The Left Hates Tubes

“Why a ban on plastic straws sucks” – Maclean’s, May 13. “The pessimists have it right, assassins are gunning for Trans Mountain [Pipeline].” – Financial Post, August 31. “If cars and trains and planes could run on green sanctimony, in the age of Justin Trudeau, Canada would be Kuwait.” – Rex Murphy, National Post, September 1. The issue of virtue fronting malevolence could use a full page. However, today’s crisis is a policy failure that goes back to May of 2016 when the National Energy Board recommended that the Trudeau government approve the Trans Mountain expansion. New to office, Trudeau wanted to dither with regulatory requirements.

It will take a similar popular uprising to reform Ottawa’s in-your-face and in-your wallet governing classes

Then, more effort was needed to further the Energy East pipeline and Trudeau refused to advance the Northern Gateway Pipelines project. The political need for distinct approval from the Liberal Party of Canada setup today’s disaster. Canada’s East Coast and Central regions depend upon oil imports from gangster countries such as Russia and Venezuela. Crude comes in and the money goes out. Ironically, oil tankers plying the pristine waters of the Atlantic Ocean are not nearly as threatening as plastic drinking-straws. Western Canada Select (WCS) oil trades at $38, compared to the US benchmark (WTI) at $70. With another shipping port for Canada’s oil the spread would not be so economically harmful – to the country. Canadians face the same problems as Americans do. An authoritarian establishment with a virtual monopoly on the governing system including the courts and the media. Popular uprisings have been inspired by governing classes living well and promising well against ordinary folk not doing so well. Just plain people forced dynastic changes in Ancient Egypt and the most recent popular uprising took down the Berlin Wall and Communism in 1989. It will take a similar popular uprising to reform Ottawa’s in-your-face and in-your wallet governing classes.

Bob Hoye——Bio and Archives

Bob Hoye (BobHoye.com) has been researching investments for decades, which eventually included the history of financial and political markets. He considers now to be the most fascinating time for both since the Great Reformation of the 1600s.  Bob casts a caustic eye on all promotions and, having a degree in geophysics, is severely critical of the audacity that a committee can “manage” not just the economy, but also the temperature of the nearest planet. He has had articles published in major financial journals and, as a speaker, has amused assemblies in a number of cities, from London to Zurich to Tokyo.