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Mischa Popoff

Bring back garbage!

By Mischa Popoff on May 18, 2012

Until someone proves that sorting trash into recyclables and compostables actually helps my family, my community, or society at large, I am no longer doing it. You heard right. I’m bringing back garbage!

Remember when it wasn’t an indictable offence to throw things away? Trash all went into a bin and the garbage man took it all away to the landfill. Why did this stop? Has anyone done a cost/benefit analysis on the various forms of recycling and composting we’re forced to adhere to?

 

Killing Kyoto… finally and painlessly

By Mischa Popoff on December 16, 2011

Prime Minister Harper had the guts to remove Canada from the Kyoto Accord almost the same way we got into it: with an order from his phone in the comfort of his office.
Never mind those big rooms down the hall full of elected representatives. Prime Minister Chrétien ratified the Kyoto Protocol at a brief ceremony in his office in 2002. He did not consult scientists, economists or anyone in his Cabinet, nor was David Anderson - Canada’s longest serving Environment Minister - consulted. Only Preston Manning and the Reform Party spoke out and were attacked as stooges for Big Oil.

 

Haiti and the scandal of The Global Fund

By Mischa Popoff on February 16, 2011

Your hard-earned tax dollars have been pouring into Haiti since the earthquake last year and things have only worsened. Here’s a thought... maybe money and aid aren’t the answer.It is now crystal clear that The Global Fund, although much ballyhooed, is totally corrupt. This is the high profile charity that pretends to fight AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria and which benefits from lucrative, high-profile support from the likes of U2 front-man Bono, Microsoft founder Bill Gates and France’s First Lady Carla Bruni-Sarkozy. The United States and Canada have pledged to give a whopping $10 billion to this fund for various third-world improvement projects, including Haiti. But if the fund can’t even keep its own affairs straight, we must demand that our politicians stop contributing to it immediately.

Message to environmentalists: ‘Humankind needs energy!’

By Mischa Popoff on July 22, 2010

Humankind needs energy; always has, always will. 

The emails from East Anglia University revealed that global-warming data were all fudged – plain and simple. This led to the collapse of a global-warming industry that had sprung up after the signing of the Kyoto Protocol. But die-hard environmentalists were never bothered by not having a leg to stand on. Not only do they still want us to quit driving our cars, they want us to quit taking flights.

Afghan detainees – the real issue

By Mischa Popoff on March 25, 2010

In politics there are issues you can bludgeon your enemies with, but every now and then an issue arises that through its repetition will turn against you because a deeper issue lies within it. What the Liberals and NDP fail to appreciate as they attack the Conservatives over the Afghan detainee issue is that at a visceral level Canadians just don’t care about Afghan detainees because they’re the enemy. There, I said it.

Harper prorogues Parliamentary backhanding

By Mischa Popoff on February 11, 2010

If Harper prorogued Parliament merely to avoid answering questions about Afghan detainees there might be a basis for the indignity the opposition feigns. But Harper had a quick look at the polls before he called G.G. Michel Jean and you can rest assured that the tale of a terrorist who claims to have been roughed up after our soldiers handed him to Afghan authorities is destined for obscurity...

Environmentalists still trying to kill the internal combustion engine

By Mischa Popoff on November 4, 2009

Remember when global-warming activists screamed for the electric car? They weren’t bothered that it could only go 100 miles, or that it could only carry kids and golf clubs, or kids and groceries, but never all three. This new breed of green believers was willing to lead the way by vastly inconveniencing themselves in the hope the rest of us, overwrought with guilt, would follow suit.

Lack of regulation you say?

By Mischa Popoff on October 1, 2009

Some claim the global financial crisis was caused by a lack of regulation. But it was overregulation and community activism that caused the American mortgage crisis which precipitated the global financial meltdown.
The American mortgage industry is overseen by Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae. They are roughly equivalent to our Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation, the big difference being that unlike CMHC they participate directly in the mortgage market. Now hold that thought…

Newspapers and the internet

By Mischa Popoff on August 6, 2009

My great-granddad bought the first radio in his neighbourhood back on the farm in Saskatchewan. Far from being a hayseed, he was literate and subscribed to many newspapers and magazines. He spent the equivalent of $10,000 in today’s money to own the best radio money could buy, about a quarter of the value of a new small tractor. It had a shortwave band on which he could listen to Radio Moscow in the evenings.
The neighbours said, “That’s it! The newspapers’ days are numbered.” Of course, they were wrong. Even when radios came down to the price of a wood stove, then later to the price of a good bottle of vodka, the radio never replaced the newspaper. And neither did TV when it made its way into every North American home.

No value in paper-based organics

By Mischa Popoff on August 6, 2009

I’m the first and only organic inspector to blow the whistle on  the organic industry. My story was first covered by The Western Producer and then picked up by the CBC, CTV, Maclean’s and Barron’s. I paid a high price for going public, but it was the right thing to do.
Now comes news about a study by the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine saying organic food is no more nutritious than regular food. The immediate response from top representatives of the organic industry has been that they never said organic food was more nutritious, only that it contains fewer harmful chemicals.

Will you get your money’s worth from “green” food?

By Mischa Popoff on July 2, 2009

There are three basic types of “green” farming. On June 30th, one of them will receive the golden stamp of approval from the federal government. Will this have a positive impact for farmers, consumers and the planet? Sadly, no...

Government’s not the solution to our problems; government is the problem (DATE DE PARUTION 19 MARS 200)

By Mischa Popoff on June 18, 2009

The late English historian A.J.P. Taylor elucidated in 1965 on the intrusion of the state into the private lives of its citizens.“ Until August 1914 a sensible, law-abiding Englishman could pass through life and hardly notice the existence of the state. All this was changed by the impact of the Great War. The state established a hold over its citizens which though relaxed in peace time, was never to be removed and which the Second World War was again to increase. The history of the English people and the English State merged for the first time.”

The Dziekanski Taser Tragedy: Baseless finger-pointing

By Mischa Popoff on May 28, 2009

A year and a half later and Robert Dziekanski’s calamitous death is still making headlines. There’s no such thing as too much coverage when someone dies tragically, but the notion being perpetuated that the officers who responded to Dziekanski’s still unexplained fit of violence are in any way to blame for his death must be laid to rest...

Obama and the art of double speak

By Mischa Popoff on May 6, 2009

How does B.H. Obama get away with it? He directed his campaign against George W. Bush, accusing him of taking the United States into an unjust war in Iraq, but now plans to launch a renewed effort in Afghanistan. I’m confused. Aren’t freedom, innocent people’s lives and democracy all worth protecting in both of those countries?

Government’s not the solution to our problems; government is the problem

By Mischa Popoff on March 19, 2009

“Until August 1914 a sensible, law-abiding Englishman could pass through life and hardly notice the existence of the state. All this was changed by the impact of the Great War. The state established a hold over its citizens which though relaxed in peace time, was never to be removed and which the Second World War was again to increase. The history of the English people and the English State merged for the first time.”