Fort McMurray and Climate Change: A Tough Conversation

Cody Hartsburg

Lately I’ve been seeing a lot of talk to not politicize the Fort McMurray fire. And the people saying this are 100% correct. There have been people on both sides of the political spectrum who have made some pretty off-hand comments, and any snarky attitudes of this sort should absolutely be condemned. But silencing talk about climate change right now is not helping anybody. With the short winter and little snowfall, higher than average temperatures, dry conditions, a fire season that is lengthening, and the increasing frequency of forest fires, it’s hard to ignore the role that climate change plays here. Yes, it would be ridiculous to claim that the Fort Mac fire was undoubtedly, 100%, only caused by global warming. But that doesn’t mean it didn’t play a role, a significant one at that. Climate change is linked with the increase of severity and frequency of extreme weather events around the globe. These types of disasters are only going to happen more often, and on a larger scale. The reason I feel the need to talk about this is that it’s not an isolated event, this is a symptom of disgusting disease. If we continue on with business-as-usual, disasters like the Fort Mac fire will slowly become the norm.

Dwayne's home fire raises huge questions

By Corinne Benson,
Peoples Voice newspaper

On February 12, there was a fire at Dwayne's Home, a hotel in Edmonton that has been converted into a transitional housing facility for 130 people, who are probably all on AISH, Alberta's "assured income for the severely handicapped" program.

These individuals are in the category of homeless and considered hard to house. I know one of them because the community of the disabled are highly ghettoized, and my daughter, also disabled, is friends with her. As I was listening to the radio, my sobbing was stilled when it was announced that all 130 had escaped the fire, and only one had been taken to the hospital.

Power Shift points to corporate power as main danger to environment

Over a thousand youth, students and young workers gathered at the University of Ottawa at the end of October for a busy weekend of presentations, workshops, seminars, and protests about climate change and social issues, under the banner of “Power Shift 2012.”

The conference aimed to bring together “a broad, diverse movement to tackle the root causes of climate and change a fundamentally unsustainable economic system based on corporate greed and perpetual growth.” Attendance was so high that the keynote speeches on Saturday night overflowed into three separate large university auditoriums and had to be simultaneously linked by video stream.

Power Shift billed itself as coming at a key moment in history where “the reality of climate change is one of the central challenges of our time, showing the problem of corporate power and the urgent need for alternatives.” Conference organizers said that “economic and climate crises we are facing have the same roots — the relentless drive to put short-term economic profits over the interests of our communities and the environment.”

The participant’s mood was upbeat and inspired by the major youth mobilizations of the past year with the Occupy movement, the Quebec student uprising, and also the powerful show of opposition to the expansion of tar sands pipelines and tankers along the west coast with the rally of 5,000 people at the BC provincial legislature last month.

“I think this is the first time I’ve been at an environmental conference that is actually talking about the system, not just the symptoms,” keynote speaker Naomi Klein told participants. “For a very long time the climate change movement has behaved as if it were the one issue that didn’t have an enemy, and we’re all in this together,” she said.

“You are coming of age in a society at war with your future” Klein said to loud cheers, pointing to reactionary governments, big corporations, war and especially the energy industry as the culprits.

Former co-spokesperson of the CLASSE, Gabriel Nadeau-Dubois, was equally frank. "The problem is not consumption, it is our economy and production. Our system is broken on a systemic level. The destruction of our environment is a natural and inevitable result" he told the conference, blaming the capitalist system.

"We will not get a second chance. Without radical change we will be faced with extinction. Resistance in these times is not an option, it is a duty", Nadeau-Dubois said.

Several speakers came from Quebec to talk about the student strike as an example of the power of mass popular mobilization in the streets, and also the less-well known victory against Hydraulic Fracturing or Fracking used to extract shale gas.

The new Parti Québécois government of Pauline Marois has indicated serious concerns over the safety and environmental impact of hydraulic fracturing with the environment minister talking about a full and permanent ban.  Currently, fracking is partially banned in Quebec pending on the results of two environmental studies.  The energy company Talisman suspended all shale gas exploration in October.

