Tag: Climate Change

New book says Canada needs to fight climate change like we fought the Nazis

New book says Canada needs to fight climate change like we fought the Nazis

Posted by | Nov 17, 2020 | , |

Timing may not be everything but it is important. Seth Klein was putting the finishing touches on his climate crisis call to arms A Good War: Mobilizing Canada for the Climate Emergency when COVID-19 hit. The war metaphors for the fight against the virus followed almost immediately and continued at many pandemic constrained Remembrance Day ceremonies last week. For now at least the pandemic and the resulting economic disruption have resulted in governments spending what it takes to wage war against the virus threat. Parallels have been drawn with World War II when the country’s debt-to-GDP ratio exceeded 100...

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While public attention is elsewhere oil and gas industry takes advantage

While public attention is elsewhere oil and gas industry takes advantage

Posted by | Sep 16, 2020 | |

As the saying goes, it’s an ill wind that blows nobody any good. So the winds that have been blowing smoke from the terrifying infernos in California and the Pacific Northwest may have a positive impact of putting climate change back on the agenda in Canada after months during which the news cycle has been dominated by COVID-19, the WE fiasco and the Black Lives Matter movement. It will be recalled that just a bit over a year ago Canada’s House of Commons joined many other institutions in declaring a climate emergency. And climate change figured large in last...

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Obsession with larger vehicles has gone into overdrive

Obsession with larger vehicles has gone into overdrive

Posted by | Jan 22, 2020 | |

Disconnect between concern about climate change and the vehicles people drive keeps growing. In 2018 I noted a couple of troubling Canadian transportation trends – the number of registered road vehicles is increasing faster than the population and SUVs and their ilk are increasingly taking over the roads. The drift continues. Between 2017 and 2018, Canada’s human population increase of 1.41 per cent was outpaced by a 2.01 per cent increase in registered road vehicles. In Nova Scotia, where population growth has become a fixation, the number of humans grew by only 0.96 per cent, while cars on the...

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Decade look backs miss climate mess

Decade look backs miss climate mess

Posted by | Jan 6, 2020 | |

At the risk of being repetitive, it’s hard not to address the dearth of discussion about climate change in the media’s reflections on the ten-year period that ended last week. Even as drought stricken Australia burned amidst heat waves and fierce winds, the media presented a menu more concerned with reflections on populism, pop culture and political positioning than climate change. Then, forcing everyone to move on, Trump changed the channel with his reckless adventurism in Iraq. One notable exception to the trend bemoaned above was a piece in the National Observer, part of a collaboration with HuffPost. It...

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Lowered political temperature bodes poorly for warming climate

Lowered political temperature bodes poorly for warming climate

Posted by | Dec 1, 2019 | |

The sweet sounds of reconciliation between the re-elected Trudeau government and the leaders of the oil-producing provinces, which began immediately after the fall election, are continuing apace. After an earlier meeting in Ottawa with Scott Moe during which he delivered a conciliatory message to the truculent Saskatchewan Premier, Justin Trudeau last week sent his ministers on mollifying missions to the lions’ dens of Calgary, Regina and Edmonton. Very little has come out about the Edmonton tête-à-tête between Jason Kenney and Deputy PM Chrystia Freeland. The news clips, which looked tame enough, were mostly about the now-settled CN Rail strike...

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Richard Starr, The man behind the Point

About Richard

RICHARD STARR has had careers as a journalist, public servant, broadcaster, political staffer and freelance policy adviser. He is author of numerous newspaper and magazine articles, a former radio and TV producer and weekly newspaper editor, and the author of three non-fiction books. Starr has lived in Dartmouth for more than 30 years.

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