How Tides Canada Controls the Secret North American Tar Sands Coalition

[photo] Ms. Berman presenting a “Green” Award to former Liberal Party of B.C. premier, Gordon Campbell … the man who privatized British Columbia, sold it to General Electric and other international corporations, who built highways across farmland and called it “green;” who reversed dioxin effluent safeguards that we fought for and instituted in B.C. to protect our water; who sold off the public and natural heritage of British Columbia and opened the doors to General Electric to occupy hundreds of watersheds, devastate riparian ecosystems, and destroy forests for transmission lines to carry expensive power to mines in the north and to sprawling cities in the U.S. – Photo source: BC government.

Repeat This Aloud

Counterpunch

October 16, 2013

By Macdonald Stainsby

Before Tzeporah Berman began her current position as head of the North American Tar Sands Coalition, Tides Canada had already established these structures to create near-total control over budgets– and therefore, most decisions– for staggering numbers of organizations. Berman was around at the time, working for PowerUp pushing forward offsets garnered by river destruction. Some of the participant organizations already had working partnerships with multiple tar sands producers. The over-whelming majority were already greased by primarily high donors and foundations. Thus, joining the NATSC meant, essentially, double dipping.

The Tides Foundation began the NATSC as a project with earmarked funding coming from other large philanthropic foundations. This unelected and unseen structure was created to stand as a vehicle to help forge a similar backroom strategy for and likely negotiation of a “final agreement” to end campaigns against either certain segments or corporations involved in tar sands, likely borrowing from concepts involved in crafting similar deals with forestry corporations.

In 2009, as a part of producing Offsetting Resistance, a full strategy paper document was leaked to myself and Dru Oja Jay. It was an internal paper from a few months prior that outlined the secret nature of the coalition, the internal structures, the over-all short, middle and long term goals of a foundation funded, and foundation directed entity that was earmarked as a project of Tides Canada, and not as a separate NGO.

The pressure applied and leveraged would be out of the hard work of other people. The people who had worked at a community or first nations grassroots level were not only to not be consulted, if deal negotiations were to happen it was without anyone but a select few ever knowing anything about it. Until the press conference.

The documents make this point specifically: “This document is confidential” reads the front page of the strategy paper for the single most important climate campaign of their multi-million dollar philanthropy. But the real kicker is the breakdown of the structures. Under the heading “Enroll key decision makers while isolating opponents” : We will not make the decisions to slow and clean up the tar sands – those in positions of authority will.”

Though there are many problematic proposed solutions contained within the program (carbon offsets, for example), this was written by Michael Marx, then head of Tides’ Tar Sands Coalition in 2008. Specific demands, strategy and more may well have moved on, especially in the face of new coalition partner, Bill McKibben, and the PR group that has brought the world 350.org. Pipeline struggles, in years past, were not as heavily focused upon as now. Keystone (both of them) gets only a whiff in the paper by name; Enbridge Gateway is described but not named. Indeed, how times have changed.

Instead of predictions about the terms of a sell-out, the focus here should be on the structures as they are described. We know automatically the terms will be detrimental to the needs of the climate or of community, simply because the Canadian Boreal Initiative, Environmental Defense, WWF, CPAWS and other organizations who do more than negotiate backroom deals– but publicly embrace and partner with corporations like Suncor, Nexen, Dow Chemical and more– are leading members. The coalition groups are now under the twin auspices of Tides and Pew funding, as well Tides and Pew membership as further “partners.”

This further blurring of foundations who are increasingly “activist” in their own right, speaking and campaigning as “just another green group” is accelerating. In the past few years, new brazen language has come from Tides Canada, previously unthinkable: “At Tides Canada we are working to bridge these two polarized camps (environmentalists and tar sands corporations– MS). As a convener of diverse interests, we’ve played this role before, most notably in British Columbia’s Great Bear Rainforest.1”

The quote above was a letter penned by President and CEO of Tides Canada, Ross McMillan. When the Great Bear Rainforest backroom deal was announced, it was publicized as a triumph of “Rainforest Solutions Project,” then comprising ForestEthics, Sierra Club BC, Greenpeace Canada and the Rainforest Action Network (RAN has since withdrawn support for the agreement). Tides was then, to use their jargon, “invisible to the outside,” but now speaks publicly as both a “stakeholder” and financial lifeblood. Now they advertise prior secretive involvement.

When looking at the real structures of the “North American Tar Sands Coalition” remember that it “shall remain invisible to the outside and to the extent possible, staff will be “purchased” from engaged organizations.”

“Purchasing” staff means that a person who is acting in the capacity of the directives of the paymaster coalition is never to public refer to the actual job, or even the organization. As such, even though someone took a leave from, say, the Pembina Institute to become a coordinator within the Tar Sands Coalition steering committee, and cashed paycheques from Tides referencing this work, they would publicly identify with their former employing organization, the Pembina Institute.

In fact, the above perfectly described the Canadian tar sands coordinator for Tides previously, Dan Woynillowicz. Google his name and he appears only as Pembina. The fact that demands, media, talking points, statements and interviews and paydays all then came from Tides direction was to “remain invisible to the outside.” He stepped aside for Jennifer Lash, who appears publicly as Executive Director of Living Oceans BC. She is, in fact, coordinator of Tides Canadian section.

Michael Marx is the former “lead coordinator” from the tar sands steering committee, above the American and Canadian coordinators. These three, in collaboration with media coordinators, form the power nucleus. Other foundations centralize campaign contributions to the Tides Coalition, and will re-direct appeals for tar sands funding to the national coordinators from this one group. This has effectively narrowed the overwhelming portion of all tar sands funding from foundation sources, leaving astronomical power in the hands of an unseen entity.

How does the final say evolve? According to Marx while he was still coordinator: “While NGOs generally prefer a network structure that allows for maximum communication, and minimal centralized control, foundations investing most heavily in the campaign have a vested interest in exercising some control over the process”(emphasis mine).

Michael Marx has moved on as mentioned, for Tzeporah Berman to become head of the North American Tar Sands Coalition. Marx himself is officially a campaigner once again with the Sierra Club in the United States.

The “Tar Sands Solutions Network” appears to be the vehicle for a public face to negotiate a “win-win” deal. A couple of years ago, the Mediacoop.ca and later on the Globe and Mail reported a leak of an attempted “fireside chat” that was to happen with no fanfare, media or record of its existence. This chat was to involve some of the largest players in energy corporations operating in the tar sands, “with beer in hand” alongside some of the more compromised and right wing environmental organizations.

That particular meeting was aborted after the leak.

There are other secret meetings as well, ones where you have to sign before hand not to release any information about what is discussed. There– without the input of the multiple indigenous communities and other active community resistance movements that target tar sands on both sides of the colonial border– strategy for the short, middle and long terms are drawn up.

Foundations spring for the event, foundations also “influence” talking points, strategy is laid out and so on. Recently, for example, there was such a meeting held off the coast of British Columbia. People who organize in other areas would likely know many of those who attended. Attendees are all sworn overtly not to speak out about its mere existence.

The coalition is the same invisible Trojan Horse that so many “collaborative model” agreements have come from in the past. Berman is simply the public face of capitalism’s last ditch attempt to save itself. The system needs reinvention as it collapses under strain, and the new class of would be green capitalists seek to emerge out of this crisis like Henry Ford did from the Depression. Exploitation of the working class, continued indigenous colonialism at home, war mongering imperialism, permanently expanding growth economics– all with climate effects being transferred onto the over-exploited majority world– this is all “just the way things are,” because “we don’t have time to try and transform the system,” and so on are invoked in defending a strategy of accommodation to capital.

The reality is it results in defeat; the tar sands are a cornerstone– as is all oil– to a growth economy. Fracking, tar sands, offshore, coal to liquids, mountain top removal and the prize of Utah and Colorado’s oil shale, every last bit of it and more must be opposed. Growth is the problem. Green capitalism is a false promise to unite a growth economy with a healthy atmosphere. It is a lie.

If the economic framework of assigning value to land to be converted to resources for dollars is not challenged, oil will continue. It is not a renegade or rogue industry. It is a perfectly normal, capitalist industry.

Big Energy’s power is a reflection of the centrality of energy, leading to influence. It is a logic completely at peace with accumulation of profit and the dominance of capital. More than “not a rogue industry,” it is the flagship, the pinnacle of industries under late industrial capitalism.

Oil exploitation has existed in every industrial society of the last few centuries; however, like the arms industry, the power nexus of its placement in the over-all economic structure of the West makes it absolutely impossible to decouple a dismantling of the power structure with any hope of weakening some falsely labelled “rogue” industry. We need at minimum to declare no right of any backroom negotiation around tar sands. Nothing can green them, nothing can legitimize discussions. Public or private.

