Russ Girling, TransCanada CEO, the company building the Keystone Pipeline, was on ABC's This Week this morning and Martha Raddatz actually ventured into the territory of real journalism--mostly. She pressed him on the issues articulated in Obama's statement that the Canadian oil would be offloaded in New Orleans and sent elsewhere, having no effect of the price of gas in the U.S.
“Understand what this project is,” President Barack Obama said Friday.
“It is providing the ability of Canada to pump their oil, send it through our land, down to the Gulf where it will be sent everywhere else. It doesn’t have an impact on U.S. gas prices.”
Citing the State Department's "thousands and thousands of pages" on the subject, Girling maintained that 100 per cent of the oil transported by Keystone would be "used in the Gulf Coast." He then adds "that 100% of our shippers continue to say that the oil will come out of Canada and be delivered to the Gulf Coast . . . "
Now this would have been a perfect time for Raddatz to ask the obvious question, "where in the Gulf Coast will it be used?--Louisiana, Florida, Belize, Mexico, Venezuela?" Here Raddatz, teetered on the precipice of a true journalistic moment which could have provided her audience with some valuable information straight from the source, instead she let this one get away and allowed him to move on and claim that the project would create 9,000 jobs in the U.S.
Raddatz redeems herself, however, and cuts him off to ask this:
"There are others who say that jobs will not be so great, going as low as 4,000 jobs and that the jobs will only be here for a couple of years; the State Department--you mentioned the State Department--says that once the proposed project enters service operations would require approximately fifty total employees in the U.S."
Girling swallows hard and stutters his way into a response.
"Yeah, uh, the uh, the uh State Department report details every type of job, uh and yes the actual operating jobs are about fifty but that doesn’t include all of the other jobs that come with it. As I said, the State Department report concludes about 42,000 jobs including all the direct and indirect jobs, and that's a fairly in-depth chapter . . . ”
Raddatz again cuts him off, "For about two years."
Girling disagrees and says the 42,000 jobs are "enduring, ongoing" citing property tax revenue as the reason.
She cuts him off for the last time when the time allotted for the interview expires. If there had been any time remaining I'd like to think she would have pressed him on what exactly was meant by "direct" and "indirect" jobs, how many were full-time jobs and why he first claims 9,000 jobs but then eagerly embraces the 42,000 number; but alas, this was not a PBS or NPR interview.
For more follow below.
In his
Huffington Post blog, Bob Keefe provides some additional perspective on the Keystone Pipeline's jobs impact.
Keystone XL will create about 35 full-time jobs and 15 temporary jobs, according to the U.S. State Department's analysis. Granted, about 1,950 construction jobs will be created, but those jobs -- while important -- disappear after the pipe goes in the ground.
He also points out Congress' hypocrisy in failing to push for "crucial, overdue policies" to expand clean energy that is homegrown.
Clean energy companies, meanwhile, announced more than 18,000 jobs in more than 20 states in just the last three months alone, according to the latest report from my organization, Environmental Entrepreneurs (E2). http://cleanenergyworksforus.org/...
In other words, nine times as many jobs were announced by energy efficiency, solar, wind, biofuel and other companies in the USA -- in just the last three months alone.
He references Obama's comments to this very point.
"If my Republican friends really want to focus on what's good for the American people in terms of job creation and lower energy costs, we should be engaging in a conversation about what are we doing to produce even more homegrown energy. I'm happy to have that conversation."
Keefe bemoans that Congress allowed the Production Tax Credit (TPC), a small tax credit for wind energy producers, to expire. "As a result, wind companies laid-off thousands of workers and the industry is stalled in uncertainty." And that isn't all.
Tax credits for homeowners who install better windows and make other energy efficiency improvements are disappearing too. So are credits for energy-efficient new homes; for commercial buildings; for producers of biofuels; for manufacturers of energy- efficient appliances and for a laundry-list of other clean energy and energy efficiency provisions.
In Raddatz' set-up piece for the Girling interview, Jonathan Carl highlights the red state Democrats who support the Pipeline, Michelle Nunn, unsuccessful Georgia Senate candidate and Mary Landrieu, currently facing an uphill run-off election to defend her Louisiana Senate seat. Harry Reid's attempt to boost Landrieu by bringing the Keystone to a vote, is likely to fail and in the process the American people are deprived of an honest discussion of the facts. Although Obama did not mention the option of a veto this appears to be our only hope of stopping this ecological and economic disaster.
10:21 AM PT: Traveling Man posts a very informative comment below regarding conversations he had with a representative from Alcoa, a company involved in building the piping. It is clear the oil is not for the U.S.
11:43 AM PT: The Summit County Citizen's Voice reported Saturday that the Rosebud Sioux Tribe is calling the Congressional vote on the Keystone Pipeline an "Act of War."
FRISCO — Conservation groups and climate activists aren’t the only ones hopping mad about the Congressional rush to approve the Keystone XL pipeline. Native Americans in South Dakota say they consider last week’s House vote to approve the pipeline “an act of war.”
http://summitcountyvoice.com/...
Apparently Congress failed to take into account that their vote violates the 1851 and 1868 Fort Laramie treaties, which gave the Black Hills to the Sioux Nation.
Rosebud Sioux (Sicangu Lakota Oyate) Tribal President Scott said his nation has yet to be properly consulted on the project, which would cross through tribal land. Concerns brought to the Department of Interior and to the Department of State have yet to be addressed, he said in a statement.
“The House has now signed our death warrants and the death warrants of our children and grandchildren,” Scott said. “We are outraged at the lack of intergovernmental cooperation. We are a sovereign nation and we are not being treated as such. We will close our reservation borders to Keystone XL. Authorizing Keystone XL is an act of war against our people,” he said.<
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More to come. This is starting to get interesting!