Obama Faces Risks in Pipeline Decision

[MindMover]

President Obama faces a knotty decision in whether to approve the much-delayed Keystone oil pipeline: a choice between alienating environmental advocates who overwhelmingly supported his candidacy or causing a deep and perhaps lasting rift with Canada.

Canada, the United States’ most important trading partner and a close ally on Iran and Afghanistan, is counting on the pipeline to propel more growth in its oil patch, a vital engine for its economy. Its leaders have made it clear that an American rejection would be viewed as an unneighborly act and could bring retaliation.

Secretary of State John F. Kerry’s first meeting with a foreign leader was with Canada’s foreign minister, John Baird, on Feb. 8. They discussed the Keystone pipeline project, among other subjects, and Mr. Kerry promised a fair, transparent and prompt decision. He did not indicate what recommendation he would make to the president.

But this is also a decisive moment for the United States environmental movement, which backed Mr. Obama strongly in the last two elections. For groups like the Sierra Club, permitting a pipeline carrying more than 700,000 barrels a day of Canadian crude into the country would be viewed as a betrayal, and as a contradiction of the president’s promises in his second inaugural and State of the Union addresses to make controlling climate change a top priority for his second term.

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/18/business/energy-environment/obamas-keystone-pipeline-decision-risks-new-problems-either-way.html?partner=rss&emc=rss&smid=tw-nytimesworld&_r=0

[DonCoquixote]

1. Canadians, can you answer this

IF Obama blocked the keystone, would it make the rift with you? Has Harper changed things that much?

[Joe Shlabotnik]

5. Nope.

I'd estimate that less than 1/3 of Canadians are gung-ho about the Tar Sands, (probably closer to 25%), 1/3 are too uninformed or apathetic to have an opinion, and about 1/3 are strongly against rampant resource extraction.

[joshcryer]

6. As far as the special interests are concerned, it wouldn't do anything.

China will happily build their own pipeline to the west. And they would probably use their own Chinese labor and do it in half the time that we'd build Keystone (Canada might have OSHA style regulations but since the Chinese would oversee the whole thing with their own labor they can cook the books as they did in Libya and are doing in Venezuela when they're called in to do big projects).

[wtmusic]

8. Or not.

"Pipelines to the Canadian West Coast such as the proposed Enbridge and Kinder Morgan pipeline have been proposed but are not likely to move forward. CIBC, a major Canadian financial services firm, recently concluded that there is a less than 50 percent chance that the West Coast pipelines – proposed by Enbridge and Kinder Morgan – will be built. The pipelines are opposed by a significant majority of British Columbians, and aboriginal communities have refused to grant necessary easements for the one pipeline that has officially sought a permit, the Northern Gateway. "

http://switchboard.nrdc.org/blogs/ddroitsch/just_the_facts_climate_impacts_1.html

Seems a lot of people aren't buying the "they're going to build it somehow, somewhere, anyway" line. And a lot of people just don't want it.

[newfie11]

2. Canada will get over it if the pipeline is rejected

Our environment will not recover so quickly if that stuff spills.

[rhett o rick]

3. There is no question here. This pipeline is a disaster and if that upsets the Canadian government,

I am sorry.

[bluestateguy]

4. What risks?

He isn't running again. Was the 22nd Amendment suddenly repealed or something?

[joshcryer]

7. That's what I was thinking.

[wtmusic]

9. Republicans might engage in obstructionism

Oh yeah...nevermind.