Tagged: keystone xl pipeline

Tens of thousands of protesters turned out on the National Mall Sunday to encourage President Obama to make good on his commitment to act on climate change.

In his Inaugural address from outside the U.S. Capitol, the president said: "We will respond to the threat of climate change knowing that the failure to do so would betray our children and future generations."

Just a few weeks later, next to the Washington Monument, Paul Birkeland was one of a couple dozen people holding a long white tube above their heads.

The United States' ambassador to the United Nations, Susan Rice, has been the subject of much criticism from the GOP.

Austin Shoplifting Ring Busted

The Associated Press reports an Austin shoplifting ring has been caught selling stolen goods and smuggling them to Mexico. The list of stolen goods includes multiple household items: detergents, shampoos, batteries, cosmetics and razors.

Quoting "a White House official," CNN and USA Today are reporting that in a speech tomorrow President Obama will push for fast-tracking the construction of the southern portion of the Keystone XL pipeline.

USA Today reports:

Just days after a Texas farmer’s restraining order against Keystone XL pipeline builder TransCanada was lifted, the Alberta company announced it is starting work on a portion of the pipeline stretching from Oklahoma to Texas.

The company announced today it was reapplying for a permit to route the pipeline through Nebraska. Concerns over the route through Nebraska’s environmentally-sensitive Sand Hills region lead in part to rejection of TransCanada’s earlier application.

But TransCanada also announced it would commence building the southernmost portion of the pipeline -- from Cushing, Oklahoma to Texas ports at the Gulf of Mexico -- while it waits on permitting for the northern portion of the line, which requires presidential approval.

As the White House and Congress battle it out over the controversial Keystone XL pipeline, the Canadian company that wants to build it is still using its land-seizure powers to get property easements for the ambitious project.

And it’s ruffling some feathers in a politically conservative patch of Texas.

Several landowners along the proposed pipeline route say TransCanada has bullied them into selling their property by asserting “eminent domain” authority, the same power that governments use to seize land for highways and other public infrastructure projects. A property rights coalition tracking the condemnation proceedings has uncovered at least 89 land condemnation lawsuits involving TransCanada in 17 counties from the Red River to the Gulf Coast — cases that could test the limits of a private company's power to condemn property.

In the pages of the Wall Street Journal, Governor Rick Perry says Texans are “baffled” by President Obama’s decision on the Keystone XL pipeline.

“Keystone would have provided a shot in the arm for our nation's uncertain economy, and it could have provided economic opportunity for tens of thousands of families, stretching from here in Texas all the way to the Canadian border,” Perry wrote in his op-ed in the Journal. He said the pipeline’s approval could create “up to 20,000 direct jobs,” a figure that has been questioned by Cornell University's Global Labor Institute. (A U.S. State Department estimate foresees approximately 5,000-6,000 construction jobs created by the pipeline.)

“Hoping to appease environmental radicals, President Obama said no, claiming he didn't have time to adequately consider the pipeline,” Perry continues.