It’s whether he turns down the Keystone XL pipeline-
Exploiting the tar sands of Alberta is so bad that famous NASA climatologist James Hansen said that if they are fully exploited for their oil deposits, “it is essentially game over” for the planet. So will he make nice with the oil companies and the Republicans or keep the planet suitable for human life?
Obama’s big dirty oil test. The Keystone pipeline protests have galvanized the environmental community. Is the president listening? By Andrew Leonard. Salon Magazine.
Ralph Maughan
Dr. Ralph Maughan is professor emeritus of political science at Idaho State University. He was a Western Watersheds Project Board Member off and on for many years, and was also its President for several years. For a long time he produced Ralph Maughan's Wolf Report. He was a founder of the Greater Yellowstone Coalition. He and Jackie Johnson Maughan wrote three editions of "Hiking Idaho." He also wrote "Beyond the Tetons" and "Backpacking Wyoming's Teton and Washakie Wilderness." He created and is the administrator of The Wildlife News.
So far his grade on this test is an….F
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/27/business/energy-environment/us-state-department-to-allow-canadian-pipeline.html?hp
This is a good reason why we need a viable third party Green party candidate…Obama doesn’t have to give a damn about anything of relevance on this board ’cause who else are we going to vote for? Bachmann? Perry?? Palin???
Huntsman is the only one of the repubs giving the environment any decent lip service and he is mired so low in the polls he might as well be back in China.
Obama will back this pipeline ’cause it doesn’t hurt him a bit to do so, and it would hurt him (anti-business!!!) if he did oppose it.
Yahoo: “U.S. State Department in favor of pipeline”.
Scumbag Obama will OK this just like everything else he has done. He lied to us to get elected and is still lying everytime he opens his mouth. He owes his allegiance to Wall Street and AIPAC, not the voters who supported him.
Where there is a profit motive, there will be a way… The dirty little secret (actually HUGE secret) is that 40 percent of our imported oil comes from Canada. Much of that oil is from the tar sands. This environmental apocalypse is being financed every time we go to the pump. I’ve heard that this process is so energy intense that prices at the pump must be at least $3.50 to $4.00 to sustain profits for the petrol companies. The government has already made its position clear that it will not interfere with the profits of the oil companies. Price ceilings or lessening gas taxes are not in the works. This administration (as well as the last) refuses to go after royalties on the oil companies. I hate to agree with the Tea Baggers on anything, but we need to flush the crap out of DC and put in people who actually represent U.S. instead of the oil company profits. The beginning steps will always be to clean up our own backyards first. Get rid of the crooked politicos at home then move on to DC.
A lonely positive thing I can about Mr. Obama at this point: AT least he and his people are not censoring Mr. Hansen, a debacle which the W. Bush administration is infamous for, and which is thoroughly documented in the book “Censoring Science.”
I saw a bumper sticker with a photo of Bush on the left and one of Obama on the right. The caption read: “SAME SHIT, DIFFERENT PILE.” It seems to have summed up Obama and the “Hope and Change” he sold us in four words.
Word today is that this will be OK’ed by the Administration. Geez, quel suprise!
Based on the gazillions of motor vehicles on the road in suburban D.C. when I passed through there last fall on my from a week in N.C., I’d say we have already reached the tipping point for old Earth, the only planet we’ve got.
Obama is a Republican. I’ve never seen a supposed Democratic president lose his base so fast. He and his advisors have lived in a bubble for the past few years.