I don't like to pull rank - but as "The most accurate public opinion pollster in the World" - I would have to respectfully call bullshit on this spin of Ms. May's.

Harper dines out -- without fear or concern - based in large part on Ms. May and Green Party.

I mean really Elizabeth -- if your party were not around - where would your supporters go -- if anywhere-- To the Conservative Party? 

This is the kind of logic that we would get if Lizzie was PM?.Charlie must have been rolling on the floor laughing when he heard that spiel.

Get it straight Lizzie - no Green Party - Harpo loses every time. The only time Cons ever won before the evil Green Party showed up was when they were exactly dead centre or left in the political spectrum.

I always suspected that Canada's Cons were dumb, but a green person voting for Stevey "Brimstone" Harpo would be so stupid as to require immediate commitment to some sort of institution.

Last federal election, exit polls showed that people who thought the environment was most important issue voted overwhelmingly Green ensuring that Harpo's fascists got to spend a few more years destroying Canada's environment.

Are Greens Canada's dumbest voters?

Neocon's love the Greens's, thinking of them as "useful idiots" who elect the Cons over and over.

The GP's existence rides on the brand name of the Euro Green movement who with their MMP electoral systems can actually get elected. Somehow some puerile Canadian's who don't play well with others, got a hold of the Green brand and now get a large contingent of brand conscious low information uninformed voters to vote their ticket These unfortunate voters give with their vote these irresponsible malcontents a huge pile of money magnifying their power enormously.

Their kind is despised in the US after GP leader Ralph Nader elected George Bush and sent the greenest politician in the world Al Gore to the sidelines. Their odious participation in that election gave us a million dead Iraqis', a fatal 10 year hiatus in the global warming war and the worst global recession in 80 years. After that experience American progressives all but eliminated the odious American green party.

Had the Green movement not been so successful at stopping new nuclear power over the last 30 years, hundreds of millions of people now sickened and dead from coal plant produced radioactive waste, dust, mercury, and arsenic, all over the world would be alive and healthy.

Global warming and peak oil would be unheard of.

Now by driving us right over that as little as ten years civilization ending Climate/Peak oil crisis with their silly "renewable" religion, and support of Big Coal/Oil's fight against nuclear power killing millions more every year, the Grfeen Party seems bound and determined to kill lots more folks in very big ways.

Lots of Green politicians are running for the NDP and Liberals and have made enormous progress in turning those parties towards sustainable policies. More mature Green activists rejected the political party concept and joined with other progressives in the Liberal and NDP parties They have signed up Green supporters by the thousands to these parties, taking over entire constituency associations, sending green delegates to policy conventions, nominating green candidates and making sure the parties went Green. Stephen Harper even showed them how to do it with his Christian fundamentalist takeover of the Progressive Conservative party.

The Green Party reelected the Gordo last time, Harpo twice and put BC and Canada back years in the battle against global warning. They have caused enormous damage to my country, my province and my planet.

Lizzie May and her cohort of useful idiots are the dark side enemy of the environmental movement and Gaia herself.
seth 

May clearly has no understanding of the concept of subtraction 

Glad I left the greens after her first campaign. You made me a liberal, crazy lady! 

this sounds like the green party leader is trying to make herself relevant. it's not working.

the greens and the liberals are not progressive. never were, never will be.

only ndp is progressive and has roots in the social justice movement.  

"With us in the mix saying, 'Look at the damage Harper is doing', it became impossible for the NDP to run a strategy of demolishing the Liberal party to be the official Opposition," May said.
============================

If this statement is anything to go on, and considering who uttered it that's not necessarily the case, but if it is valid it implies that the electoral arrangement between the Green and Liberal parties is still in force, despite the departure of Stephane Dion and Michael Ignatieff's wholesale repudiation of the Green Shift.

Rod Smelser 

It is clear that both the Liberals and Greens recognize that theirs was a mistake not to be repeated. All politicians make mistakes and so do the voters. My biggest mistake was listening to Harper during the last election advising people that it was a great time to buy stocks.

