The fight against the Keystone XL tar sands pipeline is starting to feel more like a bad horror movie everyday. Just when you think our heroes have struck a fateful blow, out comes a hand from the soil. "The zombie lives!"
This Thursday, President Obama will travel to Cushing, Oklahoma to give a press conference in a pipe yard owned by TransCanada, the company that has been trying (and failing) to build the Keystone XL pipeline for the last few years. The president is expected to trumpet his commitment to fast-track the southern leg of the Keystone XL pipeline and may even go so far as to endorse the entire project itself.
I'm not sure what campaign advisor convinced the Obama team that this press conference was a good idea, but they're way off the mark. Let's be realistic here: no matter what President Obama does, Big Oil and Republicans are going to continue to accuse him of being anti-oil development. Case in point, Obama's speech in Oklahoma is being protested by oil workers who, no doubt, will be chanting "Drill, Baby, Drill" even though the president has opened up more drilling than any of his predecessors. Try as he might, Obama just isn't going to get Big Oil to call off their dogs.
Instead, the Cushing speech will make President Obama look like exactly what his campaign accuses Romney of being: a flip-flopper, the etch-a-sketch politician who tilts whichever way the wind blows. Instead of letting him stand on principle, Obama's advisors are forcing him to walk a difficult tightrope. We've seen this circus before on health care, immigration, gay rights -- come to think of it, nearly every progressive issue near and dear to the coalition that came together to elect this president in 2008 (and the coalition he needs in 2012).
The press conference is especially disappointing because the president actually has plenty of accomplishments he could be celebrating. The historic fuel efficiency standards the administration has supported will do more to save consumers money at the pump than any drilling or pipelines ever could. The president's stimulus package was the largest investment in renewable energy in our nation's history. Just yesterday, I toured the National Renewable Energy Lab where federal dollars are funding research into thin-film solar technology and other breakthrough technologies.
Imagine the press event the president could have done if his advisors weren't convinced that more pandering to the Corporate Right would change his polling numbers. Instead of going to Cushing, President Obama could have gone to Nebraska and stood on stage with ranchers and landowners and talked about the need to stand up to a foreign oil company that's trying to build a leaky pipeline carrying dirty oil across America's heartland, putting our nation's land, water, and climate at risk. He could have rallied the country to stand up to Big Oil and support a clean energy economy that could put Americans back to work and help solve the climate crisis. And he could have continued his push against the $4 billion in subsidies that Big Oil receives every year.
After he leaves Cushing, the president will travel to Ohio State University, where he will quickly talk out of the clean energy side of his mouth and talk about supporting renewables and cutting subsidies. But instead of being met with cheers from environmentalists and students, the president will be met with protesters rallying against Keystone XL and fracking, another practice that the administration is tight-roping on. These protests will only continue as the election gets closer unless the president can convince these young people and advocates that he really does stand with them and not the fossil fuel industry.
So, in the ongoing epic summer-blockbuster type struggle against the fossil fuel industry, where do our heroes go from here? Last week, Bill McKibben laid out some next steps in a video that's been viewed by over 25,000 activists around the country:
Going forward, we need a multi-pronged approach. We'll keep up our strong opposition to Keystone XL, supporting efforts all along the pipeline route to block TransCanada from moving forward with the project. We'll also go on the offensive in two key ways, first, by pushing for an end to fossil fuel subsidies, and second, by taking on other iconic fossil fuel fights across the country. Throughout, we'll continue to remind people of the underlying goal that links all of these efforts: stopping the climate crisis. (This week, 350.org will be launching a new effort to connect the dots between extreme weather and global warming -- look for more info on that soon).
As Bill has said, "There are no permanent environmental victories." The fight against Keystone XL has helped galvanize a grassroots movement across the country. President Obama and Big Oil should be under no illusion that a couple of announcements about fast-tracking half the pipe are going to slow us down. If anything, setbacks like his help energize movements and make us stronger for the fights ahead.
The Keystone XL zombie may have risen again, but our heroes are regrouping all across the country. Stay tuned.
Follow Jamie Henn on Twitter: www.twitter.com/agent350
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Maybe "Justice" Roberts was right.
Money does = voice.
This move in OK threatens to keep me on the sidelines.
No yard sign plantings, no voter registration tables, no rallies for college voters.
At any level.
I was so encouraged when President Obama stood up to big oil and denied Keystone XL.
This half-measure walk back sickens me.
The hard decision - NO - was made and accepted. We do not need this effort now.
They act all shocked when our politicians have to compromise and play politics to win center.
The right assumes raping a woman and her womb wins the vote of center and the White House. The left assumes raping a jock in a locker room wins the vote of the left and the White House.
The reality is until you’ve been in the White House you don’t get the moderation of politics. We all must learn to concede points we call dear, the key is conceding our less coveted ideas of what we call dear.
There is no one who understands politics that doesn’t understand that we are all compromisers, flip floppers and what not. There is not surviving politics without a sense of shifting to center, when it is always shifting in a tug of war between right and left
Hope the fall doesn't hurt.
It’s the section that doesn’t need presidential or State Department approval since it does not cross an international boundary.
The part that does require State Department approval and a presidential blessing, and which holds as much as 24 billion barrels of oil, runs from the rich oil sands of Alberta, past the booming oil fields of the Bakken shale formation in North Dakota and down to Cushing. It is the portion Obama killed in January.
Obama’s base sees exactly what he’s up to, which is why they haven’t deserted him and nominated, say, Debbie Wasserman to replace him. And the Saudis are grateful too. Here’s hoping that the rest of America will grope through the protective fog thrown around this president by the media and see the same thing.
Since it looks like it's going to happen...... why don't we make sure they use pipe that will hold up to the corrosive tar sands and the extreme pressure needed to move the tar sludge so we don't have a dozen leaks per year like the existing line does?
Those of you that are upset with the President for being too centrist ........which GOP candidate are you going to vote for ??.......or are you just going to stay home and allow for an even bigger TPublican takeover?
Imagine if we didn't have to say this twice a day about every single issue....
A statistical analysis of 36 years of monthly, inflation-adjusted gasoline prices and U.S. domestic oil production by The Associated Press shows no statistical correlation between how much oil comes out of U.S. wells and the price at the pump.
U.S. oil production is back to the same level it was in March 2003, when gas cost $2.10 per gallon when adjusted for inflation. But that's not what prices are now.
That's because oil is a global commodity and U.S. production has only a tiny influence on supply.
- The world is using so much oil that non-OPEC countries cannot any more control the oil market.
Actually, the world is using 90 million barrels a day or 330 billion barrels per decade. That is 3 times more than in the 60s.
Non-OPEC countries are already burning through their reserves of conventional oil 6 times faster than OPEC countries.
In 2004, UK became a net oil importer.
In 2018, Mexico could stop exporting oil .
In 2025, Norway could stop exporting oil.
- At the same time, there are a lot of problems with unconventional oil.
There are currently more than 170 square kilometres of tailings ponds in Alberta’s oil sands regions, with 223 billion gallons of waste.
There are more and more earthquakes in areas where hydraulic fracturation is used.
In Texas, fracking a single Eagle Ford well requires as much as 13 million gallons of water.
There are predictions that we may well need to do something - by the end of the century. Surely, by anyone's definition this is not a crisis.
:-)
Obama's energy programs have actually been quite modest compared to the rest of the advanced world, including China. Much of this is due to resistance by Repubs and oil-state Dems, but as usual, instead of trying to educate the public on what is going on, Obama triangulates a position that serves the wants of fossil fuel corporations, with a few doggy snacks thrown in to keep his more gullible supporters on his side.