Canadian citizenship - now cheaper than ever!

"We want Chinese investors in Canada and the door is open," ImpMin Chris Alexander told the South China Morning Post back in March. "We are making these changes for them."

CBC :
"The Canadian government will give permanent residency to approximately 50 millionaire immigrant investors and their families per year under a pilot program set to begin in the new year.

Under the Immigrant Investor Venture Capital pilot program announced Tuesday, each investor will be required to make a non-guaranteed investment of $2 million over 15 years and have a net worth of $10 million."

By comparison, New Zealand requires a C$9.15 million investment over three years while in October the Australian government raised the price of admission to $15 million for a 12 month track to permanent residency.

Under the previous cash for citizenship scheme dating back to Mulroney in 1986, wealthy immigrants with a minimum net worth of C$1.6-million only had to loan the government $800,000 interest-free for five years but the loan was guaranteed and returned to them at the end of five years.
It was intended to encourage wealthy foreigners to set up businesses in Canada but according to the South China Morning Post earlier this year, the majority were wealthy mainland Chinese who never did move to Canada and only 16 per cent of them wound up operating businesses in Canada. 

SCMP, Feb 4 2014 :

A South China Morning Post investigation into Canada's immigration programme for millionaire investors has revealed the extraordinary extent to which it has become devoted to a single outcome: Helping rich mainland Chinese settle in Vancouver.

Since 2007, 80.8 per cent of Chinese applicants to the scheme have sought to live in British Columbia ... about six times the combined annual applications from all nationalities to the investor migrant programmes run by the US, Britain and Australia.

And it was a bust to boot . As Pete McMartin wrote in the Vancouver Sun in Feb :

"The investor class immigrants have been laughing all the way to the bank. According to the feds’ own research, over a 20-year period an investor class immigrant will pay $200,000 less in taxes than a skilled worker immigrant and $100,000 less in taxes than a live-in nanny. The immigrant billionaire living on the west side pays less in Canadian taxes than his immigrant babysitter."

Right. So back to the new rules. Having determined what we are, as the old joke goes, we are now just haggling over the price.

MinImp Chris Alexander gave a decent Q&A interview to the South China Morning Post on the new rules back in March. Excerpted  : 

Alexander : “In return for permanent residence, in return for the opportunity to do business with status from Canada, we’re taking your money for a good long time to help create jobs, growth, opportunity in Canada and for global businesses, we hope, through venture capital-focused that will be managed in Canada, and privately managed, not managed by the government. ... And believe me, there are Hong Kong and Chinese students, entrepreneurs, investors who are part of those small ecosystems driving this forward."

Will there be regional options for the scheme?

Alexander : "No, these will be pooled funds initially, so they’re going to have to be managed by professional private-sector investment managers in financial centres where those people exist. And that is quite a few Canadian cities now. We’ll have a competition to select who the managers will be, but I don’t think we’ll be directing the investment beyond that." 

"We are pursuing a strong partnership with Hong Kong and with mainland China in all fields. Our economic relationship is already approaching CA$75 billion million.  We want, as of January 1 2015, to process economic immigrants in six months."

Earlier this month, the Harper government quietly signed a customs-sharing agreement with China without announcing it to the public.

China Daily, yesterday, via the WSJ :

"Canada and China have agreed to a set of measures to support the increased use of the renminbi in trade, commerce and investment.
A reciprocal currency swap will allow a maximum amount of 200 billion yuan ($32.3 billion) and C$30 billion($26 billion).
Domenico Lombardi, an expert on the global economy from Canada's think tank Centre for International Governance Innovation, recently said, "We should prepare to see the renminbi be much more widely used, to become an international currency".

Edit : Updated figures for Australia, and typos
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Harper and Abbott at APEC : To boldly blow ...

FIPA apples don't fall far from the tree

That one hour trade committee meeting in 2012 that comprised the entirety of public and parliamentary interaction with the Canada-China FIPA provided only a single witness -- Ian Burney, assistant deputy minister for DFAIT’s trade policy and negotiations branch, and some support staff.

Ian Burney is the son of Derek Burney, former Mulroney chief of staff/ NAFTA negotiator and former head of Harper's transition team in 2006, former Canadian ambassador to the US and former Vice Chair of the Canadian Council of Chief Executives (CCCE). 
A tireless plumper for increased North American economic and security integration, Derek Burney is also a director at TransCanada and Chairman of International Advisory Board at GardaWorld, "one of the world’s largest privately owned security companies" with operations in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Colombia, Haiti, Kurdistan, Libya, and Yemen.

