Six in the Morning

Your morning dose of news comes to you today 100% swine-flu free.

1. MAYBE COLBERT IS TOO GOOD: A study from Ohio State University shows that many conservatives think Stephen Colbert is on the level. They think he's funny, sure, but tend to believe he is only pretending to be joking while genuinely meaning what he says. On the other hand, liberals, in general, get that the Colbert schtick is satire. (Huffington Post)

2. AN UNCIVIL BILL: When the Sask Party took power in 2007 and started firing civil servants they perceived as NDPers, few pointed out that severance package payouts could tally up to a hefty bill. Well, turns out they have. Saskatchewan taxpayers are on the hook for upwards of $10 million thanks to that bit of political nastiness. (Leader Post)

3. NORWAY TO BAN GAS CARS: Proving once again that anything worth doing (going to North America, making health care free, wearing pointy helmets) was done first and with a berserker rage by Vikings, the Norwegian government is considering a law to make gasoline-exclusive cars illegal by 2015. (Gas 2.0 blog)

4. LABOUR MARKS DAY OF MOURNING: People gathered outside city hall yesterday to honour those who've been injured or died while working. The International Day of Mourning is an annual event initiated by labour organizations 25 years ago. (Leader Post)

5. MASSIVE CHUNK OF ANTARTICA FALLS OFF: A piece of the Wilkins Ice Shelf the size of New York City has fallen off and become icebergs. This is in addition to 330 square kilometres of ice that broke up earlier this month. Global warming is the suspected culprit although some conservative pundits see in this a sign of God's displeasure with Arlen Spectre's treachery. (Globe and Mail)

6. LIBRARY BOARD ANNOUNCING PLANS FOR CENTRAL BRANCH: As I type, prairie dog editor Stephen Whitworth is at a press conference the Regina Public Library board is holding at which they will be announcing the firm they are retaining to refurbish/rebuild the central branch. More news as it becomes available. (Phone Call from Whitworth)

Murray Mandryk Today

There's a lively column by the L-P's political writer in today's paper. The topic: the Saskatchewan Party government's two-faced monkeyshines on the environmental file. For those who missed the news, last week the Saskatchewan Party said it was scrapping Saskatchewan's greenhouse gas reduction targets and harmonizing with federal targets--despite campaign promises to meet the NDP's 2020 targets. (Links to the Leader-Post)

Mandryk slams the government for saying one thing during the last election campaign, then doing another. Well, duh, there's a surprise. But this news isn't what matters. What matters is Mandryk's extremely entertaining prose.

Mandryk's outrage is a little bit misplaced (then again he's writing one column, not a comprehensive position paper, so cut him some slack, Whitworth). Anyone with a working brain now realizes that conservative politicians are the worst of a really bad bunch on environmental issues.* They don't understand/have contempt for science, they don't value conservation, they ruthlessley attack their critics and they consistently resist attempts to move their countries to sustainable energy systems like solar and wind power.

Bush was a monster. Harper is a monster. And anyone surprised by this just hasn't been paying attention.

It's also problematic that these issues fall under provincial jurisdiction rather than federal. Global warming is't a regional problem and the policy ought to come from the feds.

But I'm blahblahblahing here. Go read Mandryk's column, it's good and fun.


*Don't get me started on the federal Liberals, who should be jailed for their Kyoto failures.