#Elxn42...Is It Just Oil Co. Spin We Should Worry About?

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ShillVille

Remember when a whole lot of folks, except, of course, the usual suspects, became concerned that Chevron wanted to get its shill-swill into our public schools?

And remember how some of the folks whose job it is to cover the usual suspects inferred that those who were concerned were hypocrites for being concerned?

Or some such thing.

Well.

It turns out that Big Oil Co's aren't the only ones attempting to hide their shovelling of swill into the public sphere.

Martin Lukacs, writing in the Guardian, has the FOI-assisted story:

Canada’s Conservative government spent several million dollars on a tar sands advocacy fund as its push to export the oil faltered, documents reveal.

In its 2013 budget, the government invested $30 million over two years on public relations advertising and domestic and international “outreach activities” to promote Alberta’s tar sands.

The outreach activities, which cost $4.5 million and were never publicly disclosed, included efforts to “advance energy literacy amongst BC First Nations communities.”...

{snippety doo-dah}

...According to the government documents, other outreach activities included research to support Canadian lobbying against a European environmental measure that would have hampered tar sands exports. Canada has succeeded in delaying the measure - the EU Fuel Quality Directive - several times.

The government also partnered with the International Energy Agency to “advance knowledge” about unconventional fuels like fracked shale gas, which several Canadian provinces have passed moratoriums against.

The documents were included in a July 2014 policy binder that was prepared for the incoming Natural Resources Canada Deputy Minister and revealed through a freedom of information (FOI) request...

{snippety doodle dandy}

...The documents indicate the government was funding dozens of projects between 2014 and 2015 to engage Indigenous communities and advance “Canada’s reputation as a global energy leader.”

Natural Resources Canada declined, however, to explain to the Guardian what these projects were...


Gosh.

Public money being used in an effort to promote private interests by bamboozling members of the public and the fine folks responsible won't tell us what, exactly, the nature of those public efforts were/are.

I think there is a name for that.

And I'm pretty sure it doesn't start with a 'd' and end with a 'y'.

.