Charities are helping the U.S. keep Canada over a barrel
Ross McMillan, the CEO of the controversial charity Tides Canada, will speak Wednesday at the Economic Club of Canada on accountability and transparency in the charity sector. Perhaps Mr. McMillan will explain why the U.S. Tides Foundation (Tides USA) founded Tides Canada.
Tides USA is a co-funder of the Rockefeller Brothers Tar Sands Campaign, whose first goal is to stop or limit pipelines and refinery expansions. But of all the hundreds of pipelines in North America, the only pipelines that the Rockefellers single out in their multi-million-dollar campaign are the Mackenzie pipeline and the Enbridge Northern Gateway — pipelines that would export Canadian energy.
The Rockefeller Brothers also seek to ban oil tanker traffic, but again, they only oppose oil tankers on the strategic coast of British Columbia and in the far north — those export-bound to Asia.
The Rockefeller Brothers Tar Sands Campaign involves the World Wildlife Fund, the Pembina Institute, Greenpeace, the Sierra Club, the Natural Resources Defense Council, the Indigenous Environmental Network and other environmental groups funded through Tides USA. The annual budget for this campaign against Canadian oil is $7-million.
These groups say they would stop pipelines and tanker traffic by “raising the negatives,” “raising the costs,” “slowing down and stopping infrastructure development” and “enrolling key decision-makers.”
In tax filings, Tides USA has reported to the U.S. Internal Revenue Service that Tides Canada and the Endswell Foundation are related. Indeed, for many years, all three organizations had Drummond Pike and Joel Solomon at the helm. Pike is the founder of Tides USA and was CEO for 34 years, until he stepped down in 2010. Pike has been on the board of Tides Canada since 2000 and is its “founding chair.” Joel Solomon is the former chair of Tides USA and is the vice-chair of Tides Canada. Pike and Solomon are also Endswell’s long-time chair and president, respectively.
During the 1990s, Endswell was the largest funder of environmental groups in B.C. Between 2003 and 2009, Endswell made grants for a total of $8.7-million. Of that, 99% went to Tides Canada, tax returns show. Given that the senior leadership at Tides Canada and Endswell is the same, these organizations are, in essence, two pockets in the same pair of pants and have been simply transferring money from one pocket to the other.
While I generally agree with much of Krause’s financial findings, some of her American conspiracy theories do not appear to be supported by the evidence. As I note here (http://sierra-rayne.blogspot.ca/2012/06/are-american-conspiracy-theories.html), it seems that the Rockefeller foundation Krause discusses in her article opposes Canada shipping its energy to the US as much as it opposes Canada shipping it to China.
Canada and the US need a closer relationship in terms of energy production.
Canada needs to ban foreign activist money.
I’ve long argued this position, but then Canadian’s need to accept that their own activist money (i.e., charitable work) for other countries should be banned as well. I’m all for that as well, but it’s hypocrisy for Canadians to want to ban foreign activist money in their own country while still continuing to support various international charities that are active in other nations (the United Nations is also an activist organization that would be banned under this reasoning – I’m all for that, too). Regardless, Canadians need to get a consistent message on this front, otherwise it sounds like activist NIMBYism.
I just have one thing to say. Yay Harper! Sic ‘cm!