Burney père has recently been writing editorials in Canadian media in support of FIPA although CCCE enthusiasm for increased trade with China goes way back.

Burney fils, during his brief Canada-China FIFA briefing to the 2012 trade committee, was obviously proud of both the deal made - the biggest in Canada since his dad worked on NAFTA - and the wide support it enjoyed. Ian Burney :

"There have been public expressions of support from the Canadian Manufacturers and Exporters, from the Canadian Chamber of Commerce, from the CCCE, from the Asia Pacific Foundation of Canada, from the Canada China Business Council, and the list goes on, including a number of the larger companies that have investments in China now.

I'm not aware of any negative commentary that's come from the business community in Canada."

So we're all good then. Anybody who was anybody liked it.

Except for recent complaints in the G&M two days ago from Chinese state-owned businesses (SOEs) operating in Canada that "Canadian labour costs are too high so they should be able to import their own workers" and also that the "regulatory approval process for resource projects takes far too long and could almost certainly be streamlined and made more efficient", something the Canadian Energy Pipeline Association had already done for them.    G&M :

“Most of the executives we polled expressed dissatisfaction with what they saw as unfair treatment of Chinese SOEs in Canada,” Mr. Zhang wrote, noting that they thought the media did not portray them fairly and that the Canadian public seemed to dislike their investments here, even though they received government support."

Funny thing, that.
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Canada-China FIPA Environmental Assessment

Prior to the enactment of the Canada-China FIPA, the Canadian government pushed two omnibus bills through the HoC which included provisions designed to substantially weaken environment policies and regulations, some of them at the behest of a pipeline lobby group : 

G&M : Pipeline industry pushed environmental changes made in omnibus bill

"The Canadian Energy Pipeline Association met with senior government officials in the fall of 2011, urging them [...] to streamline environmental assessments but also to bring in “new regulations under [the] Navigable Waters Protection Act. ... 

In the end, they got almost everything they wanted."

Now we can't put those protections back again for 31 years if they happen to irritate China. But let's look at the "streamlined" environmental assessment done on the FIPA two years ago.  It's a stunner.

There are three stages in conducting an environmental assessment for a trade negotiation like Canada-China FIPA to determine what impact it will have on Canada: 
1) an Initial EA, 2) a Draft EA, and 3) a Final EA.

Foreign Affairs and International Trade Canada (DFAIT)
Final Environmental Assessment of the Canada-China Foreign Investment Protection Agreement (FIPA)  October 23, 2012

"An Initial Environmental Assessment of the Canada-China FIPA was completed in January 2008. The Government of Canada opened the Initial EA for public comments from February 20 to March 21, 2008. No public comments were received."

So if, like Arthur Dent, you were sitting round in your dressing gown and you didn't happen to know about your one month window of opportunity to comment on a government website about the selling out of your country in 2008, whose fault is that exactly?

"In the light of the Initial EA’s conclusions regarding the unlikelihood of significant environmental impacts in Canada, preparation of a Draft EA was subsequently deemed to be unnecessary.... In this Final EA, the claim that no significant environmental impacts are expected based on the introduction of a Canada-China FIPA are upheld."

Wait. What? "No significant environmental impacts"? 
According to the same EA, there was a 92.4% increase in Chinese investment in Canada from 2008 to 2011. How do you figure there's no accompanying environmental impact from promoting an even greater influx of capital? 

* "As new flows of investment from China into Canada (or Canada into China) cannot be directly attributed to the presence of a FIPA, there can be no causal relationship found between the implementation of such a treaty and environmental impacts in Canada. It is for this reason that the claim made in the Initial EA, that no significant environmental impacts are expected based on the introduction of a Canada-China FIPA, is upheld." *

Wha?  Ok, let me try this one on my own.
If it can't be proven that the Canada-China Foreign Investment Promotion and Protection Agreement successfully achieves the goal stated right there in its title of promoting and thereby increasing investment, then FIPA can't be blamed for any environmental impacts.
Therefore there won't be any.

I think the Vogons must have written up this particular EA.