A number of delegations, presenters and speakers also came from First Nations communities.  “We have one thing that industry and government will never have, and that’s the truth” Crystal Lameman with the Alberta-based Indigenous Environmental Network told delegates on the Saturday night session.

“My children have the right and … the government has a fiduciary [Treaty] responsibility to give us clean drinking water. And it's not okay that … when I walk past [the boarder between municipalities], our drinking water is different than others” said Lameman, who is a member of the Beaver Lake Cree First Nation, about the impact of the Tar Sands on her community and environmental racism.

“It’s not okay that my 14-year-old niece have an asthma attack, that my son got a bleeding nose - that’s not okay. And that’s what we’re living every single day. It doesn’t matter if you’re indigenous or not - it’s not okay. This is what our future looks like, because they have desecrated a site the size of Switzerland - and they want to expand it ten times,” she said.

The Power Shift conferences were first organized in Australia, New Zealand, Britain and Canada after a US conference kicked-off the initiative around 2009. Future meetings are planned for India, Africa and Japan.
From the beginning, Power Shift has drawn a very broad range of voices speaking out against climate change. The US conferences have featured speakers like former US Vice-President Al Gore on the one hand, and journalist and activist Bill McKibben on the other hand.

McKibben (founder of the group 360.org which uses social media to coordinate climate change protests globally) also spoke at Power Shift 2012 in Ottawa. He called upon young people not to fear getting arrested in non-violent civil disobedience in order to halt plans like the Enbridge Northern Gateway or Keystone XL pipelines and spoke of his arrest last August outside the Whitehouse in Washington, along with about 70 other activists protesting Keystone XL.

Outside of the presentations from big-name speakers, an almost overwhelming series of workshops dealt with activist training lead by campus, community and labour activists. Many local student unions as well as the Canadian Federation of Students sent delegates and trainers. While the contribution of the labour movement to Power Shift was smaller, a number of young workers came from unions including the CAW and CEP.

Training sessions addressed anti-oppression and environmental justice, explained climate change issues, policy and science, and discussed questions like indigenous people’s perspectives and working together in local action.  There was also discussion of direct action as well as lobbying, perhaps reflecting a certain lack of consensus around a common strategy and way forward beyond discussion.

Future preparations are now focusing on the international climate negotiations, continuing building links with social justice issues, and further campus and community training to draw more young people into the environmental movement.

Alberta communists challenge big oil regime

Peoples Voice


Alberta has a reputation as a right-wing province, in part due to its political history. From 1935 to 1971, Alberta was governed by Social Credit, which quickly dropped its populist origins to become a mainstream pro-business party. The past 41 years have seen regular majorities for the Conservatives, closely linked to Big Oil and other corporate interests.

When voters go to the polls on April 23, the main contenders are the Conservatives led by "moderate" Premier Alison Redford, and Danielle Smith's Wildrose party, a more stridently right-wing pro-corporate party.

     But Alberta also has a story of progressive politics, in Edmonton, where the NDP has often elected sizable numbers of MLAs, but also in some eastern and northern rural areas, and in coal-mining communities such as Drumheller and Blairmore, where the Communist Party of Canada had a major influence starting in the 1920s.

     Reflecting this history and the urgent issues of the 21st century, two Communist Party-Alberta candidates are on the ballot for the April 23 election. Ten thousand copies of the party's election flyer are being delivered, featuring the slogan, "We are the 99% who demand: Put People Before Profit!"

Alberta election: Who are the Wildrose?

The Wildrose campaign bus

THOMAS WALKOM
Toronto Star
APRIL 18, 2012

For Alberta, the revolution is finally coming home.

Unless something dramatic happens soon, polls indicate that Danielle Smith’s upstart Wildrose Party is poised to win Monday’s Alberta election.

Such a win — or even a narrow Wildrose loss — would be a telling victory for a hard-right movement that years ago surged out of Alberta to win the country but that could never quite capture the province of its birth.

