There she goes again, demonstrating that self-proclaimed but seldom-observed "devotion" to facts that "borders on obsessive."
If a Republican president is elected next November, one of his or her first actions as president would likely be approval of the remaining leg of the Keystone XL pipeline. The second part of that equation is less of a stretch, seeing how all the GOP candidates support completion of the project.
It will be worth watching MSNBC on the day this could happen if for no other reason than to see Rachel Maddow wipe the egg from her face after having triumphantly declared on Nov. 2, 2015 that "Keystone is dead." Which is true, provided you pay no attention to the fact that it remains alive. Details, details.
Maddow led her program last night with enviro-propaganda that only an equally-earnest intern in MSNBC public relations would describe as accurate news coverage --
We begin tonight with some breaking news, some surprising and unexpected news about one of the most politically divisive issues of the last eight years, one of the most politically divisive issues of the entire Barack Obama presidency. It has to do specifically with this object -- this is the Keystone XL pipeline. You've heard that name before, right? It's this massive pipeline project designed to bring hundreds of thousands of barrels of oil every day from north of our border, from Canada, all the way across the entire breadth of the United States, right down to the Gulf of Mexico.
The Keystone pipeline has been an object of debate and protest and anger and attack ads and political suspense and even international tension between the United States government and the Canadian government for years and years and years now. But tonight, all of a sudden, after all of these years of fighting over it, tonight it seems like it's all over -- Keystone is dead. We have just learned late tonight that the company trying to build that oil pipeline has essentially thrown in the towel. The company who was going to build Keystone XL is called TransCanada and TransCanada has just asked the US government to suspend their permit application to build Keystone. The US government, all these years, has not made a decision on whether or not to approve that application or not but TransCanada tonight has pulled the plug on it themselves. This was an unexpected result in what has been just a years-long process to try to get this pipeline built, something that has led to very acute domestic political pressure in this country.
The reason this project needed the approval of the US government in the first place is because this pipeline would across the border from Canada into the United States. It would begin in tar sands country up in Alberta, Canada. It would then cross the US border into Montana, stretch all the way down to Nebraska, and then another piece of pipeline would stretch down to the Gulf of Mexico. And this pipeline project was controversial for a whole host of reasons, among them a huge, fresh-water aquifer that the pipeline was going to pass through in South Dakota and Nebraska.
But it was for a variety of reasons the widespread opposition to this project, largely but not entirely on the left, that's made Keystone such a hot political issue for all these years. TransCanada first applied for a permit for this pipeline way back in 2008. The Obama administration has been conducting a review of that permit for President Obama's entire two terms in office. Republicans have pushed the Obama administration to approve Keystone but the president has continued to kick any decision on it down the road. Just today, the president's press secretary Josh Earnest said, oh don't expect a decision on this anytime soon.
And then today, sort of out of nowhere, TransCanada yanked it. They pulled the application for it altogether.
If your knowledge of Keystone was limited to what Maddow says here, you'd be ill-advised to pass it on as true. In a video clip accompanying its story on TransCanada seeking to suspend its application, the Washington Post stated this -- "The first thing to know about the Keystone pipeline is that it already exists."
Contrary to the distinct impression conveyed by Maddow, the project would not stretch thousands of miles from northern Alberta "across the entire breadth of the United States" to the Gulf of Mexico. Most of the pipeline is already in place -- Keystone XL refers an expansion of the existing infrastructure, 1,700 miles of new pipeline in two separate parts. The so-called "Southern Leg" consists of a 485-mile branchrunning from Cushing, Okla., to the Gulf coast in Houston -- and while Maddow can't bring herself to acknowledge it, lest it disrupt her effort to portray liberals marching in unison against Keystone, the Obama administration has already approved this part of the project and it began conveying oil in early 2015.
Obama is quoted in the Post clip saying this -- "Today I'm directing my administration to cut through the red tape, break through the bureaucratic hurdles, and make this project a priority, to go ahead and get it done." It is the so-called Northern Leg, running roughly a thousand miles from Hardistry, Alberta to Steele City, Nebr., that is the remaining unbuilt portion of the project.
Having declared "Keystone is dead" and TransCanada has "pulled the application for it altogether," Maddow then backpedaled when describing what specifically has occurred --
Well, in their letter to the US State Department tonight, TransCanada says they are asking for their permit to be put on hold while they try to resolve a dispute with the state of Nebraska over the pipeline. And maybe that Nebraska issue will be resolved in a way that puts this application back on deck for the US State Department and the US government, but it kinda seems like this is done, at least for now.
Uh, didn't you just say this kinda seems like it's dead ...?
Further undermining Maddow's propensity to distort was a nudge of a correction from her next guest, Politico energy reporter Elana Schor --
MADDOW: Were there signals, were there indications leading up to this that Keystone might do something like this?
SCHOR: Well, Rachel, ever since the Canadian election the long-standing expectation that the president would say no to this pipeline has only intensified and it's because of the reasons you just laid out. The new leader of Canada says he supports Keystone but he really wants to work with the president on climate. It's a new day in Canada. Oil is so cheap, there is a myriad of reasons why the president would say no and TransCanada knew that.
And oil will surely remain cheap well into the future, just as housing prices a decade ago were expected to keep rising in perpetuity. And let's not forget the long-entrenched history of oil-rich Middle Eastern nations to remain bastions of stability.
Here comes the nudge from Schor --
SCHOR: What this really is, though, it really is less of throwing in the towel and more of a Hail Mary that they're hoping a Republican president will catch in 2017. They are betting on a GOP White House.
Several minutes after her initial boast that "Keystone is dead," Maddow finally gets around to describing the status of the project in a way that opponents and supporters can agree is accurate --
MADDOW: So this is them trying to avoid a no, so in case a Republican is elected, they could reapply then and get a yes. They couldn't get to a yes if they had already previously been turned down with a Democrat in the White House now.
SCHOR: Essentially. What this Nebraska request means is, Nebraska will take between seven and 12 months to work through its own process, which is a pretty obscure and arcane thing but that's all you need to know, right, 'cause what happens in one year? An election and we get a new president. If they get this pause, they can stay alive pending the outcome of, you know, who wins the White House.
Compared to Maddow's kneejerk hyberbole, the New York Times took a decidedly more subdued approach, consigning news of TransCanada's decision to a two-paragraph brief on its website this morning.
