On Friday, the State Department launched a 45-day official public comment period on the Obama administration's latest sham review of the Keystone XL Pipeline.
The clock is now ticking on what will likely be our last chance to officially weigh in on the "game over for the climate" Obama Tar Sands pipeline, before the president makes his decision later this year.
We need a response that will make clear to the Obama administration that Americans oppose the Keystone XL pipeline. That's why we've set a goal of collecting 200,000 public comments against Keystone XL, the most public comments we've ever delivered during a single official comment period on an environmental issue.
The recently released Draft Supplemental Environmental Impact Statement that is the subject of these comments ignored the pipeline's significant risk for toxic spills, ignored its catastrophic impacts on our climate,1 and ignored the clear consensus among financial analysts and oil executives who agree Keystone XL will make the difference in tar sands development.2
This assessment was simply a vehicle for the White House to see if we would be silent in the face of its misguided and cynical reasoning: that we should let the bankers and the oil companies profit while the planet inevitably burns. That Canadian tar sands are going to get burned anyway, so while the government's chief climate scientist's assertion that Keystone XL will spell 'game over' for the climate may be true,3 it is is essentially irrelevant.
This is coward's logic. And we will not be silent in the face of it.
To be honest, it's not clear if any amount of pressure through official channels will be enough to get the administration to change course. After yet another fatally flawed review of Keystone XL, and perhaps more shockingly, the revelation last week that the State Department is once again farming out its analysis to oil industry contractors paid by the likes of TransCanada,4ExxonMobil and Koch Industries5, our faith in the Obama administration to listen to either science or the public is diminishing.
That's why we have escalated our tactics by launching the Pledge of Resistance to Keystone XL where more than 51,000 people have already committed to engage in civil disobedience if President Obama takes the next step toward approval of Keystone XL.
But we have to do everything in our power to stop this thing. And that means going as big as we can during this official comment period, to convince President Obama to reject Keystone XL; so we do not need to escalate our tactics against it, and so we have a better shot at preserving a livable planet. Please submit a public comment urging President Obama to reject Keystone XL, and ask your friends to do the same:
http://act.credoaction.com/r/?
Thanks for fighting Keystone XL.
Elijah Zarlin, Campaign Manager
CREDO Action from Working Assets
1. "Another flawed environmental review on the Keystone XL tar sands pipeline," NRDC, 3/1/13
2. "Keystone Pipeline Decision May Influence Oil-Sands Development," Bloomberg,3/7/13 3. "Game over for the climate," James Hansen, New York Times, 5/9/12 4. "'State Department' Keystone XL Report Actually Written By TransCanada Contractor ," Grist, 3/6/13 5. "Critical Part of Keystone Report Done by Firms with Deep Oil Industry Ties," Inside Climate, 3/6/13 |
BUCKNACKT'S SORDID TAWDRY BLOG We should not be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in an attractive & well preserved body, but rather to skid in sideways, chocolate, bier or wein in hand, body thoroughly used up, totally worn out and screaming "WHOO-HOO, WHAT A RIDE!!!!!!"
Showing posts with label Jim Hansen. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Jim Hansen. Show all posts
14 March 2013
45 days to tell Pres. Obama to reject Keystone XL 14MAR13
CREDO has launched a petition drive telling the American government to reject the keystone xl pipeline. Though Pres Obama pledged, during his campaign last year, as well as in his inaugural and State of the Union speeches, to address climate change and global warming and to listen to science on these issues it seems that a weekend of golf in Florida with a couple very rich oil industry executives from Texas has changed his mind. That doesn't mean the fight is over. PLEASE sign the petition, click the link, and then share with family, friends and coworkers. IF you belong to Organizing For Action e mail this to support@barackobama.com . Go to 350.org for more on the fight against keystone xl and see the links at the bottom of this post.
25 August 2011
Keystone XL Oil Pipeline Arrests Mount As Climate Activists Push Obama 23AUG11
Update on the nonviolent civil disobedience at the White House against the keystone xl pipeline from HuffPost.....
WASHINGTON -- Waving signs and chanting "Yes we can," scores of protesters were arrested outside the White House Monday as they called on the Obama administration to block approval of TransCanada's Keystone XL oil pipeline.
As of Monday night, 162 people had been arrested, detained and released. Organizers say more than 2,000 volunteers have signed up to participate in the sit-ins in shifts, which began over the weekend and are slated to run through Sep. 3. Dozens more are expected to be arrested Tuesday.
Frustrated by the president’s inability to get comprehensive energy and climate legislation through Congress, climate activists are pressuring Obama to take action on the proposed $7 billion pipeline project by refusing to sign-off on a permit for its construction.
