cost of humanity

Protecting the environment is important, but it shouldn't come at the cost of Canadian businesses, says federal Labour Minister Jean-Pierre Blackburn.

The Conservative government is expected this week to table clean-air legislation that would avoid setting fixed targets for businesses to reduce their greenhouse-gas emissions.

Opposition parties and environmentalists are critical of such initiatives, saying they do little to safeguard the environment. But Blackburn insists the government is taking a balanced approach.

"You have to be pro-environment, but it's also necessary to go ahead in a flexible, measured manner so that businesses don't start an uproar," Blackburn told The Canadian Press.

The minister, who is from Quebec, cited the current crisis in his home province's forestry industry as an example of excessive conservation.

do you get this kind of logic? i consider the flipside of what this nitwit said and its repulsive - its ok to protect business at the cost of the environment. effectively, that's the underlying thinking here - isn't it? and that's why kyoto sort of flopped. because business stakeholders, as a collective, and those from whom they benefit - ie conservative-leaning politicians - cannot concede that business must bleed a little now in the wake of a global crisis. no kidding - GLOBAL. the fucking polar ice caps are melting, folks! that's a problem. if you still got no clue, then you oughta see for yourself. go up north. like, north north. you know - churchill, manitoba or even nunavut. go. visit. observe. ask. you will see for yourself. the crisis looms.

and the big boys just cannot get their fucking big heads outta their asses. and they cannot adapt to a changing world. and they appear far too fixated on those god-damned fossil fuels. barrels and barrels of the stuff. and still the ice keeps melting. and still north americans occupy their thrones as the most obese and, quite possibily the stupidest and the laziest, humans on the planet. and still the ice melts. and still need grows in places like darfur, iraq, palestine, and right here in the soweto's we've created in our largest cities.

and then toss in the epidemic currently ravaging an entire generation of the world's largest and most polulated continent - africa - AIDS. and so many of us have achieved a perfect state of desentization that we can honestly believe ourselves when we look away from the tele screen and say 'its not my problem.' or believe ourselves, complete with self-righteous indignation, when we apply a scornful blame-the-victim-elitist attitude to the homeless, panhandling, addicted street uchins.

do you feel happy? you there, surrounded in all your stuff? wrapped in the comfort of your apathy and cruel disregard? do you feel connected to the web of humanity? or only when it suits your requirements? what responsibility to you ... do any of us ... feel as a human?