Putting FIPA in context :



Also ... Gus Van Harten in The Tyee : Breaking Down the Harm to Canada Done by Treaty with China 
and at DeSmogBlog : China Investment Treaty "a Straitjacket" for Canada


And I'd missed this angle previously. Canadians thinking of opening a business in China, take note...

In the G&M, a senior fellow at the Asia Pacific Foundation of Canada and special adviser to the Alberta government says Steve's sudden ratification of FIPA in advance of his visit to China in November is connected to needing a barter chip to free two Canadian Christian missionaries jailed in China. 
Kevin and Julia Dawn Garratt, who have operated a cafe in China for three decades, were arrested for spying in retaliation, he suggests, for "Ottawa publicly blaming Beijing this summer for the hacking of Canadian government computers". 

"Kevin Garratt is a devout, active Christian who says that God called him to open a cafe in Dandong."

Previously : Clampetts clownshow distracts from FIPA
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Clampetts clownshow distracts from FIPA

Gosh, was it only five years ago that Alberta Energy spokesman Tim Markle said "Chinese takeover is good news for Alberta", even as Harper was blowing off the Kyoto Accord, supposedly due to China's crappy environmental record, and pledging to build a monument to victims of communism? 

Beginning Oct 1 for the next 31 years until 2045, under the Canada-China Foreign Investment Promotion and Protection Agreement Harper just ratified on Friday, Chinese corporations will be able to directly sue the Canadian government for any public interest measures that interfere with their ability to make a profit in Canada. 

Do you think China-owned Nexen, Sinopec, and PetroChina just might consider Enbridge's Northern Gateway Pipeline to be somewhat integral to getting their $30B investment in the tarsands home to China for refining?  
Think Steve can count on Christy Clark to ensure no BC environmental protection laws might harm China's assets?
Think it's an accident Steve released this news on a Friday during the Ford brothers' Clampett Dynasty pitch?

Two years ago in Vladivostok, Harper announced his signing of the FIPA deal with China. MP Don Davies introduced a motion in the House to not ratify it. His motion failed. All the Libs and Cons voted against his motion not to ratify FIPA, including 24 Con MPs from Alberta and 19 from BC.  
You can contact those quislings through this HoC page showing that vote.

NDP Petition : Stop FIPA Now     
Green Party Petition : Stand Up to the Sellout to China          
LeadNow Petition : Stop the Secretive, Reckless & Binding Canada-China FIPA


Council of Canadians : Harper government sneaks through Canada-China FIPA despite ongoing court challenge

The Tyee : FIPA 'is the price China demanded to open its purse strings for investing in the resource sector in Canada.' and 

Harper's Sneaky, Undemocratic, Terrible Deal with China 

Montreal Simon : Stephen Harper and the Great Chinese Betrayal 

Update : Laila Yuile : Who's Harper working for?



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China, Canada sign military co-operation initiative

If you aren't in the habit of reading the China People's Daily, you probably missed the news that Canada signed a military co-operation agreement with China this summer - because certainly our own media haven't seen fit to mention it. 

When DefMin Airshow MacKay met his counterpart General Chang Wanquan in Beijing in June, CBC only reported on how MacKay "laid down clear markers" on "cyberattacks originating in China", comparing hacking to terrorism. 

The People's Daily had a slightly different take on the same meeting : 
China, Canada sign initiative on military co-operation.

"China and Canada signed an initiative on military cooperation as defense ministers of the two countries held talks in Beijing on Monday. The two sides held that China and Canada are important countries to the Asia-Pacific region and bear common responsibilities in safeguarding peace, stability and prosperity in the region."

... called the tarsands, they did not add.                Here's the DND version.

Meanwhile, the Canada-China FIPA investment agreement, which had been tabled last September, was still quietly moldering away in some mysterious Con legal netherworld while Steve approved the $15.1-billion takeover of Nexen by the Chinese state-owned oil company CNOOC.  

Five days ago, China DefMin General Chang was in Ottawa signing the "People's Liberation Army military cooperation program and Canadian Initiative" according to Xinhua, and shaking hands with Canada's new DefMin Rob Nicholson, who swapped portfolios with MacKay in July.

