Barack Obama didn’t just do the right thing, he actually did the brave thing. [View all]

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from Democracy Now with Vt. Activist Bill McKibben: http://www.democracynow.org/2012/1/19/obama_rejects_keystone_xl_pipeline_under


AMY GOODMAN: Bill, when you heard the news yesterday that President Obama had rejected the pipeline outright, what was your response?

BILL McKIBBEN: Well, you know what? I had two responses. One, you know, I wrote the first book about global warming, I think 23 years ago now, and there have been precious few days in that two decades when scientists have been left smiling and Big Oil has been left scowling. This was a real victory for people standing up. If we hadn’t gone and done what we did out in the streets, if we hadn’t made record numbers of public comments on this, then the oil industry, as usual, would have gotten away with a really bad idea.

And the second thought, frankly, was about Barack Obama. Now, I’m no knee-jerk partisan, necessarily, of the President. I get arrested—I spent three days in jail for being arrested outside his house. But yesterday, in the face of just absolutely naked political threat—the American Petroleum Institute said last week, if the pipeline wasn’t approved, there would be, quote, "huge political consequences," and you know they have the money to make good on that threat. In the face of that kind of bald political threat, Barack Obama didn’t just do the right thing, he actually did the brave thing. The knock on him is that he’s been too conciliatory and eager to please all sides and things. Yesterday was pretty stunning.


read more and watch: http://www.democracynow.org/2012/1/19/obama_rejects_keystone_xl_pipeline_under



more from Vt. Activist Bill McKibben: http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2012/01/18/obama-s-denial-of-keystone-permit-was-a-welcome-win-against-big-oil.html


Obama’s Denial of Keystone Permit Was a Welcome Win Against Big Oil

Rejecting the transcontinental oil pipeline, the president turned the conventional wisdom on its head, but the real victors were the idealistic protestors.

I wrote the first book on global warming way back in 1989, so I know for a fact that there have been very few days in the last two decades when the scientists have been smiling and big oil scowling. When the president denied the permit for Keystone XL on Wednesday, he didn’t just turn the usual balance of power upside down, he turned the conventional wisdom more or less on its head—as late as October, a National Journal poll of 300 D.C. “energy insiders” showed 91 percent predicting that the pipeline would be approved.

The victory is of course a tribute to people who set aside their natural cynicism about the possibility of change and instead went to jail in record numbers, wrote public comments in record numbers, surrounded the White House shoulder to shoulder five deep. They managed to bring reality to the forefront for once, and that reality—the leaky pipeline, the oil destined for export, the carbon overload from the tar sands—managed to trump, for now, the bottomless pockets of the fossil fuel industry.

What was interesting yesterday was watching the reaction of the congressional leadership, who’d forced the issue by passing legislation mandating a speedy approval process. They’d set the president an essentially impossible task, since Transcanada Pipeline hadn’t even announced the route they wanted to take through Nebraska. But apparently they thought he’d blink anyway. After all, the head of the American Petroleum Institute had issued the most naked political threat imaginable: block the pipeline, he’d told the president in a speech last week, and there will be “huge political consequences.” And of course he has more than enough money to back up the threat.


read more: http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2012/01/18/obama-s-denial-of-keystone-permit-was-a-welcome-win-against-big-oil.html