The Keystone XL Pipeline, Terrorism and Our National Security

Among the most salient arguments in defense of the Keystone Pipeline is the perception that the oil originating in Alberta Canada is from a safe and politically reliable source. This in sharp contrast to current U.S. imports of crude oil from the Venezuela of Chavez and the Saudi Arabia of Wahhabi indoctrination, as well as other suppliers from the OPEC cartel.

Canada, of course, is not an OPEC cartel member and the policies of the United States have been generally and positively aligned with those of its Canadian neighbor.

And yet something is astir that can only create concern and diminishes the rationale of the national security argumentation. It appears that the government of the Province of Alberta, the source of the oil to be transported through the Keystone pipeline (the Provincial Governments of Canada have far greater sway than the states in our federal union viz the French speaking Province of Quebec in context to the rest of the English speaking Canadian nation) has extended generous donations to Islamists with close connections to Hamas who are also promulgating the establishment of Sharia law. Organizations recipient of Alberta's largesse have in turn been linked to charities that had their status revoked by Ottawa for having funded terrorism.

Alberta, north of our most distant mountain states is far enough away that we know generally little about its governance. Are these recent grants an augury of Alberta's future course? Perhaps the question that needs be asked now is: are we helping to fund a future danger on our northern border, and will the revenues generated by the Keystone Pipeline help to create a condition deeply adversarial to our national security?