One of the key problems with all this mostly empty posturing is that once an election has passed, the votes are in, the governing party will actually have to look at whether they want to or can realistically implement any of these policies with any sustainable positive impact.

The cold reality is that most people's support of environmental programmes lapses once it starts to impact on their bottom line. Green issues have moved through waves of popularity and "importance" before but how many people would trade in their SUV's or suffer an economic loss for an environmental abstraction is very debatable - whether it is a Liberal one of a Conservative one.

Kyoto was an interesting example. Despite the Liberal much vaunted "support" for Kyoto, they made little effort to meet their committments. They bluntly never expected to have to meet them and correctly weighed that the political fallout would probably be mininal. In that context, Kyoto and other efforts ahve been vacant and empty gestures, political performance art rather then policy. I unfortunately see little sign that the current political dance will be effectively different.

Whooee! RichardFeller, yer on the money a hunnert percents worth. I figger yer writin' fer a Merkan audience an' yer doin' a dang decent job o' tellin' 'em what's what here in Canajun polyticks.

The publick 'pinion pools is sayin' not too many Canajuns is buyin' the new green Tories.

Now, jest today Harpoon's all puffy up on his hind legs shellin' out $1.5 Bn fer eco-votegettin'. I'm a cynical sumbitch an' the first thing popped inta my cynical head when I seen this headline was that they give that much t' the tar sands development each an' every year. They give even more t' other big oil tax breaks an' exploration subsudies.

A billion an' a half ain't peanuts but the environment's been shortchanged by this an' the previous gummint fer decades while at the selfsame time they been pumpin' billions inta the dirtiest industries we got - oil an' car-makin'.

PitBull Baird, the Enviro-minister, sez he won't go fer any carbon tax or a carbon tradin' scheme, neither.

I figger $1.5 Bn might get a few studies done an' mebbe even do some real good by gettin' sum alternative energy generation started up. It sounds like a lot but when you stack it up against the money Harpoon's sendin' t' the warlords an' opium growers in Afstan, it ain't huge.

Here in my neck o' the woods, gummint's gonna give away a billion bucks to 650 rich tobacka farmers so's they'll quit growin' tobacka.

The Bushman's spent $500,000,000,000 in EyeRack. That's five hunnert billion. I keep askin' myself what the carbon footprint o' these here Afstan an' EyeRack Wars is.

I recorded me up a new song today an' posted it up on my little boog. It's all 'bout Minister Baird an' it's called "How Much is that Pit Bull in the Window?" Drop by an' listen t' my screechin' sumtime.

JimBobby

"I keep askin' myself what the carbon footprint o' these here Afstan an' EyeRack Wars is."

I hears yuh, JimBobby.

I bin wondrin' 'bout dem deepleted uranyum clouds blowin' over everthin'.

'Taint gonna be easy singin' 'bout glowin' hearts when yer lungs is all lit up.

Whooo-Weee! And I hears dat if we ain't doin' sumtin 'bout 'dat global warmin' the tempurture might go up'ards by like a whole degree or sumtin' in da next hundert years! Ah maht even lose sleep over dat!

It's all political white-wash. No wonder no-one gives a crap.