Growth is the elephant in the living room we must confront. We must reject a “green shift” that panders to “have your cake and eat it too” eco-populism, the lefty-green rhetoric of a new green bourgeoisie trying to burst forth.

By making capital sacrosanct (“[F]oundations investing most heavily in the campaign have a vested interest in exercising some control over the process.”), the negotiation process cannot do anything about the situation of capital dominance.

Capital is most dominant in the North American political party system. The pro-Obama language of the “Tar Sands Solutions Network” likely indicates a nod to board member Bill McKibben, whose own Rockefeller funded, pro-Obama organizing in 350.org has become stuck on a hamster wheel chasing the Keystone XL. Simply put, the same PR professional thinking below the border that designed the Democrats’ Moveon.org are now more than likely having influence on crafting part of the over-all trajectory of tar sands big money organizing. Brand Obama sells, but the products are made of oil.

Let us ask: Can choreography win the day? In the excellent article “The Climate Movement’s Pipeline Preoccupation” from last week, four Rising Tide community organizers pointed out:

“[T]he mainstream Keystone XL and Northern Gateway campaigns operate on a flawed assumption that the climate movement can compel our elected leaders to respond to the climate crisis with nothing more than an effective communications strategy.”

The people who would negotiate away the work done in other diverse communities are unseen, unelected, unaccountable and have friendly relations with large corporations for a reason. They are not even a large minority of those organizing in opposition to tar sands and the energy industries, however. Those whose resistance have done the most to create this situation?

Some have warm relations with certain facets of Big Green, but all have organized independent of Big Green structures, built separate movements of their own, evolving community directed demands. Through a process of building, what it is that cannot be negotiated has evolved for every different movement in their own manner. There is not just one movement, and there are just as many different sets of principles.

Impacted indigenous communities are building opposition to Line 9 expansion with allies of theirs from outlying communities; People in Utah & Texas are engaged in creative responses of resistance to proposed tar sands mining or pipeline construction; indigenous territory has been reclaimed and rebuilt blocking all energy pipeline construction: Tar sands oil, fracked gas, none of it is being allowed across Unist’ot’en Territory near the Pacific Ocean coastline. There are other paths being walked.

People can now raise a clear voice in opposition to further moves to negotiate a final agreement that no one has any mandate to work on. We must reject the collaborative model succinctly for the tar sands, whether expressed by pipeline deals or in Alberta and Saskatchewan at the source of developments. The impacts globally from setting a North American tar sands collaborative process in motion could irreparably damage resistance to tar sands in places where it is now just getting off the ground around the world.

The current Big Green structures are undemocratic and cloak and dagger in appearance. The participants are organizations and certain individuals with a history of bad democratic practice and serious pro-corporate sympathies.

There comes a time, as has been said, when silence is betrayal. Let this be known as just such a time. Let us celebrate the existing diversity of the movements in opposition to tar sands and fossil fuels, and that have targeted the immediate, essential need to make clear the impossibility of parceling the land as a solution.

We must make certain solidarity is a true bottom line for those who are seen as allies in the battles over tar sands and climate. Solidarity cannot come from secret conversations with the enemy. Let us speak too, of this reality: Big energy is the enemy. Not bad practices within it, but the energy and growth economy itself.

The equivalent of the Canadian Tea Party crowd has filled newspaper columns with stories to frighten you and I about the power of American money. Much of the foundation-led anti-tar sands cash has been coming from the United States, and as such we are supposed to cringe at the origin. Yet it would not matter if the paper trail led one to the moon– resources in and of themselves are not the issue. Were spending resources to be the issue, big energy companies and the federal government within Canada itself have vastly outspent the foundations on both sides of the 49th parallel, promoting unfettered tar sands. The problem is the distortion of active resistance, and the hi-jacking of a public process.

These are battles that determine whether or not we can make a grim situation survivable. Capital has caused this near calamity, we surely need to stop trying to save it from itself any longer. Capital has also polluted our own thinking– and actions– from within. We must reinvigorate a democratic environmental movement through a refutation of back room deals– and organize active resistance to those who would try and negotiate one.

[Macdonald Stainsby is an anti-tar sands and social justice activist, freelance writer and professional hitchhiker looking for a ride to the better world, currently based in Vancouver, Canada. He can be reached at mstainsby@resist.ca]

Jun 04

2013

Wrong Kind of Green

350.org / 1Sky, Ceres, Foundations, Greenpeace, Natural Resources Defense Council, Non-Profit Industrial Complex, Sierra Club, TckTckTck

350.org Keystone KXL NRDC Sierra Club TckTckTck

Keystone XL: The Art of NGO Discourse – Part II

Manufacturing Discourse

The following article is the second installment of an investigative report that demonstrates why billions of dollars are pumped by corporate interests into the non-profit industrial complex, effectively to manufacture discourse in order to protect the ruling classes from systemic change. The first installment outlined the key players: Barack Obama, Hillary and Bill Clinton, Warren Buffett, the Rockefeller family, Bill Gates and Bill Ackman. The key instruments employed by the state and the oligarchs were/are a cluster of foundation-financed NGOs. These included/include Greenpeace, Sierra Club, NRDC and others, with 350.org/1Sky at the helm leading the cunning and strategic discourse.

+++

Counterpunch

June 4, 2013

Part two of an investigative report by Cory Morningstar

Keystone XL Investigative Report Series [Further Reading]: Part I • Part II • Part III • Part IV

Tar Sands Action & the Paralysis of a Movement – Investigative Report Series [Further Reading, September, 2011]: Part I • Part II [Obedience – A New Requirement for the “Revolution”] • Part III [ Unravelling the Deception of a False Movement]

Illustration courtesy of Stephanie McMillan, Minimum Security

On April 8, 2013, PRWatch asked the question: “Seven State Keystone XL Resolutions – Where Are the Environmentalists?” The author reported the following observations:

The cleanup is still underway from a massive pipeline spill in Mayflower, Arkansas, but you don’t hear anything about it at public hearings across the nation dealing with the Keystone XL (KXL) pipeline. Resolutions supporting the controversial KXL pipeline have now been introduced in seven states, but while TransCanada, the American Petroleum Institute (API) and the Chamber of Commerce have been lobbying in force for the bills to pass, there have been few opposing voices by either Democrats or environmentalists at public hearings dealing on the measures….

In February, CMD reported on state resolutions calling for the approval of the KXL pipeline project in Mississippi, Michigan, Minnesota, and Missouri. The language in three of these resolutions closely matched a “backgrounder” from TransCanada. The forth resolution, introduced in Missouri, mirrored a resolution from the American Legislative Exchange Council….

In the last few months, Ohio, Kansas, and Indiana have introduced very similar resolutions, which also feature paragraphs from TransCanada’s own materials. Although these resolutions are non-binding, they will be showcased by industry lobbyists as evidence about how state legislators (and by extension the public) feel about the pipeline project in an attempt to influence the pending State Department decision on KXL. While opponents of KXL have been active on many fronts, their absence from state legislatures nationwide has been notable….

Industry Turns Out in Force, But Face Little Opposition…

[P]ro-pipeline groups certainly seem to be organized in a coordinated national effort, with lobbyists from TransCanada, the American Petroleum Institute (or their local affiliates like Kansas Petroleum Council), and the Chamber of Commerce all attending committee hearings. But the attendance from environmental groups has been patchy at best and the support for their efforts from Democratic lawmakers has been weak.

On February 12, 2013, the Michigan resolution – SCR6 – received a hearing in the Senate Energy and Technology Committee, at which industry groups turned out in force. Lobbyists from the API, TransCanada, the Detroit Regional Chamber, and DTE Energy were all there to make the case for KXL, but as shown in the minutes there was not a single member of the public recorded as opposing KXL. The vote passed 5-1, with two committee members leaving the room just five minutes before the vote. And when two weeks later a vote was held on the House version of the bill in the House Energy and Technology Committee, again lobbyists from API, TransCanada, the Detroit Regional Chamber, and DTE Energy – as well as from Michigan Laborers Union – turned up to support the resolution. There was not a single voice of opposition and the Committee passed the resolution 16-0. The bill passed a floor vote in the House 88-20 on March 5, 2013. [Emphasis added]

The author of the above article makes reference to the fact that although 58,000 activists have pledged to be arrested, there is little opposition at the state level. Perhaps never before has there been such a clear case study that solidifies the fact that “clicktivism” is slowly and effectively destroying any meaningful activism. In the Havas Worldwide (global media giant and creator of TckTckTck) 2010 report, Who Cares Wins, The Rise of the Caring Corporation, one key element to further corporate loyalty and profit is to “Grow Through Karma Off-Setting: Consumers will actively buy from companies who are good, so they feel that they themselves don’t have to personally undertake social projects, as they have done good by making their purchase with you. Good brands provide a moral alibi for buying.” One could draw strong analogies to the 5 second “click” campaigns, which require (and demand) zero analysis and an abhorrence for critical thinking, when the Havas Worldwide campaign affects the psyche in a very similar fashion.

