Sep. 14, 2010 - Issue #778 : Pilobolus
Issues
Lots of talk, not a lot of listening
Stelmach's conversation with US Speaker Nancy Pelosi reveals a different approach
"A good neighbour lends you a cup of sugar. A great neighbour provides you with 1.4 million barrels of oil per day. And does it responsibly. Alberta, Canada. Tell it like it is."
This message, along with another one about carbon capture and storage, will run for 10 seconds three times an hour between September 1 and October 15 on the big screen in Times Square, New York. That adds up to a combined total of 2450 times that the perpetual crowds in Times Square, most of them tourists, will be told what a great neighbour Alberta is to the US.
The ads cost the Alberta government a total of $17 000, and represent their latest effort to market the province's bituminous sands south of the border on behalf of the province's largest and wealthiest industry. Despite the fact that spending money to convince Americans to buy oil seems about as necessary as trying to convince a crackhead to use crack, the provincial government insists that the ad campaign is a good investment.
The reason that the ads are necessary, according to Premier Stelmach, is to combat the very effective job environmental organizations have done of informing Americans of the impacts of tar sands operations on the environment, wildlife and public health. In typical Alberta government fashion, however, the ads are not designed to encourage people to make an informed decision about the tar sands and their impacts. They are pure unadulterated spin designed to tell people what's "true" and make sure they don't question what industry and the government say.
Given that approach, perhaps the government should add a tag-line declaring that "a great neighbour will assume you're stupid enough to believe us unquestioningly."
There is at least one American, however, that proved last week that she is not that stupid. Nancy Pelosi, Speaker of the US House of Representatives, was in Ottawa last week for meetings and asked the US Ambassador to arrange a meeting with Premier Stelmach. Her goal, she said, was to get a better understanding of what the actual issues are with the tar sands, and what is being done about them.
It turns out, however, that Ms. Pelosi also knows that regardless of how great your neighbour might claim to be, you shouldn't buy their tall-tales and half-truths hook, line and sinker. She also asked the Ambassador to arrange a meeting for her with some of Canada's high-profile environmental and indigenous leaders. Same goal—learn what the real deal is with the tar sands.
When the meetings were done, she did something truly rare for a politician: she did not say anything. She didn't hold a press conference. She didn't issue a media release commenting on what she heard. And she didn't take out a full page ad claiming that one side or the other was full of crap. She just took all the information she had gathered, and will presumably make up her own mind about what is true and what is not, using that conclusion to inform future policy and actions.
Because I am aware that this approach to gathering information may seem strange and foreign to many in Alberta, I want to explain it in a bit more detail.
Ms Pelosi is an elected representative who holds a very powerful position in the US government. As such, she believes she has a responsibility to base her policy-making and decisions on as much information from as many sources as possible. This way, she can ensure that the actions and policies she is endorsing and supporting are based on fact, are as thorough as can be and will be in the public interest.
Perhaps instead of spending tens of thousands of dollars to try to convince tourists in Times Square that industry is right and the environmentalists are wrong, Mr Stelmach and his government would do better by following Ms Pelosi's example and setting out to genuinely and objectively gather information from both industry and the environmental community, and then developing a comprehensive energy policy based on an objective analysis of that information.
It's time Albertans start demanding that our government stops spending our tax dollars to spread industry's message and start behaving like thoughtful and genuine stewards of our interest—the public interest. Only then will we be able to move beyond the current climate of public relations and spin and truly have something to flash from the billboards in Times Square. V
Ricardo Acuña is the executive director of the Parkland Institute, a non-partisan, public-policy research institute housed at the University of Alberta.
More stories in front »
vueweekly.com comments: powered by DisqusPrivacy Policy:
Vue respects your privacy. We will not forward your personal information to any other organization except as required by law, and will use your e-mail address only to respond to your comments. We reserve the right to edit and remove comments for length, clarity and/or if they are illegal or inappropriate. Your email address is never shown to visitors to vueweekly.com. Read the whole policy at: http://vueweekly.com/privacy
Comments policy
Comments go online directly without first being seen or reviewed by editors at Vue. Don't personally attack people, don't be defamatory, don't be spam-atory, don't hawk your band, don't pretend to be someone else, be clear, be on topic, be nice. Read our extended comments policy here. »
We use Disqus for our comments system. What's that all about?
We found that managing the comment community at Vue was easier to do with a system like Disqus. If this isn't straightforward to you, get help here.