The Tyee, a “fiesty” on-line magazine that loves tackling stories that the mainstream media overlook, has the definitive piece on the Harper Conservatives’ plans for Kyoto – and it’s bleak, bleak, bleak. Canada’s new federal government (this is being written before the polls close, so we’re making an assumption) is seated in the oil-soaked western province of Alberta and has been hostile to the Kyoto Protocol from the outset.

Tyee writer Donald Gutstein makes three excellent points. First, he identifies the public relations professionals who are behind the latest spin. Second, he describes how they were able to get Harper to present the clmate changing policy without suffering any political fallout during the election. And third, he outlines how a shift in Canadian policy – linking Canada to the anti-Kyoto Asia-Pacific Partnership – may be sufficient to wreck the Kyoto Accord permanently.

The Tyee piece should therefore be required reading for Kyoto supporters, for political strategists and for the kind of PR professionals who don’t mind peddling their services to the highest bidder – no matter the ultimate cost.