After the West Texas fertilizer explosion

[Bluemage]

nemonowan wrote:

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That is one reason why I think that the opponents of the Keystone XL
pipeline aren't thinking through thoroughly. I've gotten into some
arguments with some friends on this who in my opinion are not analyzing
the situation versus going into this default ideologically blinkered
view that the keystone XL is bad for the environment. This of course
ignoring that as far as transporting oil is concerned a pipeline is by
far environmentally safer than having it travel by rail...

Actually, besides whatever proportion of "make it pass through someone elses backyard" local protesters, most opponents of the Keystone XL pipeline want that oil to not be transported at all.Because leaving those canadian tar sands in the ground is MONUMENTALLY less damaging that any kind of transportation.You see, if the pipeline gets built that means that there is a cheap way to take the oil from where it is manufactured (and I use that word deliberately) to where it is sold. Therefore, it becomes rentable to exploit it, so it WILL be exploited. No pipeline, no (or at least much less) tar sands exploitation.

And that would be a perfectly legitimate argument to make, if the builders of the pipeline didn't already have an alternate pipeline, through a different country, planned.  As it is, the choice isn't between 'no oil' and 'pipeline', but between 'pipeline to/through the US' and 'pipeline into Asia'.
Between the two, I'd say that even the environmentalists should favor it coming here... if only because we regulate harder than most Asian countries.

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My Unitarian Jihad Name is: Brother Atom Bomb of Courteous Debate. Get yours.

I've been writing a bit.