Kai Nagata, The Tyee & the Far-left's Ethical Oil Strawman

There was once a time when the left despised McCarthyism.

But as I consider the left's most recent anti-oilsands talking point -- raising the spectre of Chinese communism vis a vis Sinopec's interests in the Alberta oil sands -- it becomes impossible to believe that's still true.

It seems that the left actually loves McCarthyism -- when it's baselessly turned against their opponents.

In a recent YouTube video, produced by far-left propaganda rag The Tyee and uploaded to YouTube by none other than Kai Nagata -- who left a cushy job at CTV because it simply wasn't left-wing enough for him -- two Muppet-esque puppets, K Mart and Ezy E, rap about their dedication to the oilsands.

The video is actually everything you've come to expect from the far-left, a near-three minute mashup of ad hominem attacks on Ezra Levant and Kathryn Marshall. But it concludes with what is actually the most intellectually dishonest argument anti-oilsands argument the left has offered yet: that anyone supporting the oilsands and the Keystone XL pipeline have become handpuppets for Mao Zedong.

Ignore the obvious (that Zedong has been dead since 1976) and the even more obvious (that China is no longer actually a communist state in anything but name) and perhaps this seems like a devastating argument. But considering that the logical and factual shortcomings of the argument are so purely evident, and that individuals like Kagata continue to use it, and a simple, undeniable fact emerges:

These are people who just don't respect the intelligence of Canadians.

Even if China were a communist state, this would also a drastic about-face on the approach the left demanded be taken toward communist states since the 1960s, when the left insisted that the way to approach communist states was to engage with them, not attempt to isolate them. Isolating communist countries, they insisted, would only cause them to re-trench.

Not to mention a policy of isolation is just exceedingly poor geo-politics.

Simply put, China is not a country that will simply consent to being isolated, politically or economically. An inability to import oil from the oilsands won't reduce the Chinese economy's demand for oil one iota. Instead, China will seek to satisfy that demand by purchasing even more oil from places like Saudia Arabia, Iran, and the Sudan.

Whether Nagata and the rest of the far-left like this fact or not, that one's inescapable.

So it's a very simple question of whether these people think Chinese funds would be better spent purchasing the most ethical oil on the planet from Canada, or purchasing conflict oil from the Sudan, or oppression oil from Saudi Arabia or Iran.

Regardless of how they may try to squirm out of answering this question, it's predicated on an inescapable fact: China will import oil. Knowing that, it's a question of where they will import that oil from.

And where has their inability to answer this very simple question taken them? Into the dark realm of McCarthyism. One they used to hate, but now they indulge themselves in.

All the ad hominem attacks and McCarthyite strawmen in the world will not change this one inescapable fact, and it will not make this one inescapable question go away.

The Far-Left's Great Varmint Hunt Leads Right Back to Them

Ever since Hillary Clinton made a reference to Saul Alinsky -- on whom she had written a thesis during university -- many conservatives have taken to examining the conduct of the far-left through an Alinskyite lens.

Famously, one of Alinsky's missives for the left was to always accuse their opponents of what the left themselves are doing.

What else could be at the core of the far-left's great varmint hunt centering around the Ethical Oil institute?

It began when CBC's Evan Solomon countered questions being asked by Ethical Oil spokesperson Kathryn Marshall about where the anti-oilsands movement is getting its money from. More and more, it's getting its money from outside the country. Solomon's question was whether or not EEI has received any money from Enbridge.

Solomon seemed to overlook the detail that Enbridge is a Canadian company. And sensing that they have nothing on their hands that will resonate outside the far-left echo chamber, they've instead taken to hunting for evidence a vast right-wing conspiracy.

And in order to do that, they've dug further into Marshall's personal life. What they've come up with is a shocking revelation that Kathryn Marshall is married to Hamish Marshall, who is a member of the Conservative Party Federal Council.

The far-left is feigning the vapours over this, but it's not really all that shocking at all. Nor is it really what they portray it is.

The Conservative Party stands nearly alone as the sole supporter and defender of the Canadian jobs the oilsands provide. It's not at all shocking that someone married to a Conservative Party official would also support the oil sands, and work with an organization that shares that common goal.

But perhaps the reason why the far-left has become so focused on this is because they honestly believe that conservatives do the same things they do: create elaborate front groups for their partisan political machinations, and expect people to see them as politically independent.

Take, for example, their favourite "news outlet", Rabble.ca. The site is almost dementedly far-left, a place where nearly any marginal far-left agenda can vent its spleen for the whole world to read -- although in all likelihood, comparatively few do.

One of their contributors is none other than David Climenhaga, a man who once described the Sun News Network as "Conservative Pravda", which is amusing considering that he's a contributor to a "news outlet" that is pretty much... well, Pravda. Just Pravda. Yeah.

The punchline is that Rabble.ca was co-founded by a woman by the name of Kim Elliott. Who is Kim Elliott? Well, among other things, she's NDP MP Libby Davies' life partner.

Is this enough evidence to proclaim Rabble.ca a front group for the NDP? In the minds of the far-left, it is.

The remarkable thing about Rabble.ca is that it's done a remarkable job of pretending to be a media outlet. They've even placed their own correspondent on Parliament Hill. They describe his reporting as "just reporting, not just reporting".

In other words, their correspondent reports stories that reflect Rabble.ca's interpretation of justice, which so often turns out to be justice for them, no justice for anyone else.

By the way, Rabble.ca's Parliament Hill correspondent is Karl Nerenberg.

All of this begs a question of how precisely one identifies a political front group. Perhaps the mere relation of one member of a particular organization through marriage isn't enough to define a front group.

The better way to judge a front group is by how devoted they are to the partisan interests of the political party in question. And there is no doubt Rabble.ca is relentlessly devoted to the partisan interests of the NDP.

Which is why the federal press gallery should waste no time in expelling Karl Nerenberg from the press gallery as quickly as they can. After all, it's not like he's there to do any actual news reporting.

Swapping Apples & Oranges

CBC's Evan Solomon is the worst magician ever.

On a recent edition of Power and Politics, Solomon made a decision: to take the side of Sierra Club executive director John Bennett against Ethical Oil Institute spokesperson Kathryn Marshall. In doing so, he attempted a magic trick:

He would take an apple -- Marshall's reference to the generous foreign funding enjoyed by environmental groups attempting to block the Enbridge Northern Gateway pipeline -- make it disappear, and as with all good magic tricks, make it reappear.

There was just one problem: when Solomon made the apple reappear, it was an orange. But he and Bennett tried to pretend it was still an apple.

Solomon countered Marshall's comments about the foreign funding enjoyed by these environmental groups by asking if the Ethical Oil institute received any funding from Enbridge.

The unintentional punchline is that Enbridge is a Canadian company.

Oops.

Of course, the next trick in the far-left anti-oil sands arsenal is then to attempt to write off the Ethical Oil institute as corporate shills. See, in the eyes of the far-left, even Canadian corporations are inherently evil and villainous, no matter what. Even if they're Canadian.

So then they'll try to make the issue about that: a classic bait-and-switch tactic.

Naturally, it never occurs to them that Enbridge might be donating to the Ethical Oil institute because they share common values, and because the work of the Ethical Oil institute is already beneficial to them.

Heaven forbid corporations donate money to organizations that share their values.