And when we "OD," it ain't gonna be pretty...

Obama will not stop it. The people who it will directly hurt are not rich and have little political influence. Obama will have to approve it to keep the Dems in the running in 2014 and 2016. Just face the political realities. I hate it, but it's going to happen. We should swallow hard and do what we can to make sure it's a safe as possible. Otherwise we do not do ourselves or the nation any favors by allowing this issue to usher in a total GOP Congress and White House.

fact included in the question.

it meant 34 jobs and the oil would go to China whilst our children ate the pollution, I'd guess the poll would be flipped!

...there'll be another brand-new shiny object to stare at.

I've met dolts who still believe Saddam at WMDs!

"Energy independence." But 85% of US oil in the middle east was and probably still is being sold to Germany and Japan.

We'll need thousands of people cleaning up that sludge every time there is a spill - and there will be spills probably on a regular basis.

Only a little bit of in this thought, more a since of futility, depression, and frustration.

You would think most people understand that.

The apartment building I lived in was built in about 4 months with a few hundred workers, it created 6 permanent jobs with the leasing office and maintenance.

That's the nature of construction projects, the workers work that project and then move on to the next one their employer (or themselves if they are contractors) line up.

The plus side is they are typically decent paying, a friend's dad has made a career and a fortune as a welder on pipeline and construction projects. He was making six figures working about 6 months out of the year, that's what gave me the idea to go to welding school.

Takes 35 yrs to count to a billion. No one should have more than one. It would mean the end of poverty and hunger if there were a billionaire's tax of 100% after the first billion.
Don't give the Koch bros places to spend their money to buy elections...make election tv ads and debates free...nothing to spend their money on.

Link please.

Eminent domain land 'buys' are impossible to oppose especially when that Corp has plenty of money for lawyers.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eminent_domain

It is public information and Googleable so I say Google it ...

If you make a claim, the burden is on you to provide a reference for it. Be polite to your readers and do some work. "Google it" is just plain rude. That's my motivation.

It's neighbor against neighbor in this fight and some want those dollars to leave the countryside or country and retire on.

Others don't believe in the science saying it's dangerous to farming life, or have given up on it. At least that was the reasons given by some of those who sold their land rights to fracking.

They consider those who have complained to be elitists and realistic to the 'way things are.' That is what some have argued with me, and they won't listen.

The fact that 47% of those surveyed believe it will cause damage, and still willing to sell out to them, indicates how bad off they are financially or how short sighted they are. Or believe there will be another place for them to live. So just fuck the place.

Others who are more level headed and still support it, believe they have the means to mitigate the damanges by technological methods and that those who are against it are hysterical luddites who don't know science.

The big money has convinced them that this is right and that Obama's figures of there only being two thousand pernanent jobs created, not worth the ris, is not true. After all, who ever listens to him in the media?

This decision has already been made and it will happen.
Welcome to poll driven politics.

Unless we only count what corporations want.

Look at how many Democratic politicians have turned away from actively supporting Obama care because they fear for their reelection prospects.

All of this is poll based.

I think they are cowards but it is what some are doing.

What the people of the "country wants" is not how politicians behave or what they vote for. Far from it.

Last edited Sat Mar 8, 2014, 01:16 PM - Edit history (1)

Do they have any clue where that oil would go and WHO makes all the profit?

Jesus, people are just unbelievably stupid.. actually LAZY, which MAKES them stupid.

It was back during the "Drill Baby Drill" nonsense.

"We need to drill more so we can get off foreign sources of oil!", He'd scream.

Then I explained to him that "we" don't get to keep it.

"We, the global oil corporations", get all the profits.

Most Americans have no idea how it works.

BUT, if one considers from where a majority of people get their news, it's not surprising at all. Even NPR is becoming a joke in that regard.

We may tend to think that Americans all come here to find out what's up.. Uh, uh. They don't. Just us.

Most of the people in this article are under the delusion that this oil is for US consumption!

Future pollution right through what we used to call the "breadbasket" of the country. Do people really believe that pump prices will go down? By the time the "trickle" trickles it would be long gone in the pockets of the oil barons. If they think there will be a huge demand for jobs it seems that rumor has done its' job. Land will be lost. Land will be ruined. Canada has such a great track record for safety and this "sludge" will really be a challenge to clean up. It is very depressing.

I can't take this poll seriously

where 47% said they think the pipeline will cause damage to the environment.

the Iraq War, offshore oil drilling in the Gulf of Mexico, deregulation of banks, oh and George W. Bush.