Again from The People's Daily : 
China, Canada vow to strengthen military cooperation

"Chang said military relations between China and Canada have maintained a sound momentum of development, as evidenced by frequent contacts between military leaders of the two sides, and their smooth and close coordination on global and regional issues.
Meanwhile, continuous progress has been made in bilateral military cooperation, such as in military training, international peace-keeping, defense education and mutual visits by warships, he said."

Three days previously, Chang signed a similar sounding deal with U.S. Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel in Washington ... peace, stability, security, prosperity, yadda yadda yadda.

Chang said China had been invited to participate in next year's RIMPAC in Hawaii, "the world's largest international maritime warfare exercise", along with 22 other countries including the US, Canada, Russia, Australia, and Japan.

The day after Nicholson and Chang signed their symbolic war games agreement in Ottawa, MultiCultMin Jason Kenney and CitImmMin Chris Alexander announced $1.5-million in federal funds to build a memorial in Ottawa to the tens of millions of innocent victims of Communist regimes around the world :

Once completed, this memorial will teach future generations how millions lost their lives and suffered in inhumane conditions at the hands of Communist regimes,” said Minister Kenney. “It will also serve as a reminder to all Canadians that glorifying Communist symbols insults the memory of these victims, and that we must never take for granted our core values of freedom, democracy, human rights and the rule of law.

Ooodles of press gravy for the red meat base on this one.
I'm guessing the monument got a nice press kit and the military co-operation agreement did not.

Your second moment of irony - see the man to the left of Nicholson and Chang in the People's Daily photo op above ? That's former CSIS director Richard Fadden, who shocked people three years ago with his remarks about public officials and cabinet ministers in BC/Alberta being under the influence of China, however unwittingly.

This April, CBC reported that Fadden had been shuffled to Defence.

Here's part of that 2010 interview with Mansbridge :

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Update : Laila Yuile was on this days ago! and included a fascinating speech from Ambassador Zhang Junsai at a luncheon in Calgary in May :

“Many people have even started to talk about North America’s potential of becoming the new Middle East.”

Thursday night update : Murray Brewster/CP breaks media silence:

 China's defence minister meets with Tory ministers amid undisclosed stop
Notable from his story : 

"Defence expert Rob Huebert said the government’s silence is puzzling and troubling.

Earlier in its tenure, the Harper government took a hard line on China’s human-rights record, Huebert said, and the Conservatives may be reluctant to be seen “cozying up” to Beijing for domestic political reasons, and at a time of heightened international tension. 

Beijing has strong trade ties with the regime of Bashar al Assad

This government does have a history of secrecy regarding contentious trade and military agreements. There was the SPP with the US and the "homeland security" accord with Israel.

Back in Oct 2007, the Jerusalem Post announced : “Israel, Canada sign security accord”, a Canada-Israel agreement on “homeland security matters”.

Stockwell Day’s comm director first denied it, then said it was non-binding : “The minister didn’t sign anything” - but Israel’s Ministry of Public Security website said signing was imminent.

Five months later Day announced it from Tel Aviv : a Canada-Israel Declaration of Intent to cooperate on mutually agreed threats like border security, a Canada-Israel border pact. 

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Cons pay manufacturers to move to China

From Blacklocks, via The Jurist, a tale of taxpayer-funded government-facilitated corporate welfare off-shoring :

"Cabinet paid millions of dollars in grants to Canadian manufacturers to move production and jobs overseas in the name of foreign aid. 

Newly-released accounts show the program paid cash grants totalling $3,852,927 to manufacturers to move production out of Canada, including $450,000 paid to one applicant that told Fantino’s department it had to “establish ourselves in Mexico so we can offer lower costs.” "

But most went to factories in China - automotive parts, rugs, fencing, furniture, plastics recycling .... over a two year period in 2006-7.

Because clearly China, the world's 2nd largest economy by GDP and we're #11, btw , is sorely in need of our "foreign aid" and "manufacturing jobs".

"International Cooperation Minister Julian Fantino ... had not heard of the grant scheme called the Industrial Cooperation Program."

Ah well, that's because you guys rebranded it in 2010 as the Investment Cooperation Program  or CIDA-INC.  According to the DFAIT website : 

• Managed by DFAIT, the Investment Cooperation Program, formerly the Industrial Cooperation Program, supports developmentally beneficial direct investments by Canadian firms in developing countries.

But only Canadian firms with at least $2M in annual revenues were eligible for 50- 75% taxpayer coverage of up to $1M of their costs in assessing and moving a project abroad.