If approved, the Keystone XL pipeline would pump 700,000 barrels of heavy crude per day from Canada's tar sands to refineries along the U.S. Gulf Coast. For perspective: Obama recently released 30 million barrels of oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve over a 30-day period.
Advocates of the pipeline say its construction will create jobs, while critics cite concerns over greenhouse gas emissions, as well as a history of leaks at an existing TransCanada oil pipeline known as Keystone 1.
The White House has emphasized that the decision to issue the permit rests with the State Department, which is expected to complete its review of the pipeline by the end of the year.
"The State Department is assessing the project on behalf of the federal government," said White House spokesman Clark Stevens. "That process is ongoing, including receiving important input from the public and stakeholders."
But author and environmentalist Bill McKibben said activists are holding Obama -- not Secretary of State Hillary Clinton -- accountable.
McKibben said protesters "spent a lot of time talking about how one of the last times many of us had been sleeping on the floor was when we'd been out campaigning for Obama and how much we hoped that he would do something to remind us why we were so enthusiastic." McKibben spent two nights in jail after being arrested for civil disobedience on Saturday. "This time [Obama] has a clear shot to do it; we'll see."
The jail time came as a surprise to McKibben and others who expected to be fined $100, not detained for two nights in a cell.
Another protester released Monday was former Army Lt. Daniel Choi, who was previously detained after protesting the U.S. military's "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy.
"It's a small price to pay now rather than a larger consequence in the future," Choi told HuffPost. "We're fighting just as we did with 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell.'"
With Obama on vacation and the media focused on developments in Libya, some fear the demonstrations won't command much national attention. But McKibben insists the message will be heard.
"The people who've carried this fight for three years are indigenous people on both sides of the border who have a huge stake in it because it's on their land, and farmers and ranchers from places like Nebraska," he said. He called some of the protesters "Johnny-come-latelys," adding, "It wasn’t until I sat down and read Jim Hansen’s analysis of how much carbon was in those things that I understood that this was not just a national issue, it's a global issue of the first order."
WASHINGTON -- Waving signs and chanting "Yes we can," scores of protesters were arrested outside the White House Monday as they called on the Obama administration to block approval of TransCanada's Keystone XL oil pipeline.
As of Monday night, 162 people had been arrested, detained and released. Organizers say more than 2,000 volunteers have signed up to participate in the sit-ins in shifts, which began over the weekend and are slated to run through Sep. 3. Dozens more are expected to be arrested Tuesday.
Frustrated by the president’s inability to get comprehensive energy and climate legislation through Congress, climate activists are pressuring Obama to take action on the proposed $7 billion pipeline project by refusing to sign-off on a permit for its construction.
If approved, the Keystone XL pipeline would pump 700,000 barrels of heavy crude per day from Canada's tar sands to refineries along the U.S. Gulf Coast. For perspective: Obama recently released 30 million barrels of oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve over a 30-day period.
Advocates of the pipeline say its construction will create jobs, while critics cite concerns over greenhouse gas emissions, as well as a history of leaks at an existing TransCanada oil pipeline known as Keystone 1.
The White House has emphasized that the decision to issue the permit rests with the State Department, which is expected to complete its review of the pipeline by the end of the year.
"The State Department is assessing the project on behalf of the federal government," said White House spokesman Clark Stevens. "That process is ongoing, including receiving important input from the public and stakeholders."
But author and environmentalist Bill McKibben said activists are holding Obama -- not Secretary of State Hillary Clinton -- accountable.
McKibben said protesters "spent a lot of time talking about how one of the last times many of us had been sleeping on the floor was when we'd been out campaigning for Obama and how much we hoped that he would do something to remind us why we were so enthusiastic." McKibben spent two nights in jail after being arrested for civil disobedience on Saturday. "This time [Obama] has a clear shot to do it; we'll see."
The jail time came as a surprise to McKibben and others who expected to be fined $100, not detained for two nights in a cell.
Another protester released Monday was former Army Lt. Daniel Choi, who was previously detained after protesting the U.S. military's "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy.
"It's a small price to pay now rather than a larger consequence in the future," Choi told HuffPost. "We're fighting just as we did with 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell.'"
With Obama on vacation and the media focused on developments in Libya, some fear the demonstrations won't command much national attention. But McKibben insists the message will be heard.
"The people who've carried this fight for three years are indigenous people on both sides of the border who have a huge stake in it because it's on their land, and farmers and ranchers from places like Nebraska," he said. He called some of the protesters "Johnny-come-latelys," adding, "It wasn’t until I sat down and read Jim Hansen’s analysis of how much carbon was in those things that I understood that this was not just a national issue, it's a global issue of the first order."
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