We all know how well those things turned out.

Americans = not the smartest folks ever.

some time to come I suspect

US ranks about 19th of these 80 countries with a avg of 98.....so a large section has a 2 digit IQ.


http://www.sq.4mg.com/NationIQ.htm

*I don't know anything about it, but on the face of it, it will provide many much-needed jobs.

If you want the planet to get off oil, that's a different fight. The fact is, that stuff is going to market one way or another, why not help the ailing US economy?

None of this oil is going to go to us. It's going overseas. All it's going to do is make a few rich assholes even richer at the expense of everybody else and our environment.

And actually no, weaning the planet off of oil is not a different fight. If we're ever going to get off of oil then oil companies are going to have to be FORCED (yes, I said FORCED) to find other methods of providing energy. And this pipeline is going to do the exact opposite of that.

Sorry, I'm going to have to go with the majority this time. Certainly some people stand to make a lot of money that will only end up in offshore accounts, but jobs will be created.

Good luck forcing those oil companies to provide other methods of providing energy. I'm sure you can accomplish a lot by making some signs calling them rich assholes and standing on a street corner somewhere.

At least I would be trying. Hell of a lot better than what you're doing.

Whoo fucking hoo. Too bad you're such a cheap sellout that you're willing top put millions of people in harm's way and possibly contaminate the drinking water for years to come for millions more for fifty jobs.

What an economic genius you are.

Would you rather people resorted to terrorism and property destruction to save their environment? Because if we keep sacrificing public health for short term corporate gain, eventually people will have no choice. We've already destroyed the Gulf, our climate, a good portion of the Pacific thanks to Fukushima, and God knows what else. My state of CA is currently experiencing the worst drought in a generation thanks to global warming.

So next time you want to prove just how out of touch and smug you really are by knocking people out doing to real work to save your life and that of your children, think about that. And be glad they have the courage to not only take a stand, but that they do it non-violently.

Sorry, but I pictured you doing that, because you seem the type. And no, I do not condone "terrorism and property destruction to save their environment" wtf are you crazy?

Yo, I'm not the unabomer.

It's just that you seem the type that talks down to those who protest non-violently, primarily because you just did. And yes, I've dealt with your type many times. If people protest non-violently then they are derided as being silly and childish and told they're well-meaning but naive and don't understand the real world. Like you know, how 50 jobs are apparently more important to you than safe drinking water for millions.

And then if they protest violently they're labeled as thugs and terrorists. Bottom line is they can't win with people like you. But they're the ones giving their time and in some cases their freedom for the rest of us. They deserve respect.

Of course, I was around twenty years old, then. Who knows, maybe we accomplished something? But Bush got his Gulf War anyway.

Oil companies aren't going anywhere anytime soon. We're going to have to ride this thing out.

My sympathies. Fortunately, there are those that haven't given up yet. I think I'll listen to them and their passion over you and your defeatism. Have a nice day.

This figure pretty much comes from many sources but it always comes down to fifty. Look at Ed Schultz website who has this info on it. I cite him as a source because he was originally in favor of it until he dug up the facts.

corporate media at its best in their endeavor for bullshit propaganda.

The poll is nonsense, of course. But it will server its purpose: give political cover when this is approved. "Of course I voted for it. Everyone wants it! Look at this poll!!11!" It's kind of like Cheney saying Iraq had WMD's because Judith Miller's story in the NYT provided independent verification (except that she got her "facts" from Cheney.)

If so, there's really some room for skepticism.

Only 47% thought it would pose a significant environmental risk? Really?

This to me, means these numbers are bogus.

....and see just how may we already have and how few major accidents make the news, the alternative of rail or truck might seem more dangerous to some.



And I don't think stopping the pipeline will stop the Canadians from fraking and selling it no matter how they have to ship it out.

Even if they are:

The pipeline may still be unacceptably dangerous.

Mining and using the tarsands is an environmental disaster. The pipeline is probably the cheapest was to transport the tarsands, so building the pipeline facilitates this environmental disaster. Tarsands mining isn't going to stop tomorrow, but it will stop sooner without the pipeline than with it.

to us. Let them refine it and transport it in their own country to their own seaports. We aren't going to get much of that oil so why should we accommodate them just to make a handful of our multi-millionaires even more wealthy?

In any event bitumen has been exported to the US for more than a century and refined in the US for more than forty.

