Updates
March 26, 2012: Forbes' take on Obama's hypocritical visit to Cushing, OK.
It will be a strange and remarkable visit considering that Obama in January denied a permit for the northern section of the pipeline that would have crossed the Canadian border. The strangeness wasn’t lost of Harold Hamm, the chief executive of Continental Resources, Mitt Romney’s new energy advisor, and a first-rate oil tycoon, worth $11.5 billion by Forbes’ most recent reckoning.
“It’s so hypocritical and so ironic after everything he’s tried to do against the industry,” said Hamm in a phone interview with me today. “He’s trying to take credit for all the gains we’ve made against the backdrop of the biggest oil storage complex in the world.”
Take credit? Naw, the president couldn’t be taking credit for this stretch of the Keystone XL, could he? After all, he must know full well that TransCanada got approvals to build the southern stretch months ago, and that pipelines that stay within U.S. borders don’t need presidential approval anyway. Maybe someone forgot to tell Obama advisor David Axelrod. “This president has approved dozens of pipelines,” said Axelrod on CBS’s “Face the Nation.” “So he’s certainly not hostile to transporting oil but we have to do it in an appropriate way.”
Original Post
Link here. CNN reports, citing "a source familiar with the president's announcement," that Obama will announce in Cushing that his administration will put the southern section of Keystone on the fast-track to approval. "The permit process for a project like this can typically take a year or more. The source familiar with the president's announcement says the administration could shave several months off that timeline," says the network.Up until now, most of us were unaware that the federal government even got involved in approving in-state pipelines. So much for states' rights.
But, glad to see that the president supports the Keystone XL, albeit half of it, and the half that is not connected to Canada.
This reminds me of all the federal projects that build bridges to nowhere.
Of course the Emperor has to give his approval. In his own mind anyway.
ReplyDeleteOh thank you great one you are so kind and thoughtful.
One has to remember that except for a very small percentage, maybe 0.001 percent of the US population, has even heard of the Keystone (think "Jay Walking" on the Jay Leno late night show) and even a smaller percent even care. (Most folks can't even name the Vice President of the US.)
DeleteSo, if 99.999% have not heard of the Keystone, one could easily say that the President flip-flopped and has now decided to fast-track the Keystone. Ninety-nine and 999/1000ths of Americans would only hear that he has flip-flopped and now plans to fast track the Keystone. Wow. That's news.
And it's gonna take the talking heads on CNBC, MSNBC, etc., to explain it, that he really didn't fast-track the Keystone, but like the famous dog cartoon, this is what it's gonna sound like to 99.9999%:
"yada, yada, yada, fast-track the Keystone, yada, yada, yada, environmentalists upset, yada, yada, yada, yada, gasoline at $5 a gallon, yada, yada, yada."
So, we'll see how it plays in Peoria.