GOP Hypocrisy On The Keystone XL Pipeline

As regular readers are sure to note, I follow the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel column: Congress, Following the Vote. Each week that Congress is in session it breaks out some of the bills voted on, a short description of the bill, what the yes or no vote means, and then how the Wisconsin delegation voted.

This past week two bills came up before Congress that are related to the Keystone XL pipeline. The first bill HR-3 (yes with all of the ills facing our nation the third most important thing in the house was this dang pipeline), despite the President’s veto promise, approves the completion of the pipeline. Needless to say the vote in Wisconsin went along straight party lines with the GOP in favor and the Democrats opposed…with the exception of Rep. Gwen Moore who did not vote.

And then, there was another bill that supports the owners of Keystone making payments to the Treasury Department’s Oil Spill Liability Fund. Currently the Keystone is exempt from contributing to this fund and this bill would reverse that. If it had passed the pipeline owner would have contributed 8 cents per gallon into the liability fund. Not a bad idea, pipeline’s do eventually leak…and without this fund I am guessing that you and I could be left holding the bag if TransCanada reneges on cleaning up after themselves. But off course the bill didn’t pass. Again it was strictly along party lines with the GOP in opposition and the Dems in support…and again Rep. Gwen Moore not voting.

So we can grant eminent domain to foreign companies…and let them build a dirty oil pipeline…that at some point will leak…but they don’t have to take financial precautions for the inevitable?

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2 thoughts on “GOP Hypocrisy On The Keystone XL Pipeline

  1. I’ve found it fascinating that the right wing media has been able to make the KXL pipeline such a rallying point, without being able to point to any real clear benefits for America as a whole. It’s been like watching a textbook example of the corporatist media pushing an agenda, without the supposedly widespread “liberal media” calling the planned money and land grab out for what it truly is.

  2. Despite pulling America and the World away from a decades long Depression and then structuring the greatest economy in the last 20 years, many Americans simply don’t want to have to take orders from a black man whom they consider a presidential mistake. Thus continue the idiotic attacks on the Federal Government and the people of the United States. No matter how illogical, these attacks still get traction. Nothing is off limits to those well off of the world seeking to increase their coffers; nor will they ever admit their cold hearted self interest and the lies they create to justify them.

    We should be taxing oil now that we have too much of it and adding a carbon tax to industry so that this fat cat nation can maintain highways, bridges, education, clean air, water and food.

    But no, we again have to resist GOP self interested treachery depite all the past dire warnings. But keep the faith, liberal progressives; One thing is certain: God is on the side of life.

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