Apologies for Canadian Environment Minister Prentice

onDec 6, 2009 @ 09:06 PST

As the editor of a blog that works to achieve appeal beyond the borders of Canada, I must apologize everyone else for our Canadian obsession.

Even more, however, I have to apologize for the obstructionist and embarrassing approach of the Canadian Environment Minister Jim Prentice. There was a brief respite from this action yesterday, when the Minister said that irrespective of the debatable contents of the stolen email, Canada would still struggle to take a responsible position in Copenhagen.

Overlooked, however, was the story in which Prentice said he was just kidding:

“There’s always a lot of hype and drama that gets built into this sort of international event, much of it intended to force the hand of participants,” Mr. Prentice said in a speech to Montreal business leaders on Friday. “We aren’t going to buy into that. We are not going to panic. We are confident about the actions we are taking on the domestic and the continental fronts.”

Canada is the worst laggard – the most flagrant underachiever – of all the Kyoto signatories and now proposes targets that are similar to the U.S. but – in being so – are similarly inadequate. The Canadian government also has made no effort to outline a plan that would enable the country to hit even that risible goal.

The decision by U.S. President Barack Obama to come to Copenhagen appeared to be increasing pressure on other countries to take the issue seriously The decision by Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper suggested to the ridiculously optimistic among us that Obama’s gesture was having some effect.

But, as Prentice clearly indicates: not.