The Duffy Tarsands Diaries

Never mind the Senate vagaries on where Duffy actually resides or whether other Senators  porking out at the public trough is criminal or just Senate-business-as-usual. Forget all that.  
Of the various narratives emerging from the Duffy trial, the story that should be getting a lot more attention is that Con Party fundraiser Senator Mike Duffy appears to have served as a behind-the-scenes go-between between Enbridge and Stephen Harper while simultaneously connecting up environmental charities attack dog Vivian Krause, referred to by Ezra Levent as Sun TV's "forensic environmental detective", for an energy sector speaking tour.

National Observer : Redacted diary reveals oil's hidden route to Harper :

"Redacted entries in Mike Duffy’s diary suggest he was in regular undisclosed contact with pipeline giant Enbridge during the height of the federal government's scorching attacks on environmental activists and charities in 2012.

The suspended senator’s journal shows a flurry of conversations and emails with or about top-level Enbridge executives, then PMO chief of staff Nigel Wright and the Prime Minister between January and June of 2012, just as the National Energy Board started its hearings on the Enbridge Northern Gateway pipeline proposal."

CBC : "Duffy appears to be a fan of Krause's work, mentioning her at least 10 times in his daily diary and setting her up with an agent for speaking appearances."

Setting her up with an agent?
According to Krause, speaking fees for appearances before the resources industry now comprises over 90% of her income going back to 2012.

So what else we got on PMO/tarsands-related events which took place during just the first month of the Duffy Diaries' January to June 2012 time period.

January 6, 2012 G&M : Foreign money could gum up pipeline approval, Harper warns.

"The Prime Minister is threatening to prevent foreign environmental interests from delaying the approval of a pipeline that would take bitumen from the Alberta oil sands to the West Coast for shipment to Asian markets.

Kathryn Marshall, a spokesperson for EthicalOil.org. said Canadians have much at stake in the construction of the pipeline and “must take a stand against foreigners and their lobbying groups interfering in our decision.”

Cue Ethical Oil's Kathryn Marshall that same month with her "foreign special interests and their deep pocket puppets" :

"I'm just a student with a website", said Kathryn,whose husband Hamish Marshall was former manager of strategic planning in Stephen Harper’s PMO, and whose company Go Newclear Productions, created and hosted websites for Ethical Oil and Con MPs Joe Oliver, Pierre Poilievre and Jason Kenney.

DeSmog Blog : Friends with Benefits: The Harper Government, EthicalOil.org and Sun Media Connection

Ethical Oil of course bragged about lobbying the Canada Revenue Agency for Krause-tagged audits of environmental charities critical of tarsands development. In the 2012 budget, the Canada Revenue Agency launched a special $8M program aimed at punishing environmental political activity, later topped up to $13.4 million.

On January 8, 2012,  Duffy's diary notes an email and phone call exchange with Ethical Oil author and SunNews *personality* Ezra Levant  "re: Vivian Krause". He then met with Krause on three occasions and had two telephone conversations.

On February 9, 2012 Krause testified before the Standing Committee on Natural Resources about "deep-pocketed supporters south of the border" funding campaigns against the Canadian energy sector.  Duffy was in attendance; his diary that day reads: "Lunch - Vivian Krause."

And just for lulz ...February 10, 2012 : Star :  Harper speaks from China: PM blasts foreign money in oilands debate while welcoming China   

Also Feb.10 : The G&M, the Star, and Vancouver Observer all carry stories about environmentalists being understandably pissed at being lumped in with white supremacists among the listed "issue-based" terrorist threats in Canada's new counter-terrorism strategy -   Building Resilience Against Terrorism :

"...domestic extremism that is “based on grievances – real or perceived – revolving around the promotion of various causes such as animal rights, white supremacy, environmentalism and anti-capitalism."

It's not like that's gone away. An RCMP report released this February raved on about “violent anti-petroleum extremists” and  “violent aboriginal extremists,” driven by an “anti-petroleum ideology." Particularly concerning in light of the new Anti-terrorism Bill C-51 with its new engorged mandate to act against “activity that undermines the security of Canada”, the RCMP report suggests pipeline opposition movements should be seen and treated as national criminal security threats. It is 44 pages long. To back up its position, a full nine of those pages, or 20% of the entire report, are quotes from articles by Vivian Krause.

And finally the PMO/Enbridge/Duffy connection in the diary : 

Feb.17, 2012 - “PM asks “Send me a note on Enbridge Line #9 problems” 

Good on National Observer, local Vancouver Observer now gone National, for looking beneath the redacting pencil in the Duffy diaries to publish these PMO/Enbridge/Duffy/Krause/Ezra connections.

Update : Our Oily Media - Media critic CanadaLand interviews National Observer founder Linda Solomon Wood on how the energy sector has flooded Canada's media with money, be it in ad dollars, speaking fees, charitable donations or "native content" partnerships. Rex. Mansbridge. PostMedia-CAPP partnership.

Btw, CBC, I see the pro-tarsands astroturf group "British Columbians for Prosperity" is still going strong in its campaign against the deep pockets of "foreign special interests". Is your frequent commentator Alise Mills still running the show at BC4P, as she told Vancouver Observer a year ago?

Good news - Bruce Livesey, canned from Global for his spiked report on the Koch brothers' influence in Canada, has joined National Observer and will rework the story there.

May 7 Update : National Observer : Duffy connected charity critic to lucrative industry cash

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Girls night with Kathryn Marshall and BC4P

This past February, Kathryn Marshall, former spokesy for Ethical Oil, and Brittany Allison, Interim Executive Director of British Columbians For Prosperity, had a "girls night" at a West Vancouver restaurant. 




