Harper proposes North America climate deal

With Barack Obama’s election, newly re-elected Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper is suggesting a continential climate deal.

I won’t be cynical, nor even so harshly skeptical to say I smell a rat.

I will predict, without Harper yet revealing any details, that a sine qua non for him is some sort of “amnesty,” or “bracketing” or something else to take the carbon dioxide from Alberta’s oil sands “off budget.” And, he’s going to argue that this is only fair, since Canada experts so much of that oil to the U.S.

What that argument would actually do is highlight the glaring environmental weakness of NAFTA, as well as raise the issue of whether one country can impose a carbon tax on another country’s exports.

Until and unless Harper would agree to talk about that issue seriously, not just at the NAFTA level, but supporting such a dialogue a the WTO level, I’d advise Obama to say “no deal.”