Crude from the tar stands are already being refined there, it just arrives primarily by tanker.

The amount of Canadian sourced crude that is exported from the US is inconsequential and mostly goes through Long Beach.

Your map only proves we don't need an additional pipe line for our needs. You need it though to keep your landscape pristine and still enjoy the profits.

There is a severe lack of pipeline capacity between Canada and the US for crude oil.

I don't see how you perceive this is a NIMBY issue, there just isn't that much demand for refined products in Western Canada. The population is too small.

as a NIMBY issue. Your position comes from the right wing oil backed think tanks in this country, those global interests who stand to profit from this. As a resident of Canada you know the original plan was to do this in Canada and were stopped by Canadians who understood how damaging this would be crossing their lands and territory and the pollution refineries bring.

What was stopped by the Canadians?

The Northern Gateway pipeline was approved, a new CNRL refinery near Edmonton is under construction. TransCanada is building another pipeline called Energy East that will serve Eastern Canada.

Thanks for coming right out and saying it.

why they won't transport it to Vancouver or to the Canadian east coast?

Because the Canadians know what crap this sludge is, they know about
the oil spills and they don't want to ruin their pristine landscape.

Hey, but there are those saps to the south, whose politicians we can buy
or already own.

.....I assume the USA EPA will do a better job with the refining pollution then the Chinese so better done here if we are worried about worldwide pollution levels. That is assuming the Canadians will pump it anyway if keystone gets blocked.

Why should they ship it anywhere? They can refine this sludge themselves.
There are currently 12 companies operating refineries in Canada.

Why are you advocating for this pipeline? Do you have some vested intertest
in having the pipeline operational?

I just don't think with lots of money involved they will leave it in the ground. Saying I prefer a western country refine it isn't the same as advocating for any pipeline.

They can drill it themselves.
They can refine it themselves.
They can ship it themselves.

Why do they need a pipeline through our pristine countyside?

It's Pacific terminus is at Burnaby, about thirty miles north of the border.

The Northern Gateway pipeline will terminate at Kitimat which is near the tip of Alaska.

Sheesh...Americans got some serious stoopid.

Just wait for the first rupture...oh, but the impotent media wouldn't even mention it, so it won't matter.

just like they didn't mention the oil spill that shutdown 65 miles of the Mississippi River a couple of weeks ago.

None of the main stream media even mentioned it, I had to find it on thinkprogess.org.
http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2014/02/24/3321621/oil-spill-mississippi-river/

have succeeded in convincing Americans if they just let the pipeline through it will
- Cure cancer
- Save the world from sure destruction when the sun expands and envelops the earth
- Not increase greenhouse gases into the atmosphere
- Not break and pollute the waterways and aquifers
- Not consume billions and billions of gallons of water
- Generate enough jobs to reduce unemployment to zero
- Cause gasoline prices to fall to $.30 per gallon
- Never have any of the gasoline refined here and cause environmental disaster only to be shipped to other countries

And most importantly...it will bring on Armageddon!!!

With millions of dollars spent by big oil and people like the Koch brothers, the lie has been repeated enough for average people to accept it as true. Conservative think tanks like the Heartland Institute, Heritage Foundation, and opinion offices at the Wall Street Journal get plenty of compensation for spewing denial of climate science and the dangers of fossil fuels.

The best place for fossil fuels is in the ground. Mining bitumen out of tar sands is a double whammy because of the CO2 emissions from extracting it and then more CO2 emissions from consuming it. People who cannot see that using oil is not in their best interest are acting stupid.

I wonder how many of these dumb fuckers will put 2+2 together and realize they've been lied to all this time?

"Wadda ya mean, the Canadians are selling their oil to CHINA?!?! I thought all that oil was OURS cause we let them build that pipeline?!?!"

They hear what is fed to them through corporate media. Even if they don't listen to Fox News or talk radio, there is nothing on mainstream news to give the masses a negative view of the pipeline.

They probably think the oil will be used here in the US and that the jobs are permanent and that the billions of dollars made by the oil barrons will trickle down into the economy. If they really understood it, I doubt that number would be that high.

misinforming the people ,,,...oh wait!

Pollsters are experts at getting the results they want depending on what demography or geography they conduct the polls in.

