Editor:
Like father, like son, when Pierre Elliot Trudeau was prime minister he tried using the power of parliament and backed by the eastern power brokers to enforce an arbitrary price on a barrel of oil produced in Alberta on the province of Alberta. It was only after Premier Peter Laugheed informed Pierre Elliot Trudeau that he was going to referendum so that the people of Alberta could decide on the price of their resources. The world price of oil is what Alberta wanted. It was only then Pierre Elliot Trudeau backed down. If the referendum had been held and passed by the people of Alberta and every indication at that time said it would have been passed, which was due to Pierre Elliot Trudeau's attitude towards the west. Premier Laugheed could then have invoked the non withstanding clause as per the Canadian constitution and Alberta would have become a sovereign country and Pierre Elliot Trudeau would have been infamous for the demise of Canada as we knew it then.
Now his son, the Ottawa media prince is doing his best to fuddle duddle the west. First he let Obama know that the Enbridge pipeline would not be built under his watch. That was all Obama and his friend Warren Buffet were waiting for. Obama immediately vetoed the Keystone XL pipeline. The American oil industry does not want any Canadian oil to reach a saltwater port for export because they are receiving one million barrels of oil a day by pipeline to Oklahoma at a reduced price.
Now the media prince has stated that the Canadian Energy Board will be overhauled to include more guidelines for the pipeline industry. With this liberal government it will probably take divine intervention before any pipelines will be approved. All these delays to satisfy the leaf lickers and bark eaters who are financed by American oil barons such as Warren Buffet.
There is a potential of 35 billion dollars of projects and thousands of jobs created never mind the spinoff of industry plus the continuation of oil production in Alberta and B.C. and the media prince would not have to borrow any money because private industry would be financing the projects.
When Pierre Elliot Trudeau suspended all civil rights in Canada during the F.L.Q. [Front de libération du Québec] crisis he was asked how far he was willing to go, his glib answer was "watch me." The media prince is going down the same road. He has had so much wind pumped up his back side by the C.B.C. and other media that if you stuck a pin in him he would whistle all the way to the International Space Station without stopping.
Jobs created by the private sector are important and not a burden on the tax payer.
Garry Hemmerling
Burns Lake, B.C.