Then there is his closing down parliament for partisan reasons. In the total history of the Westminster model of parliament this has happened only three times, John A McDonald once and Harper twice.

Please note this bit of hypocracy;

"When a government starts trying to cancel dissent or avoid dissent is frankly when it's rapidly losing its moral authority to govern."

- Stephen Harper, Canadian Press, April 18, 2005

Then the Conservative gutted our environmental legislation by combining the changes they wanted with the budget. This cheats all of us.

I fully believe that future historians will call Harper the worst prime minister we have ever had. 

If I were Elizabeth May -- I would say to the NDP and Liberals -- if you (or your donors) want to replace the money we receive (federal only) based on $'s per vote -- per year - we will temporarily de-register as an active political party and become a force of change through influence.

I mean seriously -- the Green Party is losing leverage -- because it repeatedly does not get elected. Cut a financial deal - with the parties who will benefit - for de registering -- Harper and Conservatives lose.

How much leverage would the Green's have influencing public policy after that kind of cause and effect hmmmm? 

Just consider the NDP Strategy in the 2006 election - try and replace the Liberals by attacking them most and giving the Conservatives a relatively easy time - and then ask yourself what other Party many NDP supporters would have migrated to if Layton had continued with that dangerous strategy.

What Elizabeth May did not mention is that the Greens also attracted a certain percentage of former Progressive Conservative voters disenchanted with Harper's "recalibration" of Conservatism and who would never vote Liberal or NDP and this also helped keep the Conservatives from a majority.

Enough with the ignorant analysis that the Greens cost Al Gore the U.S. election. Senator Al Gore lost that election by the simple fact that he did not win his home state! That would have put him over the top. Talk about ridiculous spin.
 

What a crock Walton spews.

Liberals and NDP having been attacking each other since Tommy Douglas and the CCF. Nothing new at all. Until the the Green Party came along Neocons in Canada got nowwhere. Most of the time the Progressive Conservatives were as lefty as the Liberals. It was the misantropes at the Green Party that gave ole Brimstone Harpo his shot at the title.

Like a lot of greenies you have trouble reading. There might have been one or two really stupid con voters who went green but according to exit polls, people who thought the environment was most important issue voted overwhelmingly Green. That is a huge number of progressive voters. Fortunately enough were smart enough to know the cost of a vote for the Green party and Stevey "Brimstone" Harpo was denied a majority. (more reading for you Eric).

Lots of reasons elections are won and lost. The one inescapable fact was that 5% of the vote in 2000 went to the Green Party. Since it's impossible to imagine a Green party voter supporting Bush, all those votes would have gone to Gore and millions of folks now dead would be alive, the economy would be booming along, and the we'd be approaching Kyoto targets.

Green party members are a particularly deadly bunch of misanthropes.
seth 

Seth you are talking through your hat blaming the Greens for the Bush legacy. You need to go back to Democracy 101 school. By your logic the NDP in Canada should not exist because they take votes away from the Liberals and therefore help Conservatives win - whether previous Progressive Conservative governments OR Harper Conservatives.

This kind of flawed thinking has succeeded in trapping the U.S. in a two-party system that disenfranchises most progressive voters. That is what is responsible for the scale of the U.S. military budget regardless of which party is government and the subsequent impact of U.S. foreign policy.

Let people vote their preference and parties run on the strength of their policies and record. Mainstream parties relying on limited political choice or strategic voting to win is why we suffer under so many mediocre governments and weak policies that fail under load. No wonder voting turnout is steadily dropping over time.

As for nuclear power saving us from global warming give me a break. The cost and scale of new construction that would have been required to deal with even a fraction of the carbon problem would have been a budget breaker. That is why Ontario is backing off new nuclear. It is far more effective dollar for dollar to invest in conservation and energy efficiency than nuclear if the goal is to reduce greenhouse gases. I also suggest you not buy into the nuclear energy spin that it is not a greenhouse gas producer. Nuclear power produces greenhouse gases from uranium mining and processing as well as from the construction of the facilities.  