As found in the Nov/Dec 2012, Jan 2013 issue of Bakken Oil Business Magazine:

BNSF has been hauling Bakken crude out of the Williston Basin area for over five years. ‘In that time, we have seen the volume increase nearly 7,000 percent, from 1.3 million barrels in 2008 to 88.9 million in 2012,’ said Dave Garin, BNSF group Vice President of Industrial Products….

I received the following response from Jane Kleeb after contacting her about Bold Nebraska’s oppositional stance to the KXL pipeline’s new suggested route through Nebraska: “We are waiting for all the conservative politicians who say they care about property rights and family farmers and ranchers to actually give a damn and stand up against this pipeline. We welcome pipeline infrastructure (not in the Sandhills or that crosses the Aquifer) to ensure ND and MT oil is getting to U.S. markets.”

The leg from Cushing, OK to the Gulf Coast refineries has already been approved by the states through which it is being laid, as it did not require presidential approval and does not run through Nebraska. On March 12, 2012, President Obama personally announced his approval of “fast tracking” the southern leg of the KXL pipeline to relieve pressure on the WTI crude oil inventories for shipment to the Gulf Coast. Construction has started and is expected to be completed sometime in late 2013….

The main contributor to Bold Nebraska is Dick Holland, who has financially supported this progressive political movement in its opposition to the KXL pipeline. Bold Nebraska’s NIMBY approach will only cause further delays in completing the KXL.

Mr. Holland is a good friend of Warren Buffett, the CEO of Berkshire Hathaway, and one of the world’s most successful investors. Any delay in the process by the U.S. State Department in recommending approval for the completion of the full route of the KXL by the President of the United States, will solely benefit the BNSF.

Holland and his wife were two members of the small group that invested with close friend Warren Buffett in the original Berkshire Hathaway, which dates back to the 1960s. University of Nebraska Omaha reports: “[O]ne version of Buffett’s “Oracle of Omaha” story says $10,000 at the start (less than the Hollands invested) grew to roughly $280 million.”Forbes states that the BOLD Nebraska campaign has been largely funded by Dick Holland.

Jan 26, 2012, Forbes, Obama’s Keystone Rejection May Provide A Buffett Bonanza:

The Obama administration’s original decision to postpone Keystone approval until after the 2012 elections followed loud opposition on environmental grounds led by an anti-pipeline group called “Bold Nebraska”….

The BOLD Nebraska campaign was largely funded by Dick Holland, a close Buffett friend and business associate since the 1960s and an original Berkshire Hathaway investor.The two men share a similar political philosophy and are strong Democratic Party contributors.

Although BOLD Nebraska has openly stated “[W]e welcome pipeline infrastructure (not in the Sandhills or that crosses the Aquifer) to ensure ND and MT oil is getting to U.S. markets,” it is nonetheless a partner of both 350.org [1] and Tar Sands Action.org [2]. Yet in real life, this is really no big deal. Where BOLD Nebraska may receive funding directly from a corporate interest, all organizations involved in this campaign are also funded via corporate interests, the only difference being that the funds (i.e. investment) are funnelled through foundations, which essentially serve as tax-exempt marketing agencies for neoliberal ideologies, programs and policies. It is perhaps somewhat ironic that Holland is actually forthright and transparent in his financing of BOLD Nebraska and doesn’t feel the need to conform to the political theatre in which the foundations are a key prop.

A far more serious issue is that a non-elected, self-appointed NGO, who claims to speak on behalf/represent of civil society (as all NGOs claim), that is in reality, founded/initiated/financed by elite families of hegemony (Rockefellers and Clintons predominantly at onset) has declined to disclose the source of certain monetary “donations”. The fact that an NGO that claims to represent civil society refuses to disclose all funding sources, demonstrates unequivocally a great lack of respect not only for full transparency, but for the “followers” they claim to represent. [“What 350.org’s list of donors fails to convey is that some foundations provide only US$5,000 or US$10,000, while two unidentified donors provide half of 350.org’s budget for 2011, according to its financial statements. Four grants accounted for two-thirds of 350.org’s budget. 350.org declined to identify the donors of those grants” [as referenced in part I].

Behind the curtains of the political theatre we find the prestigious marketing agencies and public relation firms that “grassroots” groups are miraculously able to afford. These firms and agencies write and develop the scripts and design the sets. They bring the stories to life, strategically exploit and manipulate and our emotions, ultimately ensuring we come to accept and partake in their politically acceptable means of discourse – discourse sanctioned (and financed) by the empire. In the case of BOLD Nebraska, partner and marketing agency, Justin Kemerling Design Co, boasts a client list of 350.org, MoveOn.org, Avaaz, the Obama campaign and many more. Another example is the corporate communications and public affairs agency Hoggan & Associates (DeSmogBlog co-founder Jim Hoggan is president and founder), whose client list includes corporate creation TckTckTck, Canadian Pacific (Rail), Shell, AMEC and many more. A planetary crisis for our Earth, which is on the verge of unprecedented, global ecological collapse, has never felt so far away. And the hustle, polished and refined in an emerald green patina, has never made us feel so damn good. Destruction of the planet and the oppression/displacement/annihilation of non-white peoples has been internalized as a completely normal, day to day part of our everyday existence.

The name of the game: allow us to subconsciously (and consciously) protect our privilege all while we’re up to our necks in blood, drowning within a system where violence and exploitation of people and planet are inherently built in. We may fiercely chastise Apple – but we’re not about to actually give up any of the corporations products. In our collective, oblivious minds, the Congo does not exist nor do the Congolese, just the SumofUs petition which Westerners sign (click) dishonestly knowing it will have no meaningful effect. (Instead we toss the latest iPhone sweatshop accessory to our average eleven year-old Euro-American populace, sanctioning rampant corporate pedophilia and indoctrination, all while we steal their very future out from under them.) DeSmogBlog may “expose” Shell on occasion, yet Hoggan & Associates has no problem raking in Shell cash to perhaps, in their own words, “…help clients identify the optimum frame and establish it in the public mind. In a crisis, we can help lift a story out of a frame that might have been set up by critics.” Not surprisingly, note that Hoggan has been a member of the David Suzuki Foundation Board since 2001 and has served as Chair since 2007. It’s all one big happy, delusional, and very privileged, family.

YES LOGO | The McKibben-Klein Doctrine

Above: 350.org DC rally signs (far right and bottom two) clearly promote the powerful Obama brand. Above left: MoveOn.org (founder of Avaaz), front group for the Democratic Party. Image to right of MoveOn.org poster: 350.org “Forward on Climate” poster/logo. Top image: Obama 2012 campaign poster/logo.

“Together, the team has marshalled every tool in the modern marketing arsenal to create and sustain the Obama brand: the perfectly calibrated logo (sunrise over stars and stripes).” — Naomi Klein, author of No Logo (10th Anniversary Edition). Klein now sits on the board of directors of Rockefellers’ 1Sky/350.org

“… A lot of times when he’s at a podium what you’ll see is, centered right beneath him, at the very top of the blue field that usually says something like ‘Change You Can Believe In,’ it’ll be just that little symbol, functioning in the same way the Nike swoosh does. People look at that and know what it means, even though it’s just an ‘O’ with some stripes in it…. The thing that sort of flabbergasts me as a professional graphic designer is that, somewhere along the way, they decided that all their graphics would basically be done in the same typeface…. If you look at one of his rallies, every single non-handmade sign is in that font. Every time you look, all those signs are perfect. Graphic designers like me don’t understand how it’s happening. It’s unprecedented and inconceivable to us. The people in the know are flabbergasted.” — Expertinent: Why the Obama “Brand” Is Working, Feb 27, 2008

“Attitude” branding is essentially defined by the ability to elicit/represent/instill a larger, more powerful feeling on an emotional, subconscious level. It need not be connected with the product or the consumption of the product whatsoever. At a deeper level, attitude branding drills into the consumer psychology of (“attitude”) choice –as much as the term “choice” is applicable in the 21st century of accelerating social engineering. The brand “Obama” does not represent nor sell a president, rather it embodies an emotional chimera of “hope” and “change” that we can choose to believe in. One could quite safely describe attitude branding as a very sophisticated and calculated method of indoctrination, perhaps one of the highest (and most subtle) forms of psychological manipulation/brainwashing.Corporations excelling in “attitude” branding include Apple and Nike, to name two. Branding a person is not fundamentally different from branding a product. In 2008, Obama-the-brand beat out the aforementioned Apple and Nike, capturing first place for Advertising Age’s marketer of the year.

