Here's what happens when you make a pothead your Prime Minister

You find yourself desperately trying to follow his utterly tortuous logic, as for example in this interview with Dawna Friesen at Global News.

Don't just read it... read it twice! Or three or four times...

Does it make any sense? We have to triple our exports of dirty oil to meet our commitments to a clean environment?

Huh? Say what?... Read it again... still doesn't make sense?

I hear you.


Now try this; roll yourself a nice plump fattie.

Fire up that fattie...  draw deep. Really deep.

Hold it in as long as you can.

Repeat as required.


Yup, Trudeau's pipeline plans are starting to make sense, aren't they?

Canada unveils Feminist Pipeline Policy

A message from The Honourable Jim Carr

Minister of Natural Resources

Peace and prosperity and abundant cheap energy are every person’s birthright. Today, as Canadians, we have a great opportunity to help the people of the world’s developing countries join the global middle class and the multilateral system that supports it.

It is worth reminding ourselves why we step up—why we devote time and resources to foreign policy, trade, defence and development: Canadians are safer and more prosperous when more of the world shares our bitumen and our values.

Those values include feminism and the promotion of the rights of women and girls.

It is important—and historic—that we have a prime minister and a government proud to proclaim themselves as feminists. Women’s rights are human rights. This includes sexual and reproductive rights—and the right to access safe and reliable fossil fuels. These rights are at the core of our foreign policy and our pipeline policy.

I am delighted to announce that we are launching Canada’s first Feminist Pipeline Policy,  which targets gender equality and the empowerment of women and girls. We are positioning Canada at the forefront of this global effort. This is a matter of basic justice and also basic economics. We know that empowering women with affordable fossil fuels, overseas and here at home, makes women and girls and the LGBTQ2 community more prosperous.

Now is the time to rise to the great pipeline challenges of this century. Our job today is to preserve the pipelines of previous generations and to build on them, twin them, extend, and expand them.

Only then can the women and girls of the world be assured of the prosperity that pipeline contractors too often take for granted.

The dark side of credentialism

You mean there's a bright side?

No, there isn't. But there's an overriding assumption in society that those who have more credentials have more cred.

Here's a perfect example. Robyn Allan is an opponent of pipeline development. About 12 paragraphs from the end of that link you'll see that one of the big pipeliners has cast aspersions on her qualifications to oppose a pipeline because she only has an M.A. in economics, whereas the pipeliners have hired on plenty of economists with Ph.D's to vouch for them.

Back in one of my previous lives I remember some sort of environmental hearing, wherein all assembled were discussing the pros and cons of a proposed residential development in what had hitherto been a farm field. On this particular occasion I was against the proposal, although I am inclined to be pro-development when I have skin in the game.

The locals figured common sense was going to prevail here, but they didn't count on the developers having "experts."

The secret weapon we had to defeat the development proposal was the "it'll mess up the wildlife" card. Deer, foxes, raccoons, and rabbits would all be inconvenienced if a subdivision were to be plunked down in a pasture that they had freely traversed for generations.

Maybe even millenia.

That's a pretty strong card to play in the NIMBY game.

So the developers bring in this guy with a Ph.D. in Zoology, who, as an expert witness, claims that the rabbits and the raccoons and the foxes and the whatever have never traversed this property, because the ridge (if I'm not mistaken, the technical term was "esker") behind the subject property would have prevented it.

That was immediately identified as whole-cloth bullshit by everybody in the room. The rabbits can't hop up a hill?

But wait a minute... the guy who made that ludicrous statement had a doctorate in zoology!

Good enough!

That sub-division is a thriving and sought-after enclave just north-west of Guelph today, thanks to that expert witness with the appropriate credentials.

So I don't know if I entirely agree with Ms. Allan's take on pipelines, but I do know it is utter foolishness to ascribe more credibility to someone who has more credentials.

After all, what's to tell the difference between someone who has a masters degree in economics and someone who has a doctorate?

Often the only difference is that the parents of the Ph.D. had deeper pockets.