It's almost like some of you really believe the evil oil sands are to blame for this fire.
Beetle killed trees did not have any impact whatsoever on the recent fire by Ft McMurray.
Look, Hurtin. It is very good that you are one of the people fighting fires, and we appreciate your technical info.
But you seem to be moving the goalposts here. Climate change is a global problem, but we can't say if the fires are a changing trend until we have more data? The oil sands are just one part of a big problem so they have no significance? Tree death didn't cause this specific fire (which I did not claim), so it presumably isn't also a big part of the threat to our forests? I mentioned it because it is a real and direct part of climate change which is contributing to our forests dying, and the major reason why not all fire is healthy renewal.
It is almost as bad as denying the whole if we can only mention it in the abstract, and not talk about how things in this case fit into that bigger whole, or not mention anything that doesn't have a direct connection to this fire.
At least when the floods were wrecking High River and Calgary no one freaked out when the completely valid point was raised that climate change contributes to more erratic weather, and that we can expect more of this.
As for this one, no I don't think it is "karma", as a former Lethbridge candidate stupidly said. Wild Rose may support big oil, but they didn't even exist a decade ago, and in fact criticized those cuts to firefighting budgets. And anyone who thinks denial is a problem specific to Alberta might want to consider that we all use that oil, and we can count our PM among those who are studiously looking the other way.