The Condor & The Eagle

It's a shame other ways can't be found to generate mass profits for businesses and people, the question being, why does oil and gas and mineral exploration generate so much cash, while so many other industries simply can't compare?

During the last Federal election campaign, Elizabeth May claimed there were hundreds if not thousands of decent green jobs waiting to be created, if I remember correctly, an idea stated by the Leap Manifesto as well I believe, I'd like to learn more about this potentiality if there are related books available, bustling economies are a wonderful thing, and if the potential for green economies is reasonable, why aren't politicians doing more to create them?

I'm not looking to replace the mineral resources sector with green economies until a genius comes along who can make dependable coffee makers out of fruits and vegetables, although reducing their environmental impacts is always a top priority, and I'm hoping that idea isn't as far-fetched as it sounds (hemp perhaps?), as we continue to find ways to combat global warming.

We're too heavily reliant on oil and metal to stop seeking new sources in the moment, and too many people's livelihoods depend on them to write them off without much forethought.

Oil's become much harder to extract, however, and vulnerable remote ecosystems are being heavily relied upon, with disastrous ecological effects, and none too comfy hard-edged working environments.

Far away from home.

And the remote locations are sometimes home to thousands of people who would rather not develop oil and gas resources.

If they say "no", it should mean "no".

Another location should be found.

But other locations aren't found and the issues interminably proliferate in the media, often reaching a dire conclusion, if objective fair play isn't judicially leveraged.

The Condor & The Eagle presents many activists fighting to save their lands on the combative frontlines.

Their stories are courageous and inspiring, as they fight back with neither time nor resources.

I've said it before, and others have too, how do you get a group of highly specialized academics or scientists to agree about anything, no matter how insignificant?, but even with all that compelling individuality, the vast majority of them firmly believe in climate change.

And have proof to back up their claims which so often fall on deaf ears.

You would think resource extraction would be more environmentally sound since they've had so much time to develop green methodologies, but nothing's as simple as these variable ideas relate.

If someone did find a way to mass market pure biotechnology, they'd probably be locked-up for life.

But it's clear that we need to transition away from oil and gas and likely should have started some time ago.

It goes without saying that it's dangerous to be so reliant on one energy source (so many "ages" came to an end).

We have the means to start transitioning.

Why don't oil and gas producers find a way to capitalize on them?

While decreasing highly dangerous and questionable expenditures?

The Muppets

And The Muppets takes us back to a more cheerful time during which humour didn't consist of making jokes about blood diamonds and friendship meant more than exchanging vitriolic insults ad infinitum. Within the spirit of the The Muppet Show is reincarnated and acclimatized to a 21st Century comedic aesthetic, and the two differing ethical approaches subtly duel before creating a productive popular counterpoint.

A musical synthesis.

The film starts out with an insufferable musical number that immediately challenged the ways in which I've been cynically indoctrinated by shows such as Family Guy over the years. "Is this movie going to be this incredibly cheesy?", thought I, as I appreciated the choreography and prepared for an internal struggle. But as it progresses and the distressed Muppets decide to get back together in order to perform once more and raise 10 million to save their dilapidated studio from a greedy oilperson (Chris Cooper as Tex Richman), their naïve hope and innocent determination took root deep down and energetically confronted years of psychological conditioning propagated by ruthless patriarchs (goodbye Berlusconi).

But writers Jason Segel and Nicholas Stoller, fully aware of their audience's manufactured predispositions, cut Kermit (Steve Whitmire) off when he begins to explain how different things were way back then, and have their characters kidnap Jack Black to host their comeback special, who sits tied to a chair throughout allegorically representing the psychological mechanizations of the 1990s and 2000s, his exchange with Fozzie (Eric Jacobson), priceless.

And to add to the seemingly hopeless situation environmentalists find themselves in these days, enough funds are not raised and the oilperson seems to have won and an attempt at transforming the filmic/televisual sphere seems to have failed.

But then that insufferable number from the film's opening act commences once more, only this time it isn't unbearable, it's entertaining and fun and cheerful and happy, and Tex Richman decides not to destroy the Muppet's studio, and everyone's getting along, and the Muppets are a hit, and they're singing, together, dancing and swinging, to the beat of their own communal drum, positive and revitalized.

Note the fortuitous relationship between this ending and the Keystone Pipeline Protests which caused the Obama Administration to delay making its decision. My gut's telling me that they delayed the decision hoping that when it comes time for reexamination, the protestors will not return and they'll be able to conduct their business as usual (the same strategy the powers that be used in Hamilton, Ontario, for decades, in order to construct the controversial Red Hill Valley Parkway). Hopefully a bit of The Muppets's spirit will remain in 2013, and the Keystone Pipeline agenda will once again unify environmentalists across North America.