I was deeply offended by the exaggerated, inaccurate and actually quite hysterically ridiculous piece by Kathryn Marshall on the Opinion page headlined “Environmentalists get their Comeuppance,” (Trail Times, Jan. 13).
First of all, in the interests of transparency and full disclosure, it would have been helpful to have identified her as a former Fraser institute staff person.
That information would have alerted many readers who have long tired of that right-wing, corporate-funded think-tank’s predictable propaganda.
When I did some on-line research, I also found it interesting that her husband, Hamish Marshall, is a former strategic planning advisor to Stephen Harper and is now working with John Cummings, head of BC’s up & coming Conservative party.
I would also say that describing “Ethical Oil” as a grassroots advocacy organization is disingenuous. It was started as a blog to promote the ideas of the Ethical Oil book author Ezra Levant, a controversial, extreme right wing, political operator and currently commentator for Sun News (check out his bio on the Wikipedia website).
In short, we’re dealing with the extreme right wing of the Conservative party, and, if anyone is into conspiracies, the people named are definitely worth researching for some interesting interconnections.
Anyway, re Marshall’s revelation that people and foundations from outside Canada are contributing money to Canadian environmental groups, all I can say is that as long as we have to deal with internationally financed transnational corporations exploiting our resources, what’s wrong with internationally financed environmental groups monitoring and challenging their activities?
There are no borders when it comes to our natural environment. The air, land and ocean interconnect and it is the responsibility of us all to do what we can to try to protect this fragile life support system for our grandchildren and generations to come.
For me, it’s simple. The very thought of BC’s coastline and ocean suffering anything like the disaster brought about by the Exxon Valdez, automatically makes me an opponent of the tanker shipments coming from the end of the Gateway pipeline. It is a no-brainer – the risks are unacceptable.
Ann Godderis
Castlegar
