Roundup: Fantasy readings of court decisions

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In the wake of last week’s Supreme Court of Canada decision in the Impact Assessment Act, there has been a lot of fantasy being projected on what the decision said (hint: it’s not what most everyone says, no matter which sentence they’ve cherry-picked). There’s a lot of blame on the Act for projects not moving forward, as even though many of them had approvals in hand already and the economics for those projects didn’t make sense with current oil prices (as many were conceived of when there was a belief that we were reaching peak oil and that prices would start to skyrocket as a result—oops), or as with certain LNG projects that never got off the ground, they couldn’t get buyers to sign contracts for what they hoped to produce. That’s why the handwringing over Qatar supplying Europe with LNG is particularly funny, because we just don’t have the LNG capacity on the east coast—there is no ready supply of natural gas to liquefy, so without another massive pipeline project, it would mean importing product to liquefy and re-sell to the Europeans, which is not exactly a cost-savings for them when they can get it much cheaper from Qatar.

Meanwhile, here’s Andrew Leach calling out these kinds of fantasies, particularly when they’re coming from the Alberta government.

As a bonus, Leach also calls out the excuses for inaction on the energy transition:

Ukraine Dispatch:

No word on any fresh attacks against Ukrainian cities. Meanwhile, artefacts that were stolen from occupied territories were confiscated when they were attempted to be smuggled into the US, and have now been returned to Ukraine.

Good reads:

  • Justin Trudeau says he remains steadfast in his call for a two-state solution for Israel and Palestinians, as over 30 MPs, many of them Liberals, are calling for a ceasefire.
  • Trudeau also raised concerns about how India’s move to strip Canadian diplomats of their immunity is contrary to international law.
  • As evacuation flights slow from Tel Aviv, the Canadian military is preparing for the possibility of evacuation flights from Lebanon if the situation degrades there.
  • Steven Guilbeault says that banning plastic waste exports could harm the creation of a circular economy that includes plastics.
  • The federal and Alberta governments are providing relief payments to livestock farmers who are being affected by drought (because they can’t get feed crops).
  • The Globe and Mail got the first major sit-down with the head of the mysterious Canada Growth Fund, and hears they’re about to start announcing things.
  • The Canadian Energy Regulator has released its reasons for allowing the Trans Mountain Expansion to cross into an area considered sacred by a First Nation.
  • Anthony Rota reappeared for the first time since his resignation as Speaker, to appear at a photo op in a military base I his riding. He won’t run again next election.
  • Pierre Poilievre has weighed in on the Alberta pension fight and says that he would call on the province to stay in the CPP.
  • Poilievre has also been calling on the federal government to reject RBC’s proposed takeover of HSBC Canada.
  • Scott Moe has passed his school pronoun bill that invokes the Notwithstanding Clause (and also indemnifies himself from being sued over it).
  • Susan Delacourt delves into the impasse between the Liberals and NDP over pharmacare (but doesn’t mention the role of the premiers in this).
  • My weekend column on why the churlish tone Poilievre has been highlighting is more of the Trump playbook he’s drawing from that is corroding our democracy.

Odds and ends:

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