Happily touted as a Canadian success story as late as March 2012 by the previous International Cooperation Minister Bev Oda, CIDA-INC was the object of damning internal audits until it was finally shut down on May 18 2012 by Trade Minister Ed Fast in a statement citing "irregularities" and "taking immediate action to recover taxpayer funds that had supported these particular INC projects" and promising a "fundamental review of the program, expected later in 2012-13".

Terrific. 

What about those intervening six years of sending Canadian manufacturing jobs to China and elsewhere - you know, the period from 2006-7 covered by Blacklocks and up to when you shut it down last year?

And does your newly branded "foreign aid" model of "doubling down on partnership with the business sector" and "vigorously promoting and defending Canadian interests and values abroad” benefit anyone here in Canada? Outside of those in the business sector looking for new avenues of taxpayer money to send Canadian manufacturing jobs overseas of course.

5 pm Update : I see SNC Lavalin had a multi-year contract with the Investment Cooperation Program, dated 2011-11-04.

"The purpose of this Investment Cooperation Program (INC) contribution agreement is to support responsible, developmentally beneficial, private sector engagement in developing countries leading to sustained economic growth and poverty reduction."

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Happy RoboCon Election Fraud Budget Day

Lucky scheduling break for the Cons, eh? - getting Election Canada's Marc Mayrand to testify on 2011 election fraud on the same day they released the 2012 budget.

"We are free to choose our future," Flaherty said in his budget speech. "We have made our choice."


Election Fraud : Calling it "absolutely outrageous" and " totally unacceptable in a modern democracy", Elections Canada Marc Mayrand told the PROCommittee EC is investigating 800 specific complaints of electoral phone fraud in 200 ridings across ten provinces and one territory. 250 files open right now including 70 out of the 7,000 complaints in Guelph.

2012 Budget : Elections Canada budget to be cut by $7.5 million a year.


Election Fraud  : CBC's Terry Milewski : Misleading robocalls went to voters ID'd as non-Tories
2012 Budget : CBC budget cut by 10%


Well I guess that'll learn 'em.


The budget features "streamlining" environmental review processes, plus gives $8 million to the Canadian Revenue Agency to target registered charities that are "too overtly political", translation : "opposition from environmental groups to the massive Northern Gateway oil sands pipeline."
New RevCan money will investigate "the extent to which these are funded by foreign sources." 

But foreign tarsands-to-tanker funding from China is still a-ok, even at the cost of Canadian jobs ... 


PetroChina bids to help build $5.5-billion Northern Gateway pipeline


"Chinese investment in Canada’s energy sector could move to a new level if PetroChina wins a bid to build the controversial Northern Gateway oil sands pipeline.
The largest of China’s three state-controlled oil companies has expressed an interest in building the $5.5-billion project across the northern Canadian Rockies and is considering purchasing an equity stake, said Pat Daniel, president and CEO of proponent Enbridge Inc.
[W]ith a workforce of almost two million and cheaper labour costs than its North American counterparts, the Chinese company stands a good chance of presenting a competitive bid."


Well so much for Pipeline Steve's Canadian 'jobs, jobs, jobs' angle in that case. Also :


WSJ : Canada To Allow Wealth Funds To Invest In Its Financial Institutions

"The Canadian government said Thursday it plans to introduce legislation to allow foreign and domestic sovereign-wealth funds to invest in Canadian financial institutions."

So. After somehow being the apparent beneficiary of massive election fraud in which they gained a majority government, The Harper Economy™, as Pogge says, "is primarily based on ripping anything that might be of value out of the ground and shipping it out of the country as quickly as possible."
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Steve flexes his sino-pecs from China

Star : Harper blasts foreign money in oil sands debate while welcoming China

        *cough*

Reuters : Canada PM vows to ensure key oil pipeline is built 


CBC : Harper ties China trade deals to Canadian values 

"Canada does not — and cannot — disconnect our trading relationship from fundamental national values."

Meanwhile ...


CTV : Chinese dissident writer gets 7 years' jail for poem

"a poem he wrote urging his countrymen to gather at a public square"

Sinopec seeks appeal in oilsands death case

A Chinese state-owned corporation wants the Supreme Court of Canada to overturn an Alberta court judgement ruling that would force it to stand trial in the deaths of two oilsands workers and 53 safety charges.

