Stephen Harper and the Conservatives have been harshly criticized for holding out for China and other major emitters to actually participate in any new climate change regime:

The Harper government will have to answer to Canadians in the next federal election over its controversial environment policy, which the Liberals and NDP say is obstructing international efforts to combat climate change.

In interviews yesterday with CanWest News Service, Liberal leader Stephane Dion and NDP leader Jack Layton predicted the government's position of pushing for binding emissions targets on all countries -- instead of just for a few leading industrialized nations such as Canada -- has left Prime Minister Stephen Harper vulnerable. Environment policy will likely be the key issue of the next federal campaign, which could come as early as February.

Canada is to press for binding emission targets for all major emitters, including industrialized developed nations and poorer, developing nations, such as India and China -- a stance that is strongly opposed by environmental groups and opposition parties.

China is the world's greatest emitter of greenhouse gases. But Stephane Dion and Jack Layton have joined with environmental groups in holding that China ought to be given the chance to reach some sort of parity with other major industrialized nations before throttling back on economic activity.

Well, not all environmentalists. Toby Heaps of Corporate Knights, a magazine for responsible business, blogging for the Toronto Star from Bali, says this:

Canada is saying no China, no climate deal: unless all major emitters accept binding targets Canada will not. Considering China is the largest emitter in the world (or soon to be, depending on whose stats you use) and we live in a globalized economy, this seems prudent from both an environmental and economic perspective. On the other hand, the environmental group pleas do not sound that sensible from an environmental or economic perspective. Their proposal is for rich countries to accept binding targets, while industrializing greenhouse gas powerhouses like China get what amounts to a free pass and scoop up the bulk of new business investment sensitive to carbon pricing along their greenhouse gas belching way.

Today, I finally figured why I was so conflicted, finding myself agreeing with the perennial Fossil of the Day, rather than the defenders of Mother Nature. Both parties are right in a way. Canada is right that if you don’t involve China, you don’t make much of a dent in emissions and you would economically hurt countries that try to make a dent. The environmentalists are right that asking fast-growing countries with hundreds of millions of people in poverty to accept the economic straitjacket of binding targets is like banning hockey in Canada—there is absolutely no chance.

Interestingly, Toby Heaps does not make mention of something he heard said by the Chinese delegate two days earlier:

"We were humiliated and our ancestors were bullied."
- China’s spontaneous outburst during morning plenary squabbles over whether technology transfer should be a separate agenda item or not. This discussion lasted for the better part of the day, as the icebergs slowly melt away. Later in the evening, the parties to the conference came around to China and the G-77’s view that technology transfer should be a separate agenda item.

So for many in the Chinese government tasked with defining China's position on climate change, the goal is not to stabilize global emissions, but payback for history standing in the way of...what? A global Chinese empire? The specific humiliations aside, for the Chinese, the Kyoto Protocol and other environmental treaties are just tools to humiliate and weaken the West.

And unlike emission goals defined by Kyoto, we don't know what the humiliation levels China wants to achieve.

Stephen Harper says Canada will not play this game. But Stephane Dion and Jack Layton think it's perfectly reasonable to wreck Canada's economy so that China can feel better, and emit without restriction.

Oh, and that it's reasonable that Canada transfer technologies and cold hard cash to reward China for doing nothing.

If it was found out that Stephane Dion and Jack Layton were actually on the take, accepting money from the Chinese government to advance China's agenda, I would actually feel better. Since I'm certain that they are not on the Chinese government payroll, it means that they really believe Canada ought to let the Chinese exact revenge and pollute with impunity.

That's sad.