The Obama brand utilized by 350.org et al for the Forward in Climate – Reject Keystone XL Pipeline was strategic and cunning. Anyone who believes otherwise is beyond naïve. Perhaps this feat could be considered a unique and compelling example of the indoctrinating attitude branding that Naomi Klein describes as “fetish strategy” in her 2000 book No Logo.

Video: John Pilger – Obama is a Corporate Marketing Creation (running time: 5:29)

Although it is obvious that the No KXL campaign logo shares remarkable and purposeful semblance to the infamous Obama logo (sunrise over stars and stripes), allowing the pro-Obama, pro-Democrat veneer to illuminate at almost 100% transparency, a natural line of defence by 350.org would be that of course they utilize what 350.org board member, Naomi Klein, refers to as “the perfectly calibrated logo” to their advantage, as, they would argue, the Obama administration is the target of their campaign.

And anyone who understands advertising, social engineering and the power of the brand, such as Klein, would understand that this line of defense is bullshit.

The KXL campaign imagery absolutely reinforces Obama’s ubiquitous “brand.”

“Brand recognition is most successful when people can state a brand without being explicitly exposed to the company’s name, but rather through visual signifiers like logos, slogans and colors.” — Investopedia

The money that the modern power elite have pumped into 1Sky/350.org via their tax-exempt foundations has proven to be an investment with such incredibly high dividends, it would make even Warren Buffet blush. [“Reports make it official: Oil and gas are booming…. the Railroad Commission issued 3,722 permits during the first two months of the year, ‘the strongest start to a year in the entire history of the TPI [Texas Petro Index],’ he said.” [April 4, 2013]

The Obama branding/marketing campaign was planned and executed with clinical precision. The Obama marketing team established brand leadership by ensuring Obama owned the “change” ideology in the voters’ minds. The KXL campaign successfully reinforced/reinforces the illusion that this same iconic “change” is still sitting right in front of us, ours for the taking, if only we believe. Like the Obama brand, the 350.org brand (along with many thousands of other NGOs) recognizes and focuses on the desire for an authentic “product,” which simultaneously reinforces our society’s collective thirst for the lies that enable the populace to continue to ignore reality – and perhaps more importantly, disregard our collective role in it.

On 16 January 2010 the Guardian publishes the article Naomi Klein on how corporate branding has taken over America. Ten years after the publication of No Logo, Naomi Klein switches her attention from the mall to Barack Obama and discovers that corporate culture has taken over the US government [Extracted from No Logo (10th Anniversary Edition) by Naomi Klein, to be published by Fourth Estate on 21 January at GBP 9.99]

When Obama was sworn in as president, the American brand could scarcely have been more battered – Bush was to his country what New Coke was to Coca-Cola, what cyanide in the bottles had been to Tylenol. Yet Obama, in what was perhaps the most successful rebranding campaign of all time, managed to turn things around. Kevin Roberts, global CEO of Saatchi & Saatchi, set out to depict visually what the new president represented. In a full-page graphic commissioned by the stylish Paper Magazine, he showed the Statue of Liberty with her legs spread, giving birth to Barack Obama. America, reborn….

So, it seemed that the United States government could solve its reputation problems with branding – it’s just that it needed a branding campaign and product spokesperson sufficiently hip, young and exciting to compete in today’s tough market. The nation found that in Obama, a man who clearly has a natural feel for branding and who has surrounded himself with a team of top-flight marketers. His social networking guru, for instance, is Chris Hughes, one of the young founders of Facebook. His social secretary is Desirée Rogers, a glamorous Harvard MBA and former marketing executive. And David Axelrod, Obama’s top adviser, was formerly a partner in ASK Public Strategies, a PR firm which, according to Business Week,”has quarterbacked campaigns” for everyone from Cablevision to AT&T. Together, the team has marshalled every tool in the modern marketing arsenal to create and sustain the Obama brand: the perfectly calibrated logo (sunrise over stars and stripes); expert viral marketing (Obama ringtones); product placement….

Indeed everything Obama and his family touches turns to branding gold…. “We have the best brand on earth: the Obama brand,”…. “Our possibilities are endless”….

Obama, in sharp contrast not just to social movements but to transformative presidents such as FDR, follows the logic of marketing: create an appealing canvas on which all are invited to project their deepest desires but stay vague enough not to lose anyone but the committed wing nuts (which, granted, constitute a not inconsequential demographic in the United States). Advertising Age had it right when it gushed that the Obama brand is “big enough to be anything to anyone yet had an intimate enough feel to inspire advocacy”….

Yet rereading No Logo after 10 years provides many reminders that success in branding can be fleeting, and that nothing is more fleeting than the quality of being cool. Many of the superbrands and branded celebrities that looked untouchable not so long ago have either faded or are in deep crisis today. The Obama brand could well suffer a similar fate. [Emphasis added]

The task at hand is to ensure Obama does not suffer this similar fate that Klein aptly describes. Hence, the millions funneled into MoveOn.org, the front group/non-profit organization for the Democratic Party. MoveOn.org takes the visible pro-Democrat position, at the forefront of the non-profit industrial complex which, for the most part, keeps their political ideological leanings hidden in order to appear both non-partisan/independent and legitimate. One should note that MoveOn is the key founder of Avaaz along with Res Publica. Both MoveOn.org and Avaaz are partners of 350.org, Avaaz being a 350.org key partner/affiliate. [FURTHER READING: AVAAZ: Imperialist Pimps of Militarism, Protectors of the Oligarchy, Trusted Facilitators of War]

When Klein stated that Obama followed the logic of creating “an appealing canvas on which all are invited to project their deepest desires but stay vague enough not to lose anyone but the committed wing nuts,” who would have known she was describing, with astounding accuracy, the very faction that she affiliated herself with, the following year on April 7, 2011. Whether Klein’s words were a self-fulfilling prophecy or simply bad judgment, one can only speculate. However, one thing is certain, the “committed wing nuts” Klein speaks of have only become more delusional in the years that have followed as Obama leads the world in the race to the bottom. Who knew that fascism, invasions, occupations, corruption and drones could be so appealing?

Hypocrisy Knows No Bounds

“Man is born free, and everywhere he is in chains.” — Jean-Jacques Rousseau

Brilliant is the person that could inspire a nation to stand up and systematically destroy the system that is killing us. These people are not brilliant. Rather, they are diabolical. The foundations that support them depend upon industrialized capitalism to grow their investments. The non-profit complex can only be sustained if the foundations’ wealth continues to reap the “rewards” of infinite growth. It is unsustainable (not to mention deadly). Without infinite growth,the non-profit complex will collapse. Gone will be the six-figured salaries of the progressive greens. Yet, every day that this system remains intact, turning Earth’s remaining natural resources into monetary capital, we are one day closer to our collective annihilation. There will be no winners in this game of 21st century Russian roulette.

+++

After the first segment of this report was published on April 12, 2013, there was still much difficulty in acceptance for the privileged few, especially those with affiliation to the corporate greens behind the KXL campaign. The dominant belief that still encapsulates the progressives is that rail is not a viable option in the future. Therefore, let us, one more time, delve back into reality.

Stock Markets and Media Tell the Story

National Post Opinion (April 9, 2009) |CN idea a winner for oil sands:

Within months, CN will be shipping 10,000 barrels daily from producers whose reserves are now stranded. The railway will deliver the oil sands production through the use of insulated and heatable railcars or by reducing its viscosity by mixing it with condensates or diluents.

But the “scalability” of the concept – up to four million barrels per day – means that the railway can ramp up production vastly by just adding rail cars. Shipping four million barrels a day is possible with current rail capacity, said Foote. [Note that this article (cited in part 1 of this series) appeared simultaneously with the April 9, 2009 Huffington Post article titled Game-changer: Canadian oil sands will bypass US for Asia written by Diane Francis. Francis was also the author of the National Post opinion piece. Although Huffington Post is now a Time-Warner acquisition, green progressives remain quite devoted to it.]

Feb 7, 2011, CN, CP push for a pipeline on rails, Globe and Mail:

[CN] has begun sending oil sands bitumen to California; heavy oil from Cold Lake, Alta., to Chicago and Detroit; and crude from the Bakken, a fast-growing play in southern Saskatchewan, to the U.S. Gulf Coast…. CN boasts that its tracks lie within 80 kilometres of five million barrels a day of refining capacity, which is more than double Canada’s entire U.S. exports….

The idea of a “pipeline on rails” has been quietly pursued by both CN and CP in recent years…. “Our unparalleled market reach and flexibility, we feel, gives shippers, buyers … and refineries new options to explore and new ways to reach different markets,” James Cairns, vice-president of petroleum and chemicals with CN, told an Insight Information conference….