Patrick Brown : Harper in China : Great, Glorious and Always Correct 

In the Great Hall of the People, Harper told Premier Wen Jiabao that Canada and China enjoy “a strategic partnership based on respect and admiration.” Wen answered that Harper’s visits “opened a new page in our bilateral relationship,” which translated into English means, “We’re glad you finally got with the program.”

Then Harper said he would be raising human rights and consular issues. That’s when the journalists were ushered out of the room. It felt just like Ottawa.

Confused?
Mound of Sound explains : Okay, I Get It.
Harper Needs China to Buy Bitumen So Canada Can Buy F-35s to defend Canada Against China
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CIDA doles out corporate welfare to mining giants

In Oct 2010, Bill C-300, An Act respecting Corporate Accountability for the Activities of Mining, Oil or Gas in Developing Countries, went down to defeat 140 to 134 because 13 Liberals, 4 Bloc, and 4 NDP skipped the vote. The bill sought only to limit Canadian tax dollars being spent to subsidize mining abuses committed by Canadian-registered companies abroad and only if they agreed to it.


A couple of months later in January 2011, Bev Oda, Minister of 'Not Kairos' and International Cooperation, acknowledged that Canadian tax dollars were subsidizing mining companies' CSR (corporate social responsibility) projects through CIDA - half a million to Barrick Gold, another half million to Rio Tinto, etc etc up to a total of $50-million for the year.

Today's G&M : CIDA funds seen to be subsidizing mining firms

This marks the first time that CIDA and mining firms are jointly funding aid projects abroad ...         The mining industry is welcoming the new trend in Canada’s foreign-aid policy. 

“There is a policy shift under way, and it’s one we’re encouraged by,” said Pierre Gratton, the president of the Canadian Mining Association.

while World Vision Canada, a CIDA partner with Barrick Gold in Peru, put it this way  (italics mine):

 “Anything we can do to encourage and advocate for better mining practices, and support the communities that they are displacing or affecting, we’re contributing to a better lifestyle and environment for them.” 

Yes, sadly, communities will be displaced but at least our taxes will be there to help polish the image of their new corporate landlords . 


It's particularly galling that multinational mining giant Rio Tinto ($US15 billion-plus earnings in 2011) is receiving Canadian corporate welfare after locking  800 Canadian workers out on New Years Day in Quebec for protesting having their union jobs replaced by contract workers. Additionally, a court injunction only permits 20 workers to demonstrate at any one time and only at a distance of 150 metres from the front gate.


Back to the G&M :

Federal officials said the policy shift at CIDA is co-ordinated with efforts by International Trade and Natural Resources to encourage the growth of Canadian firms abroad

Sure it is.
A couple of days ago, Rio Tinto took majority control of Canada's Ivanhoe Mines which owns 66% of Mongolia's Oyu Tolgoi copper and gold mine, the rest being owned by the state of Mongolia. 
As it happens, Bev Oda was in Mongolia last August :

"looking to assist Mongolia to strengthen its democratic governance and economic growth"

 presumably with the help of China :

"In 2010, Rio Tinto said that it had held talks with its biggest shareholder, Chinalco, about the possibility of bringing in the Chinese state-owned company as a partner in Oyu Tolgoi"

Why are Canadian tax dollars subsidizing these massive multinational mining corps with corporate welfare again?
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Foreign Special Interests and their Deep Pocket Puppet

A remix of the now-infamous video to include a few of those "foreign special interests" not mentioned in the original broadcast, as Ethical Oil pocket puppet Kathryn Marshall strives mightily - eight times! - to limit the phrase to describe only the environmental opposition to the Enbridge Northern Gateway tarsands project.

Original broadcast, including a more generous sprinkling of "deep pockets" and "puppets", here .
Or there's always Rick Mercer's version.

Harsha Walia : Enbridge's pipeline of distortions

Terry Glavin : China has our forests, Now we're sending our oilfields too.

*Brilliant post from Emma Pullman @ DeSmogBlog*:
Friends With Benefits: The Harper Government, EthicalOil.org and Sun Media Connection 
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Outsource This! Boeing and Lockheed Martin war bling 'full of fake Chinese parts'

Telegraph : Thousands of U.S. warplanes, ships and missiles contain fake electronic components from China, leaving them open to malfunction, according to a US Senate committee.

