As the premier of Alberta prepared to launch his massive, $5-million global “re-branding” campaign of misinformation about the environmental impact of the oil sands last night, Greenpeace successfully upstaged him by dropping from the ceiling with a large banner that read: “Stelmach, the best premier oil money can buy. Stop the tarsands!”
But Mr. Stelmach says he’s not surprised that the protesters interrupted his speech, especially after banner-waving Greenpeace activists dogged him throughout the recent Alberta election campaign.
“You’ve got to be prepared for that kind of behaviour,” he later told reporters. “And that’s why in my speech, I talked about getting the message to other jurisdictions around the world.”
“We’re certainly not going to leave it to Greenpeace or the Sierra Club, because at the end of the day they’re not accountable to anybody.”
In the end, he’s right. In being accountable to the oil companies that own this province and its government, Stelmach’s hands are tied: he must lie, he must lie repeatedly to people all over the world, and he must lie while spend millions of tax payer dollars to do so. Thankfully, Greenpeace is not accountable to these corporations, and so they are free to tell the truth.
In yet another example of how sustainability is being co-opted as a marketing strategy, Hasbro announced today that they will be releasing a “green” version of Monopoly, by which they mean they will be giving lip-service to social concerns about the environment, but not committing to change their corporate practices or donate any money from the sales of these games to environmentalist groups.
