From CBC:
A coalition of Canadian and U.S. environmental groups has launched a cross-border campaign ahead of Barack Obama’s visit to Canada, urging the U.S. president to stick to his new energy plan amid possible pleas for him to support oil production from the Alberta oilsands. [Editor's Note to CBC: Call them the Tar Sands; journalists need to be precise].
Toronto-based Environmental Defence, Washington-based Earthworks and 14 other groups have produced a newspaper advertising campaign that will start running Tuesday. They are also launching Obama2Canada.org and urging supporters to sign petitions to Prime Minister Stephen Harper and Obama, who will visit Ottawa on Feb. 19.
One ad — aimed at lawmakers and running in Roll Call, a prominent Capitol Hill newspaper in Washington — says: “On February 19 Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper will try to sell President Obama on a North American climate pact that gives special treatment to the tarsands in Alberta, the source of the dirtiest oil on earth. Tarsands don’t fit into the new energy economy.”
Please head to Obama2Canada and voice your support for a low-carbon economy based on renewable energy that doesn’t rely on the World’s Worst Environmental Disaster. By the way, the photo covers just a little part of the problem; the Alberta Tar Sands covers an area larger than England or Florida!
The Tar Sands are often in the news, as you’ll see from these brief stories at Green Inc and MSNBC. I particularly like this story about the Bishop who ministers to people who live in communities near the Alberta Tar Sands.
I’ve also written a long diatribe about the Alberta Tar Sands that begins here. We’ll be launching our own campaign against the tar sands this week.
The Obama2Canada campaign is great — really well set up and easy to use. I would be interested to track how many people send the message to Obama and Harper that dirty oil is unacceptable. I hope it’s in the tens of thousands. I just posted it to my Facebook and will leave it as the top shared link for a week. I guess a few clicks is not exactly hard work, but I do think we’ve got to try and do something. I don’t want to live in the kind of world that Harper seems hellbent on leaving us.
I’ll try to follow up with Obama2Canada, to see how it’s going… I’d like to know, too.
I am launching a few campaigns in the next week to see if we can get Canadians talking. I have no idea if anyone will pay attention, but I’m like you… I don’t like the direction that we’re taking, and feel that I have to do something!.