.
The wisest course would have been for President Bush to use his nuclear weapons to slaughter Iraqis until they complied with his demands, or until they were all dead. Then there would be little risk or expense and no American army would be left exposed. But if he did this, his cowardly electorate would have instantly ended his term of office, if not his freedom or his life.
The simple truth that modern weapons now mean a nation must practice genocide or commit suicide. Israel provides the perfect example. If the Israelis do not raze Iran, the Iranians will fulfill their boast and wipe Israel off the face of the earth. Yet Israel is not popular, and so is denied permission to defend itself. In the same vein, President Bush cannot do what is necessary for the survival of Americans. He cannot use the nation’s powerful weapons. All he can do is try and discover a result that will be popular with Americans.
As there appears to be no sensible result of the invasion of Iraq that will be popular with his countrymen other than retreat, President Bush is reviled; he has become another victim of Democracy.
By elevating popular fancy over truth, Democracy is clearly an enemy of not just truth, but duty and justice, which makes it the worst form of government. President Bush must overcome not just the situation in Iraq, but democratic government.
However, President Bush has a valuable historical example that he could choose to follow.
When the ancient Roman general Julius Caesar was struggling to conquer ancient Gaul, he not only had to defeat the Gauls, but he also had to defeat his political enemies in Rome who would destroy him the moment his tenure as consul (president) ended.
Caesar pacified Gaul by mass slaughter; he then used his successful army to crush all political opposition at home and establish himself as permanent ruler of ancient Rome. This brilliant action not only ended the personal threat to Caesar, but ended the civil chaos that was threatening anarchy in ancient Rome – thus marking the start of the ancient Roman Empire that gave peace and prosperity to the known world.
If President Bush copied Julius Caesar by ordering his army to empty Iraq of Arabs and repopulate the country with Americans, he would achieve immediate results: popularity with his military; enrichment of America by converting an Arabian Iraq into an American Iraq (therefore turning it from a liability to an asset); and boost American prestiege while terrifying American enemies.
He could then follow Caesar’s example and use his newfound popularity with the military to wield military power to become the first permanent president of America, and end the civil chaos caused by the continually squabbling Congress and the out-of-control Supreme Court.
President Bush can fail in his duty to himself, his country, and his God, by becoming “ex-president” Bush or he can become “President-for-Life” Bush: the conqueror of Iraq, who brings sense to the Congress and sanity to the Supreme Court. Then who would be able to stop Bush from emulating Augustus Caesar and becoming ruler of the world? For only an America united under one ruler has the power to save humanity from the threat of a new Dark Age wrought by terrorists armed with nuclear weapons.