"GROUPS – Partisan and ideological divisions are at play, with support for approving the pipeline peaking among Republicans at 82 percent, vs. 65 percent among independents and 51 percent of Democrats. Ideological patterns are similar, with support ranging from 75 percent of conservatives to 46 percent of liberals. Similarly, expectations that it would create jobs are higher among Republicans and conservatives, while Democrats and liberals are more likely to see significant environmental risks."

for Democrats in the midterms. It seems like a solid poll.

Maybe I should follow that up with a "duh, no shit."

Unless I've sidled up with a bunch of dummies here, and I don't think I have, I'd say we have a better informed group here that are taken a bit aback with the overall results. The media is guilty of malpractice.

and they're looking for anything

Is going to get the public green light. People can post all the rosy unemployment numbers they can generate, it still sucks out there for jobs right now.

basically it is a big BJ to the oil industry, aka the KOCHs.

http://www.politifact.com/punditfact/statements/2014/feb/10/van-jones/cnns-van-jones-says-keystone-pipeline-only-creates/

This is sad news but the fight is not over.

If Obama turns it down the people may not vote for him again.

to inform Americans.

I wonder how they plan to make this pipeline terrorist free? What a way to do in a country. Just blow up the pipeline, and the water and land is useless. We ARE doomed. But what pisses me off most, it's preventable.

can you believe any poll anymore...

How the FUCK is that the majority of Americans??? That's not even a representative sample of US voters, much less US citizen. What a bullshit poll!

of the national polls.
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/

And Gallup daily tracking polls go for 1000 (Adults).
http://www.gallup.com/poll/101872/how-does-gallup-polling-work.aspx

WaPo and ABC have plenty of experience doing polls and have a reasonable track record getting the mechanics done right.

There are no perfect polls - the closest are certified election results. But these numbers aren't way out there. You can complain about the numbers or you can work on changing minds.

I'm a liberal and I support the Keystone XL pipeline. It serves our immediate economoc needs as a nation and Obama should use it as leverage for other economic stimulus.

Would we Canadianssssssssssssssssss ever lie to you, our American friendsssssssssssssss???

Like the Post and ABC have misinformed or deceived the American public.
Significant number of jobs? That has been debunked over and over, but not by the M$M.

If it is about oil and any way related to crude oil, I would think the Koch Brother have a hand in it.

on the assumption that the pipeline would bring down the cost of gas at the pumps. A lot of people equate oil that is pumped out of North America as 'our oil'. As if the oil barons are going to sell it in the US as if we had some claim to this oil. Wake up people. BP already sells oil from Alaska to China.

Polling in the beginning was pretty high, and it began to wane. It looks like it's on the upswing again. Someone will need to really explain to the people what the downside is, and make it convincing.

I don't believe a goddamned word of it.

as the article states, people see it as part of a major economic boost based on an oil/gas boom that many are predicting for the US in the next several years. Of course long-term we are fucked, economically and environmentally, if our economy is based on petroleum.

by the time their children grow up.

... but the word "thinkers" is being pretty generous ...

Although they are creating one, just to make sure.

The amount of money these companies are getting from the fossil fuel industries for running their vile oil propaganda has to be in the billions of dollars. Skewing a poll on the XL pipeline is just "good business".

Bezos will do anything for a profit.

The new paradigm that is the prevailing thought pattern is different today because this survey used land lines. Plus the concept of any survey is based on technique rather than being objective especially in this political area. From my view rail is a better concept, the safety could be bumped up plus there is another advantage to rail could be all electric no fossil fuel. The jobs would be for a larger work force plus a new technology rather than some focused pipeline underground that needs to be excavated for service.

One of the most import spin offs of a rail project is mass transportation woven into the freight transport. Rails could be saver and best of all mass transportation should be developed not just to Canada to Alaska. Yes, rail baby rail for the best transport to Alaska to live visit study and hunt. Right from Texas to Anchorage Alaska, all electric no fossil fuel.

Or even more interesting in what has been coined the Pease Bridge through the Bering straits. Yes, to harness nature in a practical way across Siberia all the through Europe creating a new economic bond. Perhaps an economy the one percenters do not want, a real free flow of culture and technology with an economy that is supporting everyone all electric. Or image a train ride from the Argentina through the Americas through the Chinese India Russia the Europe Germany Spain Italy down through Africa all electric no fossil fuel.

We need think about this electric motor concept for space too because there is no filling stations on the way to mars. To develop this technology here on earth in a cooperative effort to be used in space is sure to be seen by the life force as an important evolution man can make in a peaceful way to exploration. Otherwise reset is for sure.

ABC is not on the side of the people.