Let the American youth never forget,
that they possess a noble inheritance,
bought by the toils, and sufferings, and blood of their ancestors; and capacity,
if wisely improved, and faithfully guarded,
of transmitting to their latest posterity
all the substantial blessings of life,
the peaceful enjoyment of
- liberty,
- property,
- religion, and
- independence.
Hearing For the First Time
The Magic of Traditional Weddings
Troll Stomping
I really didn't find any new interesting threads in going across my Facebook feeds today, but I was annoyed enough to comment on two environmentalist trolls commenting on the Keystone pipeline and the third excerpt below I believe come from an IPI thread on Illinois Democrats wanting to use public tax money to fund the Obama Presidential Library. (Most predecessors were funded by private-sector contributors.)
61% of people (I wasn't even asked, so those figures are skewed) are idiots. there are no benefits from building that pipeline. 1, the oil is not ours. 2, that's the worst quality oil. 3, building this pipeline means the destruction of American land and property. you can see how many pipeline accidents there were in the US if you search for it. its quite a long list.
Every once in a while you need to stomp on an ignorant troll. First , you don't know diddly squat about polls or statistics. Given 310 million people, most aren't sampled, and one can still come up with remarkably accurate statistics. Second, there are plenty of reasons for building pipelines (think of other modes of transport--e.g., truck or rail, each with their own challenges). Pipelines operate around the clock in all types of weather, are an efficient mechanism for reaching urban centers, have large capacity, require little handling, are much cheaper than alternatives, and have an excellent safety record (fewer than a handful of incidents per 20,000 miles of pipe per year). Third, we still import roughly a third of our oil, despite oil shale development--with its own scarcity of pipelines. So what's the troll's point? Perhaps he wants to gamble the future of our economy on imports from the volatile Middle East and Gulf Region or the likes of anti-American Venezuela? Fourth, we have much of the world's refinery capacity for dealing with this heavier Canadian oil; perhaps the troll would prefer to see American refinery jobs exported to China? Make no mistake--Canada's oil will be refined, with or without us. Finally, the Draconian consequences of pipelines' effects on the environment are wildly exaggerated. We already 55,000 lines of pipeline across the US, and pipeline and oil spillage technology improves all the time.
But really, we know that the jobs would be temporary and it wont impact our fuel prices since this oil is destined for overseas trade. Lets see how much that 61% drops if they knew that we would be taking the added transport risks and added pollution from Canada for no added benefits.
Every once in a while I need to step on an economically illiterate troll, and there are a ton in this thread. You seem to think that our market is independent of the global market, and that transportation costs other international buyers incur are minimal. For example, the Europeans pay a multiple of what we do for natural gas; but it is expensive to process gas for shipping. It's hard to get natural gas producers to explore and develop at recent domestic prices. More customers could make capital available for further development which benefits all customers (not to mention any economies of scale). The alternatives to pipelines, say, rail, truck or barge, have their own safety issues; pipelines tend to be much safer and efficient, Exaggerating environmental impact--and make no mistake, Canada will continue to produce, with or without us--simply lowers your credibility. Pipeline technology and any relevant spillage-relevant technology improves all time; there are some 2.5 million miles of pipelines in the US. Do accidents happen? Yes--but pipelines were up to 70 times safer than other modes of transport.
He's just borrowing a leaf from the Koch brothers' book!
First, the Kochs spend a fraction of what the "progressives" spend on political speech. Second, the Kochs are libertarians, not conservatives, and fiercely anti-cronyism. I don't particularly like the Kochs, but I loathe intellectually vapid "progressives" more.
Political Cartoon
 |
| Courtesy of Chip Bok via Townhall |
LeAnn Rimes, "How Do I Live Without You"