In total, the committee said it had found more than a million fake parts had made their way into warplanes such as the Boeing C-17 transport jet and the Lockheed Martin C-130J "Super Hercules".

... each of which Canada has recently signed on to buy more of : a $1.4-billion contract for 17 Lockheed Martin C-130J-30s, and a $869-million for four Boeing C-17s.

No worries though - the Senate Armed Services Committee 'discovered' exactly this same Chinese fake parts racket back in 2005, and again in 2008, and everyone on the committee had a cow both of those times as well but nothing came of it. 

"As electronics manufacturing migrated to China, the US has been less and less able to control the quality of its military hardware. Some of the fake chips are bought by the Pentagon on the open market .... These chips are often salvaged by Chinese scrap merchants from the dumps of electronic waste that have accumulated in the south of the country "

... where they are burned off old computer circuit boards, sanded down, repainted, and voilà - the new F-35 chop shop war bling!

" 'Ello, I wish register a complaint about this plane which I purchased not half an hour ago from this very boutique."

" Ah yes, the F-35. Remarkable plane, the F-35, beautiful fuselage. What's wrong with it?"

"Well if you scrape away the loose paint just here, you'll see that underneath it says "Hello Kitty".

It's your own fault, said 'a former Peoples' Liberation Army officer who has become a commentator in the Chinese media' : 

"The US has been dismantling its factories since the 1960s," he said. 

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Ethical Oil Ethics For Dummies

Ethical Oil's new spokesy Kathryn Marshall had a little think yesterday about whether the tarsands are still ethical even if bits of it are owned by China and its unethical oil company, and even if Ottawa and Alberta are successful in their bid to hawk the stuff to communist China.

"Is Canadian oil suddenly less ethical, " she asks, "when it's produced and used by unethical countries?"
No! she answers, it's still ethical! 
You're shocked, I'm sure.

Meanwhile, over at the Christian Science Monitor :

"The whole notion of ethical oil sets up a false dilemma because the very viscous Canadian crude needs to be cut with lighter oils from places like Saudi Arabia in order to be transported down a pipeline, says Chris MacDonald, a visiting scholar for the Clarkson Centre for Business Ethics at the University of Toronto. 

"So what's the point of having ethical oil if you are mixing it with this 'conflict oil'?"

Andrew Nikiforuk @ The Tyee : 

"By 2025, for example Canada could be importing more than two million barrels of foreign or so-called "unethical" oil a day, just to transport bitumen to U.S. refineries."

 The problem of adding imported diluents to tarsands crude is of considerable concern to CAPP, the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers, says Nikiforuk. Seems foreign diluents could be subject to US country-of-origin duty charges both when it is imported into Canada from non-NAFTA sources via US ports, and again when it is shipped from Canada back to US refineries.


CAPP, November 2010 : Rethinking NAFTA Certification of Canadian Heavy Crude Oil

• After 2005 regional condensate/pentanes + supply was no longer sufficient to satisfy diluent needs
• This has led to a rapid increase in diluent imports
• Initially, diluent imports were small and were sourced from the U.S.
• With development of the EnCana/Cenovus Kitimat terminal, non-NAFTA diluent began entering the western Canadian diluent pool
• Export to U.S. of Dilbit and Diluted Heavy Crude in 2009 – 970,000 BPD
• Export to U.S. of Light Crude in 2009 - 300,000 BPD
• If U.S. duty were charged on both streams, annual cost to industry - $30,000,000

Huh.


When former Ethical Oil spokesy Alykhan Velshi slagged Saudi Arabia's human rights record in a 30 second ad which resulted in Saudi cease and desist lawyery letters sent to CTV/Bell Media, Velshi's former boss Immigration Minister Jason Kenney leapt to his defence, and Dame Ezra, author of Ethical Oil : The Book and The Website, milked the speechey hell out of it over at SunTV. 


This time I'm betting Steve is thinking : Just STFU about ethics, Kathryn, we're trying to do a deal here.

Tune in next week when Kathryn considers whether it's ok for ethical oil to steal a loaf of bread to feed a hungry child ... 

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Update : The CAPP Industry presentation "Rethinking Nafta Certification of Canadian Heavy Crude Oil" link appears to no longer be available so here's a google cache copy and a pdf copy . 
Info quoted above is from pages 5 to 10.
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