Many Canadians might be surprised to learn that Alberta’s current Progressive Conservative government is not already hard-right.

But the Alberta Tories have always been a coalition, one that includes city dwellers and ranchers, small-l liberals and social conservatives.

from People's Voice: WHO ARE THE HATEMONGERS IN CALGARY?

(The following article is from the November 16-30, 2009, issue of People's Voice, Canada's leading communist newspaper. Articles can be reprinted free if the source is credited. Subscription rates in Canada: $30/year, or $15 low income rate; for U.S. readers - $45 US per year; other overseas readers - $45 US or $50 CDN per year. Send to: People's Voice, c/o PV Business Manager, 133 Herkimer St., Unit 502, Hamilton, ON, L8P 2H3.)

A recent report for the Southern Poverty Law Centre sheds important light on the hate group which is spreading its violent message in southern Alberta. The Intelligence Report by Sonia Scherr begins with a brief account of a clash last March 21, the International Day for the Elimination of Racism:

"Wielding `White Pride Worldwide' flags and wearing black combat boots, about 40 members of the Aryan Guard and their supporters strode through the heart of Calgary... to broadcast their message of hate at City Hall. But they never got there. Instead, they encountered several hundred anti-racist protesters, some of whom threw rocks, water bottles and even cans of vegetables at the group as traffic came to a halt and police called for backup. Police eventually herded the neo-Nazis onto a bus that returned them to their vehicles on Calgary's outskirts. Though no serious injuries were reported, the melee snared headlines across Canada and prompted Aryan Guard spokesman Kyle McKee - who has `Kill Jews' tattooed on his shins - to declare victory."

The Aryan Guard have spread fear and anger among Calgary's 250,000 immigrant and minority populations.

"Essentially a racist gang," writes Scherr, "the Aryan Guard is the most public hate group to appear in Calgary - which, like much of western Canada, has a history of such activity going back to the Klan of the 1920s - in the past two decades. These Nazi look-alikes have clashed with counter-protesters at rallies in the city's downtown, handed out white-power music CDs to teenagers in an attempt to bolster their membership, and perpetrated attacks on minorities despite espousing non-violence."

The Aryan Guard was founded in late 2006 with help from two former teachers: Paul Fromm of the Canadian Association for Free Expression, who lost his teaching certificate because of his white supremacist activities, and National Socialist Party of Canada leader Terry Tremaine, a former part-time university lecturer who in 2007 was fined $4,000 by the Canadian Human Rights Tribunal because of his racist and anti-Semitic Internet postings.

"They were the main catalysts behind bringing these young fellows here," said Constable Lynn MacDonald, hate crimes coordinator for the Calgary Police Service.

MacDonald says the Aryan Guard now has roughly 20 full-fledged members, and another 20 to 30 supporters, including those belonging to the Valkyrian Legion, or woman's wing of the Aryan Guard, which consists mostly of the girlfriends of male members. The majority are in their early 20s.

The group began to draw attention in 2007, when members began distributing hate literature in Calgary and Lethbridge.

In August 2007, the Aryan Guard began disrupting anti-racism rallies. Two months later, they rallied outside City Hall to denounce Muslim women who wear burkas while voting. Since then, they have conducted sporadic demonstrations, including "White Pride Day" rallies held on the International Day for the Elimination of Racism.

As Scherr notes, "the Aryan Guard has found itself vastly outnumbered by anti-racist protesters, including members of Anti-Racist Action Calgary." While police say both Aryan Guard members and counter-protesters have been arrested for assaults, ARA spokesperson Jason Devine says no member has been charged in connection with any incident at an Aryan Guard rally.

Meanwhile, the Calgary Police Service admits that Aryan Guard members have been linked to several assaults, including one against a cab driver from North Africa.

Writing about this attack on the neo-Nazi Stormfront website, McKee boasted about getting the case dismissed: "The reason being was that they couldn't make a positive ID because apparently everyone there was all dressed in combat boots with white laces [and] black flight jackets and all had shaved heads. So let this be a lesson to anyone who wonders why on earth all us skinheads dress so similarly. [T]his is another great reason. lol [laughing out loud]".

