Posted on 02/25/2015 6:39:26 AM PST by SeekAndFind
President Obama vetoed legislation approving Keystone XL this afternoon, creating the latest and most significant challenge for the proposed 1,179-mile pipeline.
“Through this bill, the United States Congress attempts to circumvent longstanding and proven processes for determining whether or not building and operating a cross-border pipeline serves the national interest,” the president wrote in his veto message. He added that “because this act of Congress conflicts with established executive procedures and cuts short thorough consideration of issues that could bear on our national interest — including our security, safety and environment — it has earned my veto.”
It’s hard to fathom how Congress could possibly “cut short” consideration and review of a project that has already been on hold for a staggering 2,349 days. During that time, the State Department conducted not one but five separate and comprehensive reviews, examining precisely the security, safety, and environmental concerns that Obama referenced this afternoon.
In fact, the State Department found, construction of the pipeline may actually improve security and safety by reducing train traffic, which has boomed on pace with the growth of the energy sector. Railway accidents can turn hazardous fast, as illustrated in myriad incidents, from last week’s fiery West Virginia oil-tanker derailment to Canada’s Lac-Mégantic disaster, which left 47 dead in 2013. Approval of the pipeline could reduce rail traffic, preventing as many as 48 injuries and six fatalities annually, the State Department projected.
Moreover, the State Department noted last year, TransCanada has prepared an extensive risk-mitigation plan addressing potential hazards both to Americans and to the environment. The Obama administration seems prepared to accept nothing short of an ironclad guarantee of unconditional safety.
The State Department has also thoroughly addressed environmental concerns, responding directly to green groups that raised them. It found that the pipeline would have a negligible effect on emissions levels.
Obama’s veto doesn’t keep Canadian oil and its accompanying emissions buried. In fact, Obama’s veto of the pipeline may be more carbon-intensive than construction would have been; as oil makes its way to the market by dirtier modes of transportation, emissions could actually grow, the State Department said.
The reality is that, contrary to what the president claims today, his own administration comprehensively reviewed Keystone XL and fastidiously scrutinized all possible security, safety, and environmental concerns — and found nothing alarming. But the State Department’s scientifically grounded conclusions apparently did not mesh with Obama’s political agenda. Today’s veto is the result.
Since it’s unlikely that Republicans will muster enough votes to override that veto, Obama’s decision all but ensures the United States will miss out on a shovel-ready $7 billion investment in American infrastructure. The veto also kills hope for the more than 42,000 jobs that would directly or indirectly result from the pipeline’s construction, as well as for $2 billion in wages, according to the Energy and Commerce Committee. Meanwhile, Obama’s supporters in organized labor will especially suffer from this lost opportunity.
This destructive veto harms America’s economy. By justifying it with blatantly flimsy excuses, the president adds insult to injury.
— Jillian Kay Melchior writes for National Review as a Thomas L. Rhodes Fellow for the Franklin Center. She is also a Senior Fellow at the Independent Women’s Forum.
Key here: Obama is never wrong. He won’t change his mind unless he sees both political and egotistical benefit. Neither is present here.
...just another tantrum by the little boy king
Da boy says it’s a violation of “protocol”. What the hell is ObamaCare? That’s the Mother of ALL Protocol Violations!
It would be funny if it weren't so pathetic.
Call your Senators and congresscitters now to vote for the override:
No sense complaining in the echo chamber—we need to make our voices heard—yes, even to Democrats.
I have made my calls—how about you?
Now Warren Buffett can still make money off of his trains.
Why does no one mention that Obummer’s pocket billionaire, Warren Buffett is making a ton of money moving oil by rail? With the pipeline he looses that cash cow.
Can’t touch that potential fundraiser.
Keystone is to be built wholly with private money, not like Solyndra and other government fund green energy fiascos. Those projects were known to be failures at the start yet Obama poured in millions of tax payer dollars. The only reason for the veto is pandering to the environmentalists, yet years of studies have dismissed environmental concerns. The emperor is simply displeased and no one displeases the emperor.
What a piece of shit!
Keystone is a part of north American energy security.
It is for both nations as the pipeline is a two way street. Canada has resources and will sell them / develop new trade avenues/ new means/ new clients and new investors.
It means a stronger more secure America & Canada and less dependency on the mid east.
But then again, he wants ALL our oil money to go to fund his mid eastern brethren, doesn’t he?
And he is the leader of the “free West”?
I’ll readily throw in with Netanyahu. He has a vision for the west. HE has a vision for modern man. To me? His vision is what that POS in the white hut needs to learn!
Obama’s position on a secure north America is lacking. He is not competent in attending to America’s business nor safety. This energy policy is just representative of everything he seeks to do, and that is to marginalize America. Rudy is right.
Cannot Congress override the veto, and more importantly, WILL they?
Tom Steyr controls too many Democrats via his huge donations.
I don’t think it will be overridden.
I wonder how much Buffett is paying Obama to keep all that oil in the tankers than are on the BNSF Railway that Buffett owns????
Obama and the Democrat Party continue their destruction of the middle class.
I don’t think Buffett bribes Obama directly, although he benefits from the rails instead of pipeline policy. Just my opinion.
Of course they can vote to override the veto but I doubt they will muster the votes to do so. Reid and Pelosi hold the Democrat's feet to the party line fire, Boehner and McConnell not so much.
The story got little more coverage than the introduction of a low level bill being introduced in Congress.
If one decided to have a battle of wits with Obama they would be dealing with an unarmed person.
The most ironic aspect of this stupidity (and one which will be ignored or minimized by the lackeys in the MSM branch of the Democrat party) is that this veto actually puts the environment at greater risk.
I know people in the energy business, and to an individual, they all assert that the oil will get here, it will just get here by rail, at least until the pipeline is built. And as recent experience has shown, rail transport of immense volumes of crude is not only wasteful from the standpoint of energy use, it’s also more dangerous, both to humans and to the natural environment.
Ideology trumps facts everyday!
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