Rail cars can also ship pure bitumen, the very heavy crude produced in the oil sands. Bitumen is so thick that it needs to be mixed at about a 70-to-30 ratio with a thinner hydrocarbon – called diluent – to flow in a pipeline. Diluent then needs to be returned to the oil sands, creating substantial additional pipe costs. Rail cars, which are already used to transport asphalt, can take undiluted bitumen….

“There’s a lot of talk about is it pipe? Is it rail?” Mr. Cairns said. “Our view is pretty simple. It’s a big pie.” [Emphasis added]

Nov 3, 2011, Oil aboard! Railroads shipping more Alberta crude:

A year ago, almost no Alberta crude traveled by rail. Now, Canadian railroads can’t find enough cars to ship the gooey stuff. That’s part of the reason Canada’s two biggest railroads, CN (Canadian National Railway) and CP (Canadian Pacific Railway) are wrapping up the year on an upswing. CN’s third-quarter profit climbed 19 percent… Some 2 million barrels of Canadian crude go through pipelines to the U.S. daily, and estimates are that only 10,000 to 20,000 go by rail. But as oil companies grow more comfortable shipping by rail, analysts say, there’ll be a lot more crude in – actually, on – their pipelines on rails.

March 1, 2012, Bloomberg News:

Gains in mineral and chemical carloads helped BNSF pay a $1 billion distribution to Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway last month….

Oil and gas-field servicing are “exploding very healthily” for BNSF, said Paul Bingham, economics practice leader at consultant CDM Smith in Arlington, Va. “In the West I think the BN disproportionately benefits from that.”

March 24, 2012, BNSF Galesburg Yard’s New Tracks Are In Service:

Okay, it’s time to reveal the big secret. Last Saturday (March 17), while waiting at Galesburg for the expected arrival of a rare (for the past several years anyway), Decatur-bound Canadian National “haulage” (by BNSF) grain train, I decided to check out the new tracks that have been built at BNSF Railway’s Galesburg Yard during the past several months….

Anyway, the three new long tracks were empty, and just as I thought how cool it would be to see a train actually using one of the tracks, a North Dakota oil train came into view and pulled onto one of these tracks!

A BNSF Railway petroleum crude oil train uses one of three new “Long Tracks” at Galesburg, Illinois classification yard Saturday, March 17, 2012

June 27, 2012, Southern Pacific Resource Corp. completes arrangements to transport and market bitumen via CN to the U.S. Gulf Coast:

Southern Pacific Resource Corp. (“Southern Pacific” or the “Company”) (TSX: STP) announced today completion of a long-term arrangement to transport its bitumen to the U.S. Gulf Coast via the rail network of CN (TSX: CNR) (NYSE: CNI)….Given recent regulatory delays around additional pipeline capacity to accommodate growing bitumen volumes from Alberta, the Company has now secured direct and immediate access into the Gulf Coast market….In 2012, CN expects to move a total of approximately 25,000 carloads of crude oil, up significantly from approximately 5,000 last year.

August 21, 2012, Railways ship bitumen to relieve pipeline bottlenecks:

It also allows producers additional options for getting oil to market. Some 2 million barrels of Canadian crude go through pipelines to the U.S. daily, and estimates are that only 10,000 to 20,000 go by rail. Some estimates say it costs $3 to $6 to move a barrel of crude through a pipeline versus $15 to move it by rail. The rail option, that did not exist even 2 years ago, will continue grow.

Jan 3, 2013, UPDATE 1-U.S. petroleum rail shipments up nearly 50 pct in 2012

Shipments of petroleum on U.S. railroads rose more than 46 percent in 2012 as shale oil producers put record amounts of crude on trains to overcome pipeline capacity constraints…. Major U.S. freight railroads carried 66,000 carloads of crude in 2011, up from only 11,000 carloads in 2009. By the third quarter of last year, daily shipments of crude oil were exceeding 500,000 barrels per day, roughly equivalent to the output of OPEC’s smallest member, Ecuador. If growth patterns hold, crude by rail could “easily” blow past 600,000 barrels per day by early 2013, AAR said… By the end of the third quarter last year, about 430,000 barrels per day of crude moved out of North Dakota’s Bakken shale play by rail, up from nearly nothing in mid-2010, according to the North Dakota Pipeline Authority. [Emphasis added]

January 7, 2013, Alberta bitumen makes it to Mississippi by rail:

EDMONTON – The first oil from Southern Pacific Resource Corp.’s startup thermal oilsands facility near Fort McMurray reached Mississippi by rail this week after a 4,500-kilometre, two-week journey. The Calgary-based firm was in the news this fall when it announced it would avoid the bitumen pipeline bottlenecks and very low prices being paid to Canadian oilsands producers by contracting for new terminals and a fleet of rail cars to carry its product to the U.S. Gulf Coast. The first shipment of diluted bitumen left the Lynton rail terminal, located just south of Fort McMurray, on Dec. 22 and landed in Mississippi on Jan. 6. It will be off-loaded at the Genesis Natchez terminal where Southern Pacific has exclusive terminal capacity, the company announced Monday. Initial production at the firm’s steam-assisted gravity drainage (SAGD) facility 45 km northwest of Fort McMurray was 1,200 barrels per day in December. It could take at least another year before the design capacity of 12,000 bpd is achieved. [Emphasis added]

Feb 5, 2013, Macleans Canada: Oil Sands Bust:

Meanwhile, another group of businessmen is backing a $10.4-billion plan to construct a new, 2,400-km “purpose built” railroad to carry oil from Alberta to Alaska, where it could then be shipped overseas on tankers. [Emphasis added]

Feb 18, 2013, Price differentials boost rail transport of blended bitumen:

A surge in rail delivery of crude oil and oil products in the US last year reflects, in part, a textbook system of price leapfrog, known more formally as location arbitrage. Although oil is far more expensive to move by railcar than by pipeline, tracks connect more places than pipes do. So when production surges somewhere not fully served by pipelines, such as the Bakken play in North Dakota, oil finds its way into tank cars. The Energy Information Administration reports Association of American Railroads data showing last year’s rail delivery of crude and oil products exceeded the prior year’s total by 46%. [Emphasis added]

March 6, 2013, If Buffett Were Canadian, He’d Want This Stock:

In late 2009, Buffett’s buy big mentality led him to a well-positioned railroad play. But instead of just adding to his shares, Buffett bought out Burlington Northern Santa Fe Railroad (BNSF)…. Since his purchase, railroad stocks have been burning up the tracks. For reference, the Dow Jones Transportation Average, which started as a simple gauge of railroad activity, is booming….Railways across America are booming from a sea-change of energy flow. In fact, things are going so well for the rail industry, besides hitting brand new highs yesterday, something else amazing is happening. Today, in Houston, the CEO for BNSF, Matt Rose, is giving a talk on North American energy, “The New Abundance and What it Means.” This is huge. Just the fact that an executive for a railroad company is speaking at the IHS Cera Week event, is an amazing milestone. [Emphasis added]

May 13, 2013, Oil trains – pipelines on wheels – headed to Northwest terminals and refineries from North Dakota fracking:

Enter trains. In 2008, the largest railroads carried 9,500 carloads of crude. Last year: more than 200,000….

If all the proposed oil terminals are built, the traffic could hit nearly 3,000 loaded trains a year, not counting direct trips to refineries.

That could come on top of coal traffic. Three proposals for Northwest coal export terminals would generate nearly 7,000 coal train trips a year at full capacity on already congested tracks in Spokane, the Gorge and along Interstate 5.

BNSF Railway is likely to carry most of those loads. Spokesman Steve Forsberg said BNSF is investing a record $4.1 billion in upgrades nationwide this year. [Emphasis added]

Let’s take one moment to acknowledge that there is truth in the first article cited above (CN idea a winner for oil sands, November 9, 2009) when it states “As for Canada’s environmental concerns, the oil sands is absolutely essential to maintaining the future living standards of Canadians.” And while the progressive greens bitch about the Venezuelan government utilizing their oil wealth to lift their people, who have been oppressed and exploited under imperialism for centuries, out of poverty, perhaps this is a good time for reflection and some unadulterated “truth”. Demand & consumption is what pushes extraction. As long as professional activists and all other privileged activists/citizens that fall into the 1% category (with the 1% essentially being anyone who can afford to get on an airplane) continue to fly all over the world and while activists and celebrities fly in and out of KXL protests on the front lawn of the White House (which have been nothing more than state-sanctioned photo-ops and pro-Democratic parties), don’t expect anything to change – except for more pipelines and extraction. It is the wealthy that create the climate crisis. As an example, Venezuelan emissions account for only .056% of global emissions while the wealthiest 8% emit 50% of all GHG emissions … and the 3 billion poorest people emit essentially nothing. More recently (no doubt after the engineered financial crisis of 2008), esteemed scientist Kevin Anderson has stated that 50% of emissions come from 1% of the world’s population. [3] Rib-eyed steaks, Coca-Cola, shopping malls, air conditioners and western consumption do not correspond with mitigation on climate change. Perhaps one of the very few options left is to eat the rich.