I'm feeling Eric Walton 

The NDP where around a long time and did a lot of good. In those days we had Progressive Conservatives, almost indistinguishable from Liberals. Now thanks thanks to you peurile malcontents who represent only a tiny fraction of real Greens in this county the Neocons with their steady 33% known for goose stepping in lockstep behind der Furher, rule.

American progressives are now participating in large numbers at the grassroots, changing the Dems around.You need to listen to American progressives like Rachel Maddow, Thom Hartmann, and Amy Goodman screaming invictives at the American Green Party.

Like the US version, Canada's Green Party represents almost exactly zero percent of real greens and acts solely as the destroyer of the green progressive movement and Gaia herself.

"Let people vote their preference and parties run on the strength of their policies and record" This is the useful idiot statement. These are your niave malicous fools who want to destroy the earth so they can stand on their electoral soapbox claiming their right as if the political system was perfect.

Like all greenies I've encountered you have zero knowledge of energy in general or nuclear power specifically. Current OECD figure's have nuclear power at 2.6 cents a kwh in Canada and 3 cents in the US cheaper than any alternative.

Ontario is backing off nuclear because Harpo won't support AECL and Premier Dolt like Gordo here has been bought and paid for by not so Green IPP producers. The latest AECL tender provided 2.3 GW 24/7 for 60 years for $23B. Worked out to less than 2 cents a kwh but Stevey "Brimstone" Harper wants to sell Natural Gas so not only wouldn't cover continguencies but is trying to firesale AECL.

Energy efficiency is far more expensive than nuclear power per unit energy and is a almost pointless when one considers the world''s billions who can't wait to use as much energy as we do.

Nuclear power generates far more GHG free power than is required for uranium related activities or construction materials. Wind power uses 60 times the steel and concrete per unit energy of a modern nuke.

Not so renewables produce enormous amounts of GHG's due to the need to load balance them with low efficiency dirty GHG and radioactive radon gas spewing NG plant. Less GHG's and lower cost to just build high efficiency CCGT plant and skip the not so renewables.

seth 

Talk about greenwashing the last Progressive Conservative majority government. Did you forget the FTA that led to NAFTA. That was a watershed moment and the choice was not certainly not "indistinguishable". Had the NDP not split the vote under your logic the yes vote for FTA would have failed. That said I do not hold the NDP responsible for that outcome.

I suggest you take your partisan bias - and your invective that undermines your credibility - out of your analysis if you want to get closer to fact and not simply opinion.

Your nuclear power numbers fail to account for multiple government subsidies, decommissioning costs and liability waivers. On a true cost accounting basis it is probably the most expensive source of energy.


 

I'll take my partisan bias - as if being a progressive is partisan - if you'll take your political party and shove into the same incinerator you are trying to use on the rest of country.

I see that you can't even do simple research - still not a clue on nuke power.

There are no current nuclear subsidies if there were in the past lets take advantage.

The American nuclear industry has a $15B liablility fund in case of a impossible accident. The chemical, hydro, and NG industries with much more likely million dead scenarios have no such insurance.

Decomissioning costs are covered in a NRC mandated fee. However in a world dedicated to a GHG free existance no nuclear site will ever be decommissioned - just reactor cores replaced.
seth 

Did you actually write "an impossible accident" with a straight face? What was the partial core meltdown at Three Mile Island then - a test run?.

If an accident is "impossible" then lets proceed to remove the liability limits that restricts the pay-out in the event of an accident - in Canada - to $75 million (or even the proposed new $650 million) and watch what happens to premiums - if insurance coverage can even be obtained. Estimates of the economic costs of the Chernobyl accident are in the range of $250 billion.

Since you claim great expertise on the nuclear file then perhaps you can provide a critique of the 2009 MIT update of its 2003 study that now puts nuclear power cost - in the U.S. - at 8.4 cents a kwh and not the 3 cents a kwh you are claiming.
 

