With 41 votes against and 59 votes in favor, Sen. Mary Landrieu's effort fell one vote short of the 60 vote threshold needed to proceed. Sen. Elizabeth Warren announced the result of the roll call vote followed by the sound of loud chanting or singing from the gallery though it wasn't clear what it was supposed to communicate.
After the disturbance subsided, it was time to move on to other business, but first, McConnell was given a moment to speak. He said that the Keystone XL Pipeline approval will come to a vote again very early in the 114th session after it begins in January.
Landrieu sent out another blizzard of tweets to say middle class, job creation, shoulder to shoulder, fighting for my state.
To borrow a phrase from another Democratic woman who left us too soon, "Stick a fork in her, she's done."
Now, to be clear, there's no satisfaction in losing a Senate seat to the Republicans. Landrieu faces a steep uphill climb to beat Cassidy in the runoff. That's just Arithmetic.
It's not that I dislike Landrieu. Everywhere on the Gulf Coast from Corpus Christi to Louisiana, everybody who's anybody is in oil and gas, or so I've been told. There's no way to ignore it or escape it.
What I don't like are the lies. Louisiana is 2nd after Texas in oil refining. Heavy sour crude, similar in quality and characteristics to Canadian tar sands, is what they refine there. It comes to Louisiana by tanker from Venezuela which is currently the US's #3 foreign supplier of crude. Since Louisiana's refineries are outfitted to process heavy sour crude, they may prefer to buy from Canada and tar sands crude is available by rail.
With two sources of product available, Louisiana's refineries are already operating at capacity or close to it. A bigger supply of Canadian tar sands would probably push out the water-borne crude from Venezuela which could be a potential loser if the pipeline was built. Since the refineries are already running at capacity, it's a fib when Landrieu and her pals say the pipeline will bring jobs.
The Keystone XL cheerleaders insistently deny that Canada's product is destined for export. The one key fact to know is that American crude is prohibited from export by law. Canada's tar sands crude is eligible for export and there's a market for it in the European Union as North Sea production is exhausted and continues to decline.
Against this background that points to tar sands exports, there's an aggressive lobbying campaign in DC to lift the ban on the export of US crude. Currently, crude oil producers can apply for a waiver from the ban at the Department of Commerce, headed by Secretary Penny Pritzker. The approval is anything but a transparent process.
The ever-increasing crude oil production from fracking shale formations in Texas and North Dakota results in a glut of lease condensate, a by-product that's useful as a diluent for tar sands crude. The Department of Commerce already approved some applications to export lease condensate and it already goes to Canada to support tar sands production.
However, it seems that lobbyists are determined to export more than lease condensate and a law to repeal the ban on the export of US crude would allow the light sweet product recovered from shale to be exported, too.
If Lie #1 is Jobs, Lie #2 is Energy Security.
What would justify exporting US crude? The total refining capacity of the US is maxing out. Capacity is constrained by refineries that are outfitted for crude with specific qualities and characteristics. Production for sale to refineries is offset by reducing imports of crude with like qualities and characteristics. When the US discontinues all imports of light sweet crude, and refineries can't keep up with domestic production, where does the excess go? Overseas.