Business
Corporate Canada betrayed capitalism. Now it has been betrayed
From the Fraser Institute
By Bruce Pardy
The original Battlestar Galactica, a campy space opera, debuted on network television in 1978. Canadian actor John Colicos played the traitor Baltar, who helps robot Cylons ambush human civilization. After humans have been almost wiped out, Baltar is hauled before the Cylons’ Imperious Leader. “What of our bargain?!” Baltar demands. “My colony was to be spared!” The Leader says he has altered the bargain. “How can you change one side of a bargain?!” Baltar spits, not getting it. “When there is no other side,” the robot tells him, “You have missed the entire point of the war. There can be no survivors.” “Surely,” Baltar stammers, finally understanding, “you don’t mean me.”
Corporate Canada should know the feeling. After years of colluding with climate hysteria and betraying capitalism, Canadian companies have been dumped at the curb.
On June 20, Bill C-59 received Royal Assent. It’s a hodgepodge bill of humdrum provisions, hundreds of pages long, related to last year’s spring federal budget and fall economic statement. But buried in the stack are two sections that prohibit “greenwashing.” Businesses cannot claim that their products or practices help to protect against climate change or provide other environmental benefits unless they can prove the claims are true. The provisions amend the Competition Act and make climate and other environmental claims subject to the same regulatory regime as false advertising.
Companies and industry associations have taken down climate pledges and environmental commitments from their websites and social media. “Ottawa’s ban on ‘greenwashing’ has already put a chill on climate disclosure targets,” objected Deborah Yedlin, president and CEO of the Calgary Chamber of Commerce, in a commentary for CTV. It will affect the entire economy, she wrote, add bureaucratic burden, halt investment, and weigh on Canada’s sagging productivity. Corporate Canada has lost its climate bargain.
Over the course of decades, Western countries, but nowhere more than Canada, have undergone a cultural revolution. Accelerating climate activism, aggressive social justice ideology and managerial government have changed the landscape. Business elites, instead of defending capitalism, competition, open markets, the rule of law and other values of Western civilization, decided to switch rather than fight. To protect their own prosperity and influence, corporate leaders learned to speak the language and adopt the norms of progressive collectivism. They became cheerleaders for the new regime. Many came to believe in it themselves.
Companies took on new roles. The social responsibility of business became not merely to increase its profits, as Milton Friedman famously insisted, but to serve as social welfare agencies. They were not just to obey the law and deliver products and services that people wanted to buy, but to pursue social and environmental causes. They would serve the interests not just of their shareholders but their “stakeholders,” as “Environmental, Social and Governance” (ESG) models demanded.
In their marketing and rhetoric, they embraced climate action, corporate social responsibility, social licence, “equity, diversity and inclusion” (EDI) and social justice. They promoted the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), which are a blueprint for socialist managerialism. The Business Council of Canada endorsed carbon pricing and Canada’s climate plans. Major oil companies promoted net zero and repeated the kinds of claims that governments themselves made: that climate action in Canada helps to prevent the climate from changing.
Such claims are patently false. Even if you believe in anthropogenic climate change, if your country doesn’t contribute much to the problem, cutting its contribution isn’t a solution. Bringing Canadian carbon emissions to zero would make no measurable difference to anything. Countries that together produce far and away most of the emissions on Earth have no intention of changing their paths. And who can blame them? If I were them, I would do the same.
Canada excels at climate boondoggles. Carbon taxes are just more money for government coffers that do not necessarily reduce emissions, if that actually mattered.
Wind and solar power, a lucrative source of government largesse that some businesses have adeptly saddled up to, don’t replace fossil fuels. Carbon capture and storage, perhaps the most pathetic pretend of them all, is a breathtakingly expensive symbolic gesture that cannot be applied at scale. The Paris accord and its net zero aspirations are climate fairy tales.
Canadian business leaders would never say any of this. That was the deal: pay homage to the climate gods, and you can be on the team. But now they can’t.
Progressive statism has never been about the climate, or transgenderism, or whatever the cause du jour. The target has always been Western values and principles. Free enterprise is anathema to its aspirations, and as it turns out, so is prosperity itself. Canadian companies have betrayed the economic principles of their own society. How does government change one side of a bargain? When there is no other side.
The Canadian business community still does not understand the point of the revolution. There can be no survivors. Surely, they sputter, you don’t mean us.
Author:
Energy Talking Points by Alex Epstein
Alex Epstein
This is the kind of integrity we need from industry—and from Congress.