The Green Party is a joke. A bunch of pot smoking hippies who think they can save the planet by destroying the economy. 

Peter B. I expect most Greens would tell you that it is the alcoholics and prescription abusers currently running this economy -- that they are saving the planet from. 

Peter B. Did you go to sleep in the 1960's and just wake up. Before you make ignorant remarks do some research -read Vision Green to start - and it will become apparent that if anything Green policies will help renew the economy and prevent it from self-destruction.  

Once again Eric - the kind of silly superficial thinking that led to the deaths of over a hundred million human beings when folks just like you shut down nuclear power for coal in the seventies. Is there actually an engineer, somebody with a tiny bit of technical knowledge in the Green Party that can defend this nonsense.

The BC Green Party's chief energy critic seems to be some guy with a diploma in film from Kwantlen.

The core meltdown in 1960's tech 3 mile island actually did exactly what it was supposed to no coolant no reaction and only superficial damage to the inner steel reactor casing. While that type of accident is impossible in today's reactor with passive cooling systems it illustrates the effect of today's negative coefficient of reactivity design.

Reactor physics makes Chernobyl impossible in a modern reactor. However these wacky estimates coming from activist sources on alternet, have been proven nonsense by real peer reviewed science published in reputable journals. 56 people died at Chernobyl and science suggests maybe another 4000 cancer case advanced a few years. Bhopal an accident extremely likely almost everywhere in the world killed 20000. Every year the Green Party can defer the coal to nuclear conversion another 3 million die for coal pollution. I've yet to find a Greenie that gives a rats ass about that one.

Currently the American nuclear industry has $15B in insurance. The infinitely more likely million dead accident from the LNG tanker nuclear sized bomb, dam burst, or chemical accident has no insurance coverage at all. Don't see the Green Party complaining about those.

You might want to read this and learn

http://newpapyrusmagazine.blogspot.com/2009/01/relative-safety-of-new-ge...

You give me a bunch of ivory tower academics basing their cost data on absurd projections from reactors built in the US 30 years previous. Here are real costs of real reactors under construction or sale prices.

American nuclear power built by American engineers in five years or less overseas for public power companies

AP1000 build $1.2B/Gw 2007, 1.3 cents a kwh

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601080&refer=asia&sid=aJPyNB5Q_Fr0

Built by Canadian engineers in five years or less overseas.

Candu 6 build 2004 $2B/Gw, 2 cents a kwh

http://www.cnnc.com.cn/tabid/168/Default.aspx

This report gives the actual as built cost of a Candu 6 in 2004. That cost is consistent with the recent sales quotes from AECL for the new ACR - 1000 for OPG and Bruce Power in Alberta.

Korean nuclear power in the UAE a notoriously corrupt country with no industrial capacity.

$3.6B/Gw 1.5 cents a kwh.

http://www.glgroup.com/News/S.-Korea---UAE-Nuclear-Reactor-Deal-45697.html

Both AECL and Westinghouse are predicting less than $1B/Gw their new Gen 3+ units when production levels get into the scores.

Are the Chinese are lying about the cost of the Candu 6?. Are the owners and investors in Toshiba, and Kepco a buncha stupid boobs that are in business to lose money because those sale prices is all they is a gonna get for those reactors?

Here is an additional link for the current as of jan 2009 budget data for a twin AP-1000 build in South Carolina. This build is an American first of a kind built by American attorneys in eight years for a corrupt and inefficient private power company and the cost is still under $4.5B/Gw
cheaper than coal or natural gas.

http://www.scana.com/en/investor-relations/nuclear-financial-information...

With the current US operating cost of under 2 cents a kwh, public power company TVA could build and run those SCANA reactors for 5 cents a kwh.

High wage Japan is building America ABWR's for $1.4B/GW. Less than two cents a kwh when modern OM and fuel costs are considered.