Language

The pipeline corrosion and safety issues (the primary focus being that of pipeline oil spills) have been the focus points in the Keystone XL debate. This is not by accident. Again, let us for a moment consider the language used in 350.org et al’s “Defend Our Coast” campaign.

The stated goal of the campaign is essentially that they want the Obama administration to “reject a Canadian company’s application to construct the $7 billion, 1,702-mile pipeline, which would carry heavy crude from the oil sands mines of Alberta to refineries along the Gulf Coast.”

Meaningful language would state unequivocally that the main reason to shut down the production of all tar sands is simple: if we do not shut down all tar sands production, we will annihilate our species. It is that simple. By framing our demands with “reasonable” and “politically correct” language, we lock ourselves willingly into the “acceptable” limits as dictated by the industry operating within the industrialized capitalist system – which we must oppose and destroy if we are to simply continue to live. Working within the confines of the acceptable language as constructed by the system ensures absolute subservience, obedience and, always, failure.

Video: Using the Discourse of Revolutionary Opposition (Running time: 2:16)

The intent of the language employed by corporate greens is to create a feeling of trust/safety, effectively pacifying resistance, and to “normalize” our acquiescence to corporate culture and abuse. The state will never fear what it can control. [Further Reading: Tar Sands Action & the Paralysis of a Movement | Part I]

Avoiding Systemic Change Promises Global Ecological Collapse

“Reformers who are always compromising, have not yet grasped the idea that truth is the only safe ground to stand upon.” — Elizabeth Stanton

Internationally, 32,000 km of new pipelines are constructed each year: this is a $US28 billion business, and 50% of these new builds are expected in North and South America. Additionally, 8,000 km of offshore pipelines are being built per year: this is a $5 billion business with 60% in northwest Europe, Asia Pacific, and the Gulf of Mexico. [Source: OIL AND GAS PIPELINES: Yesterday and Today by Phil Hopkins, Chairman, 2006-7]

Considering that the Keystone XL represents a mere 1,702-mile pipeline out of a yearly 32,000 km of pipeline being constructed each year globally, and considering that stopping the KXL will not stop the expansion of the tar sands as we now have a booming rail industry in place, it might be worth asking why we are focusing on a single pipeline rather than the root causes of climate and environmental disruption. Yet, if we are to be honest with ourselves, we do know why (greed, lack of ethics, lack of respect for/separation from our natural world, trappings, denialism), so instead, why don’t we re-visit the root causes of our multiple crises.

More than half (58%) of the total energy produced in the US alone is wasted due to inefficiencies (Phys.org – April 2011). The US military (alone) consumes as much as one million barrels of oil per day (source: author Barry Sanders) to steal resources from sovereign states while simultaneously moving trillions in tax dollars from hard-working people into the hands of global corporations. Millions of men, women and children have been murdered in the process. Approximately 51% of all GHG emissions are created from industrialized livestock. Butwhereas bio-fuel (aptly coined agro-fuel) is an acceptable topic within the constructed left paradigm, industrialized livestock is not.Theblatant hypocrisies of the privileged once again shine transparent on this critical yet unspoken issue. Progressive greens correctly identify that running our cars, etc. on ethanol has already contributed to the world’s food shortages and that the consequences of converting forest land for growing corn for ethanol, etc. are profound. Most activists would agree with these excellent observations and argue against corn ethanol based on these facts and further damning facts simply because it is common sense. Yet, it is clear that the progressive greens are unwilling to collectively identify these very same arguments when it comes to industrial livestock. [4] What are our proposed solutions to the fact there has been a 158% increase in methane (72-100 times more powerful than CO2 in the short-term) as we approach and surpass accelerating feedbacks and irreversible topping points? Maybe the current NOAA methane graphs are terrifying only to the atolls slipping under the rising oceans. The root cause of climate disruption is our global, industrialized capitalist economic system. Yet on these issues, the most critical issues of our lifetime, there is no discussion within the non-profit industrial complex. There is a reason. The complex is financed to the tune of billions of dollars to ensure the right discourse in order to protect the system.

Timing is Everything | Sierra Club and Warren Buffett’s MidAmerican Energy Company Landmark Settlement

January 13, 2013, Indigenous Environmental Network:

Tuesday, January 22, 2013 DES MOINES, IA – Today, the Sierra Club and Warren Buffett’s MidAmerican Energy Company announced a landmark settlement that requires the Iowa utility to phase out coal burning at seven coal-fired boilers, clean up another two coal-fired boilers and build a large solar installation at the Iowa State Fairgrounds. The announcement also pushes the total amount of coal generation retired or announced to retire since 2010 to over 50,000 megawatts, almost one-sixth of the nation’s coal fleet….

“Iowans are joining a growing number of citizens around the country who are helping to end our nation’s dependency on coal and move the U.S. toward a cleaner energy future,” said Michael R. Bloomberg, whose Bloomberg Philanthropies has contributed $50 million to the Sierra Club’s Beyond Coal campaign….

“Today’s settlement marks an important national milestone to end the scourge of coal, as well as an important milestone in our ongoing discussion with the Warren Buffett family of companies about combating climate disruption,” said Bruce Nilles, Senior Director of the Beyond Coal campaign. [Emphasis in original]

Most interesting is the fact that Nilles makes absolutely no mention of Buffet’s expanding rail empire transporting oil across North America. Rather, the release goes on to state:

However, Nilles also took aim at two other parts of Mr. Buffett’s holdings, his western utility, Pacificorp, that owns and operates six existing coal-fired power plants and Mr. Buffett’s BNSF, the largest hauler of coal nationwide. “Pacificorp continues to be a laggard on clean energy and BNSF is one of the very worst actors when it comes to lobbying and promoting expanded coal use nationally and internationally,” Nilles said. “Over the coming months we will be stepping up our engagement with Paciforp and BNSF to urge them to follow the examples of other forward-looking parts of Mr. Buffett’s holdings.” [Emphasis in original]

One might wonder what holdings appear “forward-looking” in the eyes of Nilles. One must also contemplate which undisclosed non-profit was chosen as the beneficiary of a massive financial contribution from Warren Buffett.

On Feb 4, 2013, Time-Warner/AOL’s Huffington Post reports:

Buffett revealed the donations Monday. Buffett, who is Berkshire’s chairman and CEO, made donations of Class B shares to four unnamed charities and three individuals between September and December.

The biggest single gift reported Monday was 172,375 shares worth $16.6 million given to a nonprofit.

These gifts are in addition to the 22.4 million Class B Berkshire shares Buffett gave to the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and the four Buffett family foundations that are slated to eventually distribute most of Buffett’s fortune. [In progressive green foundation-funded fashion, Huffington Post includes under the aforementioned article a 14-page online photo album titled “Adorable Warren Buffett Photos.”]

All those within the non-profit industrial complex brand the Sierra Club – Buffett landmark settlement as a victory (even more so on the heels of Obama’s 2013 inaugural address), when in reality it is nothing more than a strategic component of new investment hijinks: get paid to retire the old and reap even more billions to build new – all under the guise of the illusory “green economy.” Let us not forget how the non-profit industrial complex strategically whitewashed “clean coal.”

On August 31, 2011, environmentalist Gregory Vickrey posed a question in response to a legitimate grassroots organiser demonstrating public support for the very NGOs undermining the grassroots. This question was put forward by Vickrey before it was disclosed on Feb 12 2012, that the Sierra Club raked in $26 million from the natural gas industry and following the announcement (July 21, 2011) that Michael R. Bloomberg’s “Bloomberg Philanthropies” contributed $50 million (over 4 years) to the Sierra Club’s Beyond Coal campaign (initiated in Spring of 2010). Vickrey asks:

My primary concern lies with providing a tract of general legitimacy for those sellouts. Right or wrong, when we vocalize support or otherwise endorse these sanitized events and the players behind them, we are seen as sanctioning them on the whole, and it makes walking the fine line of organizing an effective movement tough. Our present reality is tough to swallow in context.

On coal, I understand some of the stronger points of messaging from, say, the Sierra Club, but am concerned that much of that movement is likewise funded primarily with Rockefeller Family money (Bill himself states this, and proudly) and defines (dilutes) success in increments that, in the grand scheme of things, mean little. We can’t tolerate another 6k mW of coal active in FL, for example, but that is a victory to the Beyond Coal campaign because they managed to stop another 13k mW. In the next cycle, industry will again ask for 20k mW, and will get 5-8k mW. And that will be labeled another victory. At which point are they pyrrhic?