Dear Chairman Smith and Chairman Crapo:
We, the undersigned American energy producers and investors, write to voice our principled support for full repeal of the Inflation Reduction Act’s (IRA) energy subsidies, including subsidies that would appear to be to our firms’ and industry’s benefit. This is the only moral and practical path forward if we are to truly unleash American energy.
In recent weeks, Congress has been embroiled in battles over which, if any, of the IRA energy subsidies to cut. Lobbyists representing every corner of the energy landscape, including trade groups that many of us are part of, are jockeying to preserve their own piece of the pie, claiming that it is uniquely valuable.
We have oil lobbyists fighting to keep carbon capture and hydrogen subsidies, solar and wind lobbyists fighting to keep solar and wind subsidies, biofuel lobbyists fighting to keep biofuel subsidies, and EV lobbyists fighting to keep EV subsidies.
If this continues, we will likely preserve most if not all of the subsidies, which, deep down, everyone knows are not good for America.
The fundamental truth about subsidies is very simple. For any product, including energy, a subsidy is just a way of taking money from more efficient producers—and from taxpayers—and giving it to less efficient producers. The result is always less efficient production and therefore higher costs or lower quality for Americans.
The most egregious example of subsidies’ destructiveness is the IRA’s solar and wind subsidies, which pay electric utilities to invest much more money in solar and wind than they otherwise would, and thus much less in coal and gas than they otherwise would. Ultimately this means higher electricity prices and certainly less electricity reliability for Americans.
The IRA subsidies’ devastating harm to American energy is more than enough to compel us, as energy producers, to oppose them.
But their harm goes far beyond energy, as they will dramatically increase our debt and ultimately undermine every aspect of our economy.
A central Congressional priority is to curb the national debt during the upcoming budget reconciliation exercise. But according to credible estimates, the IRA will cost over $1 trillion over the next decade and trillions more after that. Worse, the IRA subsidies are expected to misallocate, into uncompetitive business and jobs, $3 trillion of investment by 2032 and $11 trillion by 2050. That’s a disaster for our economy, and for real job opportunities.
Clearly, the right thing to do is to eliminate all these subsidies. When lobbyists say that these subsidies are essential for America, what they’re really saying is that their backers have made investments in projects that have no near term cost-effectiveness and that are totally dependent on indefinite subsidies to sustain themselves.
Most people know the truth, but are afraid to say it due to institutional pressures. Too many Congressmen are afraid of alienating trade groups. Too many trade groups are afraid of alienating their large and vocal members who have made investments hoping for indefinite subsidies. All the while, too few are talking about freedom.
That’s why we invite our colleagues to do the right thing: level with the American people, say that we made a mistake, and that those who built subsidy-dependent businesses took on the kind of risk that we do not want to reward.
Keeping the IRA subsidies—despite all the evidence that they benefit only special interests at the expense of America—risks making our nation ever more like Europe, where industries do not succeed by providing the best value to consumers, but by providing the best favors to politicians. That’s not the America we want to work in.
Sincerely,
Bud Brigham, Founder, Atlas Energy Services and Brigham Exploration
David Albin, Managing Partner, Spectra Holdings
Adam Anderson, CEO, Innovex International
Thurmon Andress, Chairman and CEO, Andress Oil
Don Bennett, Managing Partner, Bennett Ventures LP
Greg Bird, CEO and President, Jetta Operating Company
David de Roode, Partner, Lockton
Andy Eidson, CEO, Alpha Metallurgical Resources
Matt Gallagher, President and CEO, Greenlake Energy
Mike Howard, CEO, Howard Energy
Justin Thompson, CEO, Iron Senergy
Ed Kovalik, CEO, Prairie Operating Company
Thomas E. Knauff, Executive Chairman, EDP
Lance Langford, CEO, Langford Energy Partners
Mickey McKee, CEO, Kodiak Gas Services
Mike O’Shaughnessy, CEO, Lario Oil and Gas Company
D. Martin Phillips, Founder, EnCap Investments LP
Karl Pfluger, midstream executive
David Rees-Jones, President, Chief Energy
Rob Roosa, CEO, Brigham Royalties
Bobby Shackouls, Former CEO, Burlington Resources
Ross Stevens, Founder and CEO, Stone Ridge Holdings Group
Kyle Stallings, CEO, Desert Royalty Company
Justin Thompson, CEO, Iron Senergy
Mike Wallace, Partner, Wallace Family Partnership
Ladd Wilks, CEO, ProFrac
Denzil West, CEO, Admiral Permian Operating
Bill Zartler, Founder and CEO, Solaris Oilfield Infrastructure
Additional signatories (email [email protected] to add yours):
Jimmy Brock, Executive Chairman, Core Natural Resources
Ted Williams, President and CEO, Rockport Energy Solutions LLC
To make sure as many politicians as possible see this letter, help us by sharing on Twitter/X and tagging your Congressmen! Congress is currently undecided about what to do about the IRA subsidies, so now is the moment to make your voice heard.