I'd suggest you start doing some research on energy matters and be the first Green Party member that actually knows something about these issues.
seth 

ROFL! Green party? Are they still around? Heck I've been using that term for home parties for years ... and it don't (often) deal with conservationism unless you consider the return of beer bottles...  

We get a near 80% "Yes" to the BP spill making Citizens -- "more aware" of "underwater environment".

That is because -- of visual images of the disaster -- images of efforts to stop the massive leak -- deal with massive other problems -- but we are witnesses to this effort -- and it matters to people.

The Green - economy I am convinced will be the way out of the problem that has arrived for capitalism --- (I've been in business all of my adult life)---its ability to exploit workers/vulnerable markets. The possibilities for huge 'good' growth --- in the oceans and sea - beyond drilling for oil - will be great------------I honestly believe -- this is one of those situations -- where if BP is held to account -- the U.S. government acts in the interests of the people---where lemons may actually spawn lemonade.

Also--Technology has been great -- but ask anyone with a computer if they trust its "continued functional operation" relative to their television -- and the computer loses every time. 

Seth, If there is any silly superficial thinking going on it is in your claim that the Green Party supports Big Coal and are therefore responsible for millions of deaths from this polluting energy source. This is beyond absurd and frankly shreds your credibility.

A central economic Green Party plank proposes a revenue-neutral carbon tax that would specifically tax energy produced by coal. The Greens oppose dirty nuclear as well as dirty coal! 

Both Neocons and Big Coal are big supporters of the Green Party considering them to be their useful idiot team in their respective battles. It was greenies after all who caused over a hundred million souls to die from coal pollution when they shut down "too cheap to meter" nukes in the seventies knowing full well the consequences, and every year the Green Party can delay the conversion of coal to nuke another 3 million souls worldwide are lost to your coal plants.

Since nuclear power is a far cleaner technology then any not so renewable, you must be thinking of dirty nuclear weapons.
seth 

Nuclear power is dirty energy in part because of the length of time its radioactive by-products persist in the environment. Its also "dirty" because of the greenhouse gases and pollution caused by uranium mining and this will only get worse as lower grade uranium is mined as higher grade sources are depleted. It is also "dirty" because it diverts money that could have been spent on conservation/energy efficiency. It is also "dirty" because it advances nuclear weapons proliferation as Canada did with its Candu program. Seth, your love affair with nuclear power has led you to absurd conclusions about mortality and politics.  

Eric my friend this is why Greenies are so deadly. You know absolutely nothing about nuclear power and are dead set against it even though it is the only zero GHG baseload power source technically and politically capable of replacing the coal that kills millions every year. Do you think the dead folks are a worthwhile sacrifice so your dream of a mythical wind/solar solution can 50 years from now happen.

All the worlds nuclear waste occupying a football buried 50 feet deep is actually nuclear fuel for gen IV reactors, enough to power the world for hundreds of years. The low level waste left would fit under the goal posts.

Since nuclear power already produces far more energy than used in uranium mining and related activites there are no net GHG's from mining activities. Even so numerous peer reviewed papers have nuclear ghg's per kwh at less than wind and much less than solar. That is until the enormous amount of load balancing gas is included with wind/solar.

With the newer breeder reactors now coming into service, very little more uranium will need to be mined.

Money spent on large scale conservation and energy efficiency is ten times the cost of nuclear power. Since the entire third world can't wait to be using as much energy as we do, we had better find another solution hadn't we.

Nuclear weapons have nothing to do with proliferation. Weapons are produced with centrifuges and dirt cheap "research" reactors. The Candu had nothing to do with India's nuclear weapons program.

The love affair you silly greenies have with sunbeams and warm breezes kills millions every year by deferring the nuclear solution to coal pollution and by leading us inevitably to that civilization ending peak oil/climate crisis will kill billions more.
seth 

Nuclear power is not zero GHG - not even close. And ten thousand years of radioactive waste storage is not inconsequential.