Pipelines are Just Too Scary

March/22/2011 16:43PM
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Did you know the first pipeline was built in the US in 1865. Obama seems to think he’s this generation’s Abe Lincoln. I think he’s this generation’s Jimmy Carter, in way over his head, but let him have his little fantasy. After all, he’s a Nobel Prize winner. But, I digress, that first pipeline was only 6KM long. But, in 1875, pipelines started their real role in America. Due largely to pipelines, we have the most sophisticated and efficient hydrocarbon distribution system in the world. Pipelines save you hundreds of dollars every year on your gasoline and natural gas or heating oil bills.

When the Trans-Alaskan pipeline was proposed across Alaska in 1970, the critics came out of the woodwork. To us, they said, pipelines are bad things. You can have leaks, explosions, block the migration paths of caribou, melt the permafrost, etc, etc. Somehow, despite the delays due to lawsuits, environmental impact studies, political haymaking, and God knows what else, the pipeline began operation in 1977, Since then it has brought 16 billion barrels of oil from the North Slope that we would not have had.

A new pipeline is being proposed. Dubbed the Keystone line, it would bring 500,000 barrels a day from the Canadian tar sands to the Gulf Coast refineries. Declining production from Mexico and Venezuela make this a pressing need.

Do gooders in the Obama administration don’t like the idea of Canadian Shale oil. They think it’s America’s responsibility to stop this practice, not purchase the end product. To stop this project they cite the recent pipeline problem in Michigan with a line that is 42 years old.

They want you to believe pipelines are truly scary things. Gee, how many Americans have died since 1865 from pipelines? More kids have died in unsafe cribs than deaths from pipelines.

If you are afraid of pipelines you are truly paranoid and need professional help. If you believe we in America should stop buying from our main oil supplier because we don’t approve of tar sand oil extraction, then move to Canada and vote for people who agree with you.

There is absolutely no common sense being applied to this project. And, the Canadians don’t need us to do this. They can simply ship to the West and sell to China. Of course, China is building pipelines wherever they need them, signing contracts with countries like Canada to buy their crude oil on a long-term basis, and seem to think it’s Canada’s business if they want all that revenue and all those jobs that come from sand extraction.

Who is really calling the shots here? How is it that no one cares if this high priority projects gets delayed indefinitely and maybe, just maybe, China ends up with the oil?

I care and it’s Obama’s fault. Plain and simple. If he wants you to have energy for the next 20 years he needs to move this forward. He can’t and he won’t. So vote for someone who will.

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