In July 2008, a 17-year-old Aryan Guard member who had been making anti-Asian remarks followed a young Japanese woman as she left a bar and kicked her in the back of the head with steel-toed boots. He was wearing red laces - a skinhead symbol indicating he'd spilled blood for the movement.

ARA members believe that the Aryan Guard is responsible for the violent attacks against Jason and Bonnie Devine's home. Aryan Guard members have taunted the couple about the firebomb attack. "Is it hot in there?" they have asked during protests, according to Devine. "How are the kids? How's the house?"

And in yet another ugly case, four Aryan Guard members were charged with disturbing the peace after vandalizing a shopping mall and using racial slurs on a First Nations reserve near Calgary.

Scherr reports that two of the group's most prominent members, McKee and Dallas Price, faced assault and weapons charges in connection with a September 2006 confrontation in which one victim was hit with a wooden club and another was stabbed with a knife. Guard member Robert Reitmeier was charged with attempted murder in connection with a November 2006 assault on a man who suffered skull and facial fractures. Member Bill Noble was convicted in 2008 of posting hate material on the Internet that primarily targeted non-whites, Jews and gays. A judge sentenced him to four months in jail and imposed limits on his computer use for three years, though Noble continues to post frequently on Stormfront.

COMMUNIST PARTY CONDEMNS CALGARY POLICE INACTION

The failure by the Calgary Police Service to seriously investigate neo-Nazi violence against anti-racist activists is a reckless and shocking dereliction of duty which endangers lives. On October 3, the family home of Jason and Bonnie Devine and their four young children was the target of yet another such attack, in which windows were smashed and Neo-nazi graffiti was spray-painted on the front door: a swastika and "C-18", an obvious reference to the violent British fascist organization known as "Combat 18." In February 2009, the house was firebombed with molotov cocktails.

Fortunately, nobody was hurt in either incident, but the long history of email and telephone threats against the Devine family is ample warning that they remain in serious danger. The most likely suspects are in plain view - the Aryan Guard group which has been actively promoting racism and neo-Nazi ideology in Calgary for several years. Jason and Bonnie Devine have been in the forefront of community activists calling attention to the Aryan Guard. Both have campaigned as candidates for the Communist Party, and their courage has clearly angered the local fascists.

Despite its motto, "To maximize public safety in Calgary with vigilance, courage, and pride," the Calgary Police Service has ignored repeated public appeals to take action. Aryan Guard members are suspects in various other crimes, including the beatings of a homeless man, a gay community member, and a cab driver from North Africa, but no arrests have resulted. In the view of the Communist Party of Canada, this pattern has gone beyond neglect, into the territory of tacit encouragement of criminal activity. If serious injury or death results from further attacks, innocent blood will not only be on the hands of the perpetrators, but also on the hands of the Calgary Police Service which hides behind the feeble claim that "both sides are equally responsible" and that the Aryan Guard is simply "exercising its right to free speech."

The time has come for the City of Calgary and the Alberta provincial government to intervene in this crisis situation. Strong political leadership is required to replace Chief Rick Hanson with a police chief who is willing and capable of ensuring that swift action is taken to bring an end to these racist attacks. In the meantime, we extend our ongoing full solidarity to anti-racist activists and all democratic-minded citizens of Calgary who are standing up to the violent neo-Nazis in their community.

It should be noted that a redwatch* style website targeting communists, anarchists and jews in Canada has a link to the recent violent attacks.

* [from wikipedia]...Redwatch is a British neo-Nazi website that publishes photographs and personal information of alleged left-wing and anti-fascist activists. There also used to be a British magazine of the same name, and with similar subject matter. The website's slogan is "Remember places, traitors' faces, they'll all pay for their crimes", a quote from neo-Nazi musician Ian Stuart Donaldson.

The information gathered by Redwatch is indexed by cities or regions. Many of the people listed are members of the Anti-Nazi League or other anti-racist or left-wing groups...