Obama finally buckled under to the neocons/tea party/Republicans. If you haven't heard, he has promised to fast-track the Keystone CL pipeline through the U.S. to the gulf coast to carry tar from Alberta to the New Orleans area. The intellectually challenged have claimed that it will help the economy and bring down gasoline prices...
I've written about this in the past, but here is the real truth. The net benefit for America is zero.
1) Prime minister Harper returned from China last month with a signed contract selling them the entire output of the pipeline
2) This week, the Prime minister is in Japan arranging to purchase all of the steel for the pipeline from them.
3) Keystone is a Canadian company. All work on the pipeline will be done by Canadians. The only jobs for Americans MAY be a few hundred refinery workers to refine the tar into gasoline before some existing dock workers load it onto Chinese ships.
A few months ago, the president tried to add a codicil to the bill to build the pipeline through prime American farmland, which would force the majority of the oil from being sold overseas. The Republican House of Representatives blocked that because it wouldn't benefit the oil interests or the Wall Street speculators.
I defy anybody to show me where America will benefit from any of this. This has bee news in all of the major Canadian news programs and newspapers for close to a year, so it's no surprise here.
In the even of a spill or some terrorist operation blowing up a section of the pipeline, the Federal government has told the states that they will not be allowed to sue any of the companies for damages or cleanup. Not only will prime farmland be affected, but it will run over the Ogallala Aquifer, which supplies irrigation for eight states and drinking water for 30% of the people in those states.
recommend
Facebook
Twitter
bookmark 
print
Comments: 5
Some argument can be made that this is yet another small step to reduce our dependency on "foreign oil", which is usually meant to describe "middle east oil", as Canada is a much preferred trading partner to most middle east countries.
But if we really want to reduce our dependency on oil (foreign or domestic), we need to consider non petrochemical energy sources (wind, solar, nuclear, hydroelectric).