You'll recall Ethical Oil's Kathryn Marshall, formerly of the Koch-funded Fraser Institute :

"Successfully recruited major prospects for donations and sponsorships and built and maintained relationships between the Fraser Institute and donors. May 2008 – July 2009 "

... and her hapless tv stints raving against "foreign special interests and their deep pockets" that secretly funded opposition to the tarsands' efforts to get its ethical bitumen to Chinese markets. 

"I'm just a student with a website," insisted Kathryn - wife of Hamish Marshall, former manager of strategic planning in Stephen Harper’s PMO, whose company Go Newclear Productions, created and hosted websites for Ethical Oil and Con MPs Joe Oliver, Pierre Poilievre and Jason Kenney.

She took over the job from former American Enterprise Institute intern Alykhan Velshi, who left Jason Kenney's employ in 2011 to head up the website based on Ezra Levant's book of the same name and returned to Harper's office afterwards as planning director. 
After her came Jamie Ellerton, executive assistant - first to Jason Kenney til September 2010 and then to teabaggin' Tim Hudak .

Ethical Oil's specialty was attack ads. 
Recently, climate change skeptic Ezra Levant, who interned with Koch 20 years ago, has pondered in the pages of the Edmonton Sun whether environmentalist groups in Canada are funded by Putin.

For all their concern about foreign funding, neither Velshi nor Marshall ever answered repeated media questions about whether Enbridge or any other Canadian corporate interest was backing Ethical Oil.  Ironically, at the timeEnbridge's chair and 5 out of 12 directors were American.


Kathryn's 'girls night' buddy, Brittany Allison, also maintains a focus on shadowy foreign funding from her perch at BC4P moneytrail.ca : 

FOLLOW THE MONEY TRAIL AND EXPLORE THE U.S. FOUNDATION FUNDING HYPOCRISY THAT'S IMPACTING CANADA'S SOVEREIGNTY

"Wealthy American Foundations pump millions of dollars into campaigns to halt Canadian oil sands production and pipelines."

According to BC4P, that would be the Foundations Rockefeller, Pew, and Tides, among 70 odd others.

BC4P Interim Policy Director Brittany Allison was previously :

"Policy Researcher in the Prime Minister’s Office in Ottawa and Research Officer in the B.C. Legislature in Victoria"

prior to being Public Affairs Advisor for Fraser Surrey Docks coal expansion project.

Like Ethical Oil, BC4P director and frequent CBC commentator Alise Mills also declines to reveal their sources of funding.

Foreign funding researcher Vivian Krause, who you would expect to be a natural political soul sister to these two, stated in a Kootenay Co-op radio interview in April that in addition to her objection to BC4P's flawed arguments - [transcript in comment #8 ] :

"I'm not involved with that group at all. They asked me to be involved but they wouldn't disclose their own funding sources so I wasn't willing to work with them."

Like Ethical Oil before them, BC4P has likely come to the end of its robocalling astroturfing usefulness, only to be replaced by yet another *grassroots org* of undisclosed funding - - like this one :

Canada Action Plan

"Full Value for Canadian Resources - Support Northern Gateway"

Just two guys with a grassroots website ...

... and an op ed in the CAPP/Postmedia partnership world of the Vancouver Sun a month ago :
Pipeline fear factor is inappropriate

... and a *surprise* visit from Ezra Levant at the "No Enbridge!" Sunset Beach protest in Vancouver where their Canada Action counter-protest banners were big enough to block the view of the ocean.

... and an endorsement on their Support the Northern Gateway Pipeline pledge from Bruce Lounds of BC4P.

Two days ago, Olivia Ward had a piece in The Star : Billionaire Koch brothers are big oil players in Alberta as the largest foreign landholder. 

"During an ill-fated run for vice-president in 1980, David Koch campaigned on a platform that promoted destruction of the social welfare system, repeal of taxation and an end to public education, children’s services, government medical care, minimum wage laws and environmental regulation.
But through the Kochs’ persistence and lavish funding, their libertarian ideas are now part of the Republican Party’s agenda, and they have helped to change the face of America.

Founding or funding groups like the Cato Institute, Americans for Prosperity, the American Enterprise Institute and the State Policy Network — which acts as a seed bank for dozens of others — the Kochs gradually inched across the political landscape.

In Canada, Koch’s presence in the oil sands has set environmentalists’ teeth on edge as the brothers back U.S. climate skeptics, tout fossil fuels and oppose the Obama administration’s environmental agenda."

The Kochtopus with its unfettered free market oil-friendly political tentacles winding 

"into the mainstream through the tea party and "dark money" political coalitions that allow donors to shield their identity while funding attack ads "

In the same article, Ward interviews Kenneth Green, the Fraser Institute's Energy and Natural Resources director. Although she doesn't mention it, Green spent 3 years with the Fraser Institute and then seven with the Koch and Exxon-funded American Enterprise Institute before cycling back to the Fraser Institute again last year. In 2007 while with AEI, Green offered $10,000 each to any scientists willing to refute the IPCC's climate change report. 

Ward :

"Fraser Institute president Niels Veldhuis says that although Koch contributed $115,000 to the Fraser Institute in the past year, “it is for our Economic Freedom of the World project”

You know, the next time you two girls get together to talk 'foreign special interests and their deep pockets', you might want to have a look into that. 

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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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Six Degrees of Separation

From Matt Price @ HuffPost, who in turn credits Deep Climate and DeSmogBlog for the research

Meanwhile, about that "foreign money" and "foreign special interest groups" that Steve and Joe are so worried will influence what should be a purely Canadian decision on the Enbridge Northern Gateway project : 
Enbridge would like you to know that only its Chair and 5 out of 12 of its directors are American.
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