On the eve of the Copenhagen Climate Summit, CBC reports that a new poll says Canadians are more concerned about the economy than about the environment . This is no surprise. It would be a surprise if it were not so.

Canadians have been getting slim pickings in the headlines about the Copenhagen Summit and the huge global movement focussed upon and now moving toward Copenhagen. Most Canadians can't tell you the day that the Copenhagen Summit begins. Pssst. It begins next Monday — December 7.

The Canadian media has fed Canadians a diet full of headlines about the economy, with a minimum about the environment, the warming of our planet and the potential consequences of failing to reach agreement for radical emissions control in Copenhagen. There is little in Canadian news about the copious amount pre-Copenhagen activity on every continent and almost every country of our world.

Canadians have been dumbed down unless they have taken it upon themselves to find climate information or to follow-up on the morsels of environmental news provided by new media, that is, if they haven't been sidetracked by Rex Murphy and other non-scientists who blather and obfuscate so merrily.

On the other hand, news of the economy and profound pronouncements by pundits, politicians, bankers and other assorted whiz kids, is a daily ritual in the news and the headlines, even though the survival of life on the planet may well be hanging in the balance if we do not reign in our out of control carbon-based, toxin-spewing, unsustainably gluttonous ways of living.

Canadians are notoriously dumbed down and poorly informed by CBC, CTV, Global and the US media. The poll shows what's been in the headlines. Nothing more.

That doesn't mean that Copenhagen is not the most important event of this year, this decade or this century in the opinion of many people. Some think it is the most important meeting in human history since failure could lead irrevocably to the CO2 tipping point, the point at which climate change and all of its consequences cartwheels chaotically, wiping out species, ecosystems and maybe your descendants, not that far into the future. By the time the next Copenhagen-like climate summit occurs, we as a species may be behind in the game so far that we could never catch up.

The results of this poll illustrate of the lack of education of the populace. It tells of the failure of mainstream media to inform and to educate. It's what's in the headlines. Duh.