Yet no crop could grow in the pitch-black surface exposed by the machine working 1,000ft below our helicopter. This is the edge of a fast-expanding open-cast mine in the Canadian tar sands, one of the world’s most polluting sources of oil.

It takes only a few minutes to fly across the 200 sq miles (520 sq km) of mines, processing plants and man-made lakes of toxic water. But Canada has so far extracted only 2 per cent of a resource that it hopes will turn it into a global energy superpower.

via It’s a Dirty Business — The New Gold Rush That Is Blackening Canada’s Name | CommonDreams.org.

You’re destroying your country. Instead you could be doing things a whole lot differently. You could be a leader and be chastising the Untied States, instead you’re going down a dark path.