Where are we going? Why are we so eager to get there?

I really shouldn't open my email when I'm writing but like most of us, I am easily distracted, prone to procrastinate and I like reading things that are addressed only to me.

The article posted right after this entry just came into my inbox and I read it. Wish I hadn't.

Ten years ago I might have thought this was an interesting move. Twenty years ago I would have thought it was exactly the right thing to do. Now, I think it is a sign of everything wrong with the world and this continent and the country I live in more than anything else.

Are we really so incredibly stupid that we think we can call the world's water a national possession? Do we really think of this planet as a commodity and nothing else? Do we really believe we have the right to assign a monetary value to how people think about water? And do we think water won't flow where it flows? Do we think there will be no resistance to this? No retaliation? Are we ready to pay $10 for a grapefruit? Do we think Texas created its water problems by being so much more reckless than we are that they just squandered it?

These all sound like stupid questions to me. Of course we have to think about fresh water resources as part of the natural landmass that is north america. Of course we benefit from the milder climate to the south and we eat because of that climate. Literally. Of course we are idiots if we think we can cage a river or a spring as we would a dog or cat and expect it to kneel down to us. And of course the Americans are going to be upset when they read that Canada has decided they are bad people who drink too much water so we're going to make sure we don't give them any more to waste.

When climate change exacts its toll and California goes dry, where will we go for the fresh fruit and vegetables we eat all winter? Will we build greenhouses? At what cost?

And it's not as though we're any better at conserving the stuff than the Americans are. The tar sands require an expenditure of 2 - 4 gallons of fresh, drinkable water for every single gallon of crude produced. Some of the water is reclaimed, most ends up in tailings ponds. Call that a responsible use of water? Cause I sure as hell don't. (and that's just the direct water cost, that doesn't include the cost of trucking the stuff, building and supporting temporary settlements in the north, where it's winter almost all the time, the damage done to the native communities who live in the area, the fact that the people who actually own that land never get a penny of these profits because it is - as I have said a thousand times, all owned by the crown - and on and on and on.)

As far as water, carbon, asbestos and virtually every other environmental time bomb is concerned, Canada is the problem not the victim and I think it's time we started taking some responsibility for that and looking to work with our family to the south not against them.