(Stephen Harper's) About-face on the environment (Bush delayed Canada's efforts.)

About-face on the environment

It's hard to believe he said it, but he did. Prime Minister Stephen Harper, at his joint press conference in Ottawa on Thursday with U.S. President Barack Obama, actually blamed the administration of George W. Bush for delaying his government's efforts to fight global warming and reduce greenhouse-gas emissions.

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During last fall's federal election, Harper used Liberal leader Stephane Dion's own Green Shift environmental plan to club Dion like a helpless seal pup on a rapidly melting ice floe. Specifically, on Sept. 12, Harper applied this bit of twisted logic: that the Liberal carbon tax would create a "big recession" and that, in centralizing more money and power in Ottawa to pay for the plan, Dion would fan the flames of nationalism in Quebec, resulting in a threat to national unity.

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Now that Obama is in office, however, Harper has apparently gotten religion to atone for his environmental sins. But where this new "partnership" leads is anyone's guess.

Ultimately, both the U. S. and Canada will have to get down to setting serious emissions reductions goals.

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