It is significant to note that massive “gifts” (i.e. investments) by philanthropists (i.e. capitalists protecting their power/privilege) are rarely if ever given in one lump sum. Rather, as in the case of Sierra Club/Bloomberg above, the “gift”/investment is staggered in installments over many years, thus ensuring that dependence on the funding source is created (if not established prior). This quickly translates into obedience and convenient cognitive dissonance on behalf of the recipient.

Off to the Next Campaign

When the KXL campaign is all said and done (it almost is), progressive greens will proclaim they’re mad as hell and they’re not going to take it anymore. They mayfly away to a retreat in the Netherlands in order to go through their crafted agenda as TckTckTck(GCCA)/Greenpeace (faux environmental leader Kumi Naidoo chairs both) did after the COP15 United Nations climate conference where they grossly undermined the most powerful positions put forward by leading states and the G77.

One should take note that, like many professional activists who move freely through the revolving doors of the non-profit industrial complex and corridors of empire, TckTckTck/Greenpeace chair, Naidoo is no exception. Of special interest to the Keystone XL analysis is Naidoo’s board position on the 350.org international advisory council. Further, Naidoo was an advisor to the chair of the Clinton Global Initiative [Source: May 26, 2007]. Recall that in 2007, the Clinton Global Initiative undertook an instrumental role in the development of 1Sky, now 350.org.

Naidoo’s high profile board and advisory positions and appointments with renowned institutes of empire include/included but are not limited to: Amnesty International (Soros-funded), the World Economic Forum, the United Nations UNDEF, UNIFEM, the Panel of Eminent Persons on UN Civil Society Relations (appointed by the UN Secretary General), international adviser for the CarnegieUK Trust, secretary general and CEO of CIVICUS (Ford-funded) and the SumOfUs Advisory Board. [Further reading: The Most Important COP Briefing That No One Ever Heard | Truth, Lies, Racism & Omnicide.] The agenda would look something as follows: 1) Discuss key points arising from evaluation of the KXL campaign 2) Power Analysis & Critical Pathway 3) Overall Strategic Framework 4) Draft 2013 Action Plan 5) Communications/Mobilization: Vision, objectives and options for next steps, and 6) The next campaign.

With certainty, the NGOs within the complex will abandon the Natives and the Earth’s most oppressed peoples in their centuries old fight for basic human rights. This will be especially true in the case of outright treaty violations involving the theft of Native land guaranteed by a contract, as well as the genocide brought about by poisoning Native drinking water. McKibben et al will internalize that such contradictions are not within their scope, nor their jurisdiction, nor their mission statements – when in fact it is these very violations that are the integral basis for the entire controversy.

TckTckTck is not the only organization “fighting against climate change” whose leading “activists” jet-set to retreats in order to “regroup” as demonstrated in the 350.org’s 2011 990 tax form that reported $53,000 in retreat expenses.

While pipelines are being built all around the entire planet, the US (and even international)media focuses on just this one as the single pipeline that will push us over the precipice – the infamous KXL (ultimately, only an extension of the newly built and already operational Keystone pipeline no less). With the Shut Down the Tar Sands campaign now essentially defunct, having been tossed to Polaris Institute on Feb 6, 2013 by Indigenous Environmental Network (who is now focused on ~~managing~~ pacifying the Idle No More ~~movement~~ campaign), we can expect that the remaining NGOs will be abandoning the KXL campaign in relatively short order.

The Polaris Tar Sands Watch is another NGO entangled within the massive non-profit industrial complex web. As an example, Anuradha Mittal serves on (to name a few) the board of Polaris Institute, International Forum on Globalization, World Future Council, Ben and Jerry’s (Ceres partner) and Natural Capital Institute which has, as of January 1st, 2011, been officially renamed WiserEarth! (Seeing that the illusory “green economy,” “climate wealth” and other terms of delusion are now exposed and frowned upon by many,including eco-footprint founder/scientist Bill Rees and Kevin Anderson, a name change was imperative.) In 2012, Wiser.org, in collaboration with Earth Day Network, “challenged” members and citizens around the world to make a pledge toward the “Billion Acts of Green” campaign. Key partners/supporters included TckTckTck, 350.org, Anonymous – Tides Foundation, Ford Foundation, and many more. Confused? That’s all right, you’re supposed to be. Don’t think. Just open up your mouth and say “ahhh….” Prepare yourself for the bitter taste of “green capitalism.”

A Scruffy Little Outfit Swimming in Money

Grassroots has never been so prestigious. Joining McKibben and Ms. Klein on the 350.org/1Sky board/US advisory councilare representatives of the Rockefeller Brother Fund.

Elizabeth Butler earns $93,144. as the 350.org campaign director. Yet this is somewhat a poverty level when one compares Butler’s salary with 350.org partner and Avaaz founder Ricken Patel, whose earnings in 2011, from Avaaz alone (not including consulting or other income), amounted to $183,264. Patriarchy is alive and well within the non-profit industrial complex. These fat salaries are typical, as well as incredibly illustrative. The NGO professional elite “99 percenters” most always receive high salaries when they’re in “leadership” positions.

Self-Destructive and Collective Deception

In the past, issues of critical importance were discussed at the dinner table, on living room floors, at the community school, at the town hall, etc. Today, comfortable citizens (taking solace in the fact they make an automatic payment of 25.00 per month to their favourite NGO brand) are under a gross misconception that NGOs such as Greenpeace and 350.org are actually representing civil society,as they claim. They are not. First and foremost, these self-appointed NGOs represent and protect the interests of their funders. 350.org and friends successfully take the issues away from the dinner table, where the issues need discussing, and instead, they make the issue about them. Then, after poisoning it, they’ll blame someone else for it. This is narcissism, which flourishes like a cancer within the complex. A complex built on a foundation of whiteness and aversive racism. It is ugly. Perhaps the late George Carlin summarizes the second half of this investigative report far better on stage than in typeface: “It’s a big club and you ain’t in it.”

And as an apt expression of how we have regressed from the first Earth day in 1970 to the most recent one in 2013, perhaps activist Jeff Weinberger sums it up best:

“Tomorrow being Earth Day, just want to wish you all a relaxing, thoughtful day peacefully focused on how we’re going to avoid ANNIHILATING EVERYTHING : ) …in other words, a calm day spent considering – amidst the other joy! – that aside from the obvious villains, the system creates smiley villains in green-face, floating about in the alphabet soup made in the non-profit industrial complex kitchen…this shit is BOILED for consumption…don’t be fooled because it tastes good at first…NGO’s are more toxic than fossil fuels and radiation…consider perspectives like this so we can have some hope of uniting to rip the ecocidal tendency out at the root, to affirm Life – Happy Earth Day!

[Cory Morningstar is an independent investigative journalist, writer and environmental activist, focusing on global ecological collapse and political analysis of the non-profit industrial complex. She resides in Canada. Her recent writings can be found on Wrong Kind of Green, The Art of Annihilation, Political Context, Counterpunch, Canadians for Action on Climate Change and Countercurrents. You can follow her on twitter: @elleprovocateur ]

Notes:

[1] “Many thanks, [from] Bill McKibben and May Boeve, 350.org; Michael Brune, Sierra Club; Naomi Klein, author; James Hansen, climate scientist; Tzeporah Berman, author; Jane Kleeb, BOLD Nebraska; Michael Kieschnick, Credo Mobile; Tom Goldtooth, Indigenous Environmental Network; Gus Speth, author and professor of law, Vermont Law School; Maura Cowley, Energy Action Coalition; Rebecca Tarbotton, Rainforest Action Network; Joe Uehlein, Labor Network for Sustainability; Mike Tidwell, Chesapeake Climate Action Network; Michael Mann, Penn State University Earth System Science Center; Stephen Kretzmann, Oil Change International; Brad Johnson, Forecast the Facts; Phil Radford, Greenpeace US; Erich Pica, Friends of the Earth; Cherri Foytlin, Bridge the Gulf Project; Tar Sands Blockade.” Source

[2] “Many thanks, [from] Michael Brune, Sierra Club; Naomi Klein, author; James Hansen, NASA; Tzeporah Berman, author; Jane Kleeb, BOLD Nebraska; Michael Kieschnick, Credo Mobile; Tom Goldtooth, Indigenous Environmental Network; Gus Speth, author and professor of law, Vermont Law School; Maura Cowley, Energy Action Coalition; Rebecca Tarbotton, Rainforest Action Network; Joe Uehlein, Labor Network for Sustainability; Mike Tidwell, Chesapeake Climate Action Network; Michael Mann, Penn State University Earth System Science Center; Bill McKibben and May Boeve, 350.org; Stephen Kretzmann, Oil Change International; Bridge the Gulf Project; Tar Sands Blockade.” Source

[3] This is especially appalling considering that globally, the wealthiest 8% emit 50% of all emissions and the 3 billion poorest people emit essentially nothing (Professor Stephen Pacala of Princeton University). Simply stated, the development of the desperately poor is not in conflict with solving the climate crisis. The wealthiest 15% emit 75% of all emissions and areresponsible for three-quarters of global emissions. The top 500 million people [7.5% of humanity] emit half the greenhouse emissions. The remaining 85% of humanity emit only 25% of all emissions. Theglobally wealthy must solve the crisis as there is absolutely no other way. The emission cuts necessary to prevent catastrophic climate change must be made by the wealthiest 7½%, because they are using almost all of the greenhouse gas-emitting fossil fuels. In contrast to this gross injustice (aka “The American Dream”) we have the “living well” concept by the Bolivian government. There is a growing movement in downshifting – citizens who reject consumerism outright, exchanging materialism for values. Millions are embracing a simple quality of life that builds and nourishes our character rather than eroding it.

