by Joe Oliver, Canadian Natural Resource Minister
I’m so sick of hearing about climate change and how humans are responsible for it. We get it already! Geez. Get off my back.
Yeah, the White House’s delayed approval of the Keystone XL pipeline, and the European Union’s move to classify Canada’s tar sands oil as “highly polluting” irks me. It really does.
But what really shaves my yak is that all these organizations that want to blame oil consumption, deforestation, lax environmental policies and lack of support for diversified renewable energy don’t spread the blame equally.
If you want to criticize someone for inaction on climate change, then you need to spread the blame equally—like gravy over poutine—to everyone who isn’t doing jack shit about climate change.
Think about it. Yeah, I’m not helping. Yeah, poutine is delicious. Yeah, BP spills oil in the ocean and blocks regulation that could stop the looming decimation of our planet. Yeah, the Keystone XL pipeline might have “hazards” or “extreme dangers” or even “a catastrophic downside.”
But more importantly, what are the goddamn animals doing to help?
Not a goddamn thing.
They’re just sitting in their enclosures and endangered habitats and farting up a storm. An indisputable fact: animal farts contain methane, which is bad for the environment.
I don’t see the Sierra Club protesting every time some farmer gives his pigs beans. You know what those beans are going to become? Human-killing farts.
Animals are by their nature lazy. They never help out, but all I hear is “protect the animals” and “the polar bears are dying” and “this pipeline is destroying habitats.”
I don’t get letters from animals saying, “Uh, hey Joe, did you know that carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere are at their highest levels in human history, crossing 400 parts per million?”
I didn’t see one stupid duck helping with the cleanup of BP’s Gulf Coast oil spill. Didn’t happen.
If pandas want cap and trade so bad, I’d like to see them get involved. Write a letter that can be ignored. Protest one day so everyone can forget about it the next. The kind of things college students and hippies do so they can sleep at night.
The point is, the animals are on the take. They’re in the back room honing their vast conspiracy with climate scientists, liberal politicians and activists, plotting a way to curb the oil industry’s record profits.
Yeah, honing. I said it. I know what it means. We have schools in Canada. Big time.
Does this information shock you? It should. I make up shocking things all the time. What if instead of saying that tar sands oil produces 12 percent more emissions than other methods, I said that the Athabasca tar sands oil is carbon neutral? It’s a lie, but would it shock? Yes. Yes, it would.
Want a true one? The overall emissions from oil sands mining have dropped 26 percent per barrel since 1990. Not bad right? It’s still 12 percent more per barrel than other methods—but high-five time, right?
And that’s really the point. Not that I’m a liar, but this: Fuck you and fuck the animals.