Vote
with your wallet
The
10 Canadian CEOs who will be deciding the policies government will then duly implement
can be sent a message by the public: “Support the SPP and we won’t support
you.” Some suggestions: switch from Bell to another (preferably local Canadian)
phone company, then phone Bell and tell them why. Shop in Rona or Reno Depot,
not Home Depot. Buy Lindt or Cadbury’s rather than Ganong chocolates. Avoid
Sunaco gas stations. Buy wood not produced by Canfor lumber company. The other
companies: CN, Linamar Corporation, Manulife Financial, Power Corporation of Canada
(owns Power Financial Corporation, Gesca, PTIC, Great-West Lifeco Inc. and IGM
Financial Inc, Power Financial Corporation, The Great-West Life Assurance Company,
Great-West Life & Annuity Insurance Company, London Insurance Group, London
Life Insurance Company; Canada Life Financial Corporation, The Canada Life Assurance
Company.)
Continue
to spread the word.
This
message finishes with an article by Mike Nickerson
The Security
and Prosperity Partnership (SPP) - disaster or solution?
It
is a Question of Direction.
For
those of us opposing Deep North American Integration, the Canada, USA, Mexico
SPP negotiations, August 20 - 21, at the Chateau Montebello near Ottawa, are a
nightmare. Nevertheless, as long as Growth (the expansion of monetary activity)
is seen as society's primary goal, efforts to stop the SPP will be an uphill battle.
Mass production and economies of scale have long served expansion. The SPP would
accommodate both by providing uninhibited access to natural resources, labour
and markets for businesses with continental operations. The problem is that growth,
for growth's sake, is past its "best before date."
To reclaim
local governance with its hands-on appreciation of environmental and social impacts,
we have to challenge the legitimacy of perpetual economic expansion.
Climate
change, peak oil and all manner of other natural resource and pollution problems
are aggravated by ever expanding human activity. Like a child who has grown to
maturity, humanity now faces adult responsibilities. And now that we face planetary
limits, we can no longer disregard the natural laws of resource limitation and
tolerance to accumulating waste. Any species that fills its habitat and breaks
these laws is dealt with in the "court of natural selection."
While simple
mathematics clearly show that getting bigger makes resource and waste problems
worse, customs and institutions, from our historic and prehistoric past, encourage
and compel continued growth. For tens of thousands of years before we filled the
Earth, growth served us well. The SPP answers the familiar call -- to our peril.
To put
out a fire, one throws water at the source of the flames. To stop growth inducing
trade deals, we need to question the legitimacy upon which they are based. It
is a Question of Direction.
More
on shifting the focus of legitimacy can be found in "The Challenge and the
Goal" at:
Http://www.SustainWellBeing.net/challengeandgoal.html
Best
wishes as we work for a better world.
Mike
Nickerson
Author:
"Life, Money & Illusion; Living on Earth as if we want to stay"
http://www.SustainWellBeing.net/LMI/lmisummary.html
Air,
Water, Soil and Energy are essential to all life.
"To
call these things sacred is to say that they have a value beyond their usefulness
for human ends, that they themselves become the standards by which our acts, our
economics, our laws, and our purpose must be judged. No one has the right to appropriate
them or profit from them at the expense of others. Any government that fails to
protect them forfeits its legitimacy."
Starhawk;
from "The Fifth Sacred Thing."
============
More information
on the Security and Prosperity Partnership:
Green
Party of Canada
http://www.greenparty.ca/en/releases/16.08.2007
Council
of Canadians
http://www.canadians.org/integratethis/summit/forum.html
============
Sustainability
Project - 7th Generation Initiative
http://www.SustainWellBeing.net