“Energy Talking Points by Alex Epstein” is my free Substack newsletter designed to give as many people as possible
access to concise, powerful, well-referenced talking points on the latest energy, environmental,
and climate issues from a pro-human, pro-energy perspective.
Share Energy Talking Points by Alex Epstein
Business
Possible Criminal Charges for US Institute for Peace Officials who barricade office in effort to thwart DOGE
From the Daily Caller News Foundation
By
The Department of Justice is exploring potential criminal charges against former U.S. Institute of Peace (USIP) officials who attempted to block the Trump administration’s leadership changes at the federally funded think tank Monday, a senior DOJ official told the Daily Caller News Foundation.
The official, who requested anonymity, told the DCNF the DOJ is examining whether certain USIP actions — such as the removal and destruction of internal and external door locks — created illegal fire hazards. The official also flagged the widespread distribution of internal flyers instructing USIP staff not to cooperate with incoming Trump administration officials as potentially obstructive conduct. The DCNF was the first to report on USIP’s internal flyer campaign and destruction of door locks.
“Eleven board members were lawfully removed, and remaining board members appointed Kenneth Jackson acting president,” Anna Kelly, White House deputy press secretary, previously told the DCNF. “Rogue bureaucrats will not be allowed to hold agencies hostage. The Trump administration will enforce the President’s executive authority and ensure his agencies remain accountable to the American people.”
The inquiry — which remains in its early stages, the official emphasized — follows a contentious standoff Monday after former USIP leadership tried to block the installation of Kenneth Jackson, who President Donald Trump appointed as the institute’s new president on March 14. The Trump administration determined the institute had failed to comply with a Feb. 19 executive order requiring federally funded organizations like USIP to scale operations down to their bare statutory minimums, triggering a leadership shakeup the institute attempted to resist.
USIP leadership began preparing for a confrontation weeks before the executive order was issued. A Feb. 6 internal document exclusively obtained by the DCNF outlined plans to deny building access to outside officials and reasserted the institute’s discretion over security systems and facilities. Flyers with the names and photos of Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) officials were posted throughout the building, instructing staff to report their presence and avoid conversation.
After Jackson and other DOGE officials arrived on March 14 with law enforcement and a copy of Trump’s order, they were turned away by USIP’s legal counsel, sources previously told the DCNF. Over the following weekend, USIP leadership escalated its resistance — terminating its private security firm, disabling internet and phone systems and resorting to walkie-talkie communication inside the building.
DOGE officials returned Monday to find the building locked down and staff barricaded on the fifth floor. USIP officials called the Metropolitan Police Department (MPD), sources previously told the DCNF, who only later arrived at the request of the U.S. Attorney’s Office for D.C. after reports of obstruction by institute staff. MPD entered the fifth floor through emergency stairwells and removed former USIP President George Moose and other senior officials from the premises.
While a federal judge declined to issue a restraining order halting the leadership transition Wednesday, she sharply criticized DOGE’s cooperation with law enforcement, despite the circumstances surrounding USIP’s refusal to comply.
The DOJ official did not specify which individuals were under investigation or when a decision on charges might be made.
Where To Draw The Line: Is Carney’s Daughter Off-Limits to Media?
Poilieve introduces “Canada First Shovel-Ready Zones” pre-approved areas to build mines, data centres, pipelines, LNG plants and more
Al Gore Attempts To Keep The Sinking Climate Crisis Ship Afloat
Leading proponent of Alberta Independence predicts provincial referendum in 2025
-
Alberta2 days ago
Leading proponent of Alberta Independence predicts provincial referendum in 2025
-
Economy2 days agoLatest dire predictions about Carney’s emissions cap
-
Business1 day agoTrump Tariffs are not going away. Canada needs to adapt or face the consequences
-
Business1 day agoA Look at Canada’s Import Tariffs
-
2025 Federal Election1 day agoIt’s on! Federal Election called for April 28
-
COVID-191 day ago10 Shocking Stories the Media Buried This Week
-
Business8 hours ago
Possible Criminal Charges for US Institute for Peace Officials who barricade office in effort to thwart DOGE
-
Alberta6 hours agoFederal emissions plan will cost Albertans dearly