[4] How can we argue that it makes sense to feed livestock – to then be eaten by people – instead of feeding people directly while we face a planetary climate emergency … during a global water crisis, while all the pollutants and environmental damage from this industry continue to be externalized onto the planet, people and all life? Why is the environmental movement (and especially the climate justice movement) not vocally opposing a system that does not make sense, in the same way as ethanol does not make sense? Especially given we are in a massive methane emergency … with escalating food crises … escalating food shortages … agriculture that will only continue to decline, not to mention a severe health crisis in North America (half of Americans will be diabetic or pre-diabetic by 2020; Type 2 diabetes is strongly associated with being seriously overweight or obese, and in the US the report estimates 68.3 percent of Americans were overweight or obese in 2008, with this figure rising each year) all while over 1 billion people are starving/dying, with no access to clean water.

Nov 09

2010

Wrong Kind of Green

David Suzuki Foundation, Greenpeace, Sierra Club

Enbridge Foundation Funding. Investigative Reports Keystone Pew Pipeline Tarsands

Secret Agreement in the Works Between ENGOs and Tar Sands Industry

Will environmentalists continue to allow foundation funding to dictate to the movement?

by Dru Oja Jay

A slew of recent articles have pointed to the likelihood that some foundation-funded environmental groups and the tar sands extraction industry are getting ready to make peace and sign a deal. The precedent, these reports note, has been set with the Canadian Boreal Forest Agreement and the Great Bear Rainforest Agreement. What the media coverage doesn’t mention is the actual character of these previous deals, and the unprecedented consolidation of funder influence in the hands of one man that is driving environmental groups toward such an agreement.

Things got started back in April, when a secret "fireside chat" was planned between oil industry executive and ENGO leaders including former Great Bear Rainforest Agreement negotiators Tzeporah Berman and Merran Smith, and representatives from Tides Canada, World Wildlife Fund, Pembina Institute and others. After word circulated about the "informal, beer in hand" discussions, the meeting was called off–temporarily.

The idea hit the corporate media in September 2010, with reports that Syncrude Chairman Marcel Coutu had solicited David Suzuki to broker an agreement between environmentalists and tar sands operators. Suzuki rebuffed him, saying that a dialogue was not possible while oil companies were funding lies about their environmental impact.

But the idea didn’t die–and neither did the lies. In October 2010, during a major ad campaign from the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers that compared tar sands tailings to yogurt, the Edmonton Journal and Calgary Herald published a report by Sheila Pratt entitled "Is an oilsands [sic] truce possible?"

In this report, Pratt chronicles the Syncrude executive Marcel Coutu’s efforts to woo David Suzuki into brokering an agreement between environmentalists and tar sands operators. Pratt interviews Avrim Lazar, CEO of the Forest Products Association of Canada (FPAC), the group of logging companies that signed an accord the with Greenpeace, the David Suzuki Foundation, and several other Environmental Non-Governmental Organizations (ENGOs). That was the "Canadian Boreal Forest Agreement" (CBFA).

(Pratt repeats the false claim that the agreement preserves 72 million hectares of forest. In fact, the CBFA maintains the current rate of logging, simply shifting a small portion (about the size of metro Toronto) to areas outside of the caribou range. Furthermore, it requires ENGOs to defend the logging companies that signed against criticism and help them market their products.)

Of all of Pratt’s interviewees, only Greenpeace’s Mike Hudema states the obvious: it not possible to green the tar sands.

On October 21, John Spears of the Toronto Star interviewed FPAC’s Avrim Lazar, who told Spears of the calls he was fielding from oil company executives curious about the logging companies’ experience finding common ground with environmental groups. Lazar said that an important precursor to an agreement is for both parties to recognize that tar sands operations have an environmental impact, but for environmentalists to "stop calling oil sands extraction ‘an abomination that has to be stopped’.

"Once you have those two, then you have something to talk about," Lazar was quoted as saying. "You can go to problem-solving mode… It doesn’t become easy, but it becomes possible."

Oil companies left no doubt about their interest in an agreement. What about their ENGO partners?

They waited until October 23rd to express interest. Ross McMillan, CEO of Tides Canada Foundation, wrote a letter to the Financial Post in response to a right wing attack on foundation funding for anti-tar sands work published on October 15.

"At Tides Canada we are working to bridge these two polarized camps," wrote McMillan, referring to environmentalists and oil companies. McMillan went on to cite Tides’ role in the 2001 Great Bear Rainforest Agreement, which dealt with a massive area of BC’s central coast. When that agreement was signed, ForestEthics negotiators emerged from secret negotiations with logging companies to announce that they had signed a deal for 20 per cent protection. That was less than half of what scientists said was the minimum area that would need to be preserved to avoid damaging biodiversity, and it violated protocol agreements they had signed with local ENGOs and First Nations. None of that mattered to the signatories, who proclaimed themselves victorious.

There are two key differences between agreements signed ten year ago, and those anticipated today.

First, deals have become even more transparently meaningless. Greenpeace and company literally declared that they had "saved the Boreal forest" by signing an agreement that actually makes no net change in the amount of logging. No CBFA signatory can say with a straight face that they have protected an area the size of Germany, though press releases on their site still make that claim. Even the Great Bear Rainforest Agreement completely preserved 20 per cent of the vast forest. Though some activists say that ENGOs subsequently turned a blind eye to clearcutting on Vancouver Island, negating even those gains.

Second, and most crucially, funders have consolidated control of funding for anti-tar sands campaigns to an unprecedented extent. Anyone who wants foundation funding (which most ENGOs rely on to a large extent) for their campaigns has to talk to Corporate Ethics founder Michael Marx. Marx and his coordinators set funding priorities through the "Tar Sands Coalition," a structure that, according to internal documents, is supposed to remain "invisible to the outside."

All of the money for the Tar Sands Coalition comes through Tides Canada Foundation. We know little about where it originates, though the bulk of it comes from US mega-foundations like the Pew Charitable Trusts, which outed itself as the architect of the CBFA after giving tens of millions to environmental groups doing Boreal forest work. Other big donors include the Rockefeller Brothers Fund, the Gordon & Betty Moore Foundation, William & Flora Hewlett Foundation, and the David & Lucile Packard Foundation.

Together, they have given at least $4.3 million to tar sands campaigns since 2000. Together, they hold vast power to decide the fate of those campaigns.

Control over the vast majority of ENGO funding for tar sands work is firmly in the hands of Michael Marx, on behalf of foundations with a taste for collaborative agreements. Journalists seem willing to print claims about "saving the Boreal forest" or "protecting an area the size of Germany" without seeing any actual agreement.

Our future hinges on the tar sands. Will any level of environmental destruction, loss of human life, or climate change be considered an acceptable cost to continue consumption of fossil fuels? Or is there a limit to the amount of destruction we will accept?

If a secret agreement is allowed to go forward, then those who cannot accept ever-escalating destruction will have to fight other ENGOs in addition to fighting the oil companies. Will the Tar Sands Greenwashing Accord continue as planned?

For more about ENGOs and the collaborative model, read the 2009 report Offsetting Resistance: The effects of foundation funding from the Great Bear Rainforest to the Athabasca River, by Macdonald Stainsby and Dru Oja Jay.

Archives

How Tides Canada Controls the Secret North American Tar Sands Coalition

Repeat This Aloud

Keystone XL: The Art of NGO Discourse – Part II

Manufacturing Discourse

YES LOGO | The McKibben-Klein Doctrine

Hypocrisy Knows No Bounds

Stock Markets and Media Tell the Story

Secret Agreement in the Works Between ENGOs and Tar Sands Industry

Secret Agreement in the Works Between ENGOs and Tar Sands Industry

Will environmentalists continue to allow foundation funding to dictate to the movement?

http://montreal.mediacoop.ca/story/secret-agreement-works-between-engos-and-tar-sands-industry/5089