{"id":891,"date":"2011-11-07T20:25:08","date_gmt":"2011-11-08T01:25:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/alexprudhomme.com\/?p=891"},"modified":"2011-11-07T20:25:08","modified_gmt":"2011-11-08T01:25:08","slug":"mckibben-ruffalo-keystone-xl-protestors-encircle-white-house","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alexprudhomme.com\/2011\/11\/07\/mckibben-ruffalo-keystone-xl-protestors-encircle-white-house\/","title":{"rendered":"McKibben, Ruffalo, Keystone XL protestors encircle White House"},"content":{"rendered":"<p id=\"article-date\">MONDAY, NOVEMBER 07, 2011<\/p>\n<h3>BIGGEST PIPELINE PROTEST YET AT WHITE HOUSE<\/h3>\n<p id=\"article-summary\">Thousands of protesters, including environmentalist Bill McKibben and actor Mark Ruffalo, encircled the White House to voice their opposition to TransCanada\u2019s Keystone XL pipeline<\/p>\n<p>No one expected it to get this big. Yesterday, a whole lot of people gathered in Washington, DC, and encircled the White House to protest Keystone XL, a 1,700-mile oil pipeline that, if approved by President Obama, would run from Alberta\u2019s Tar Sands to Texas. Event organizers estimated that 12,000 protesters showed up. That number may be swollen, but not by much; there was a large enough crowd to create a shoulder-to-shoulder ring of people three-to-five rows deep on the four streets surrounding the big house. The action was the culmination of a two-month grassroots campaign organized by an activist coalition, Tar Sands Action, that includes groups like\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/350.org\/\">350.org<\/a>,\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/ran.org\/\">Rainforest Action Network<\/a>, and\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.outsideonline.com\/outdoor-adventure\/nature\/The-Trials-of-Bidder-70.html\">Tim DeChristopher<\/a>\u2019s\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.peacefuluprising.org\/\">Peaceful Uprising<\/a>. The public leader of the anti-Keystone campaign is author and\u00a0<em>Outside<\/em>\u00a0contributor<a href=\"https:\/\/www.outsideonline.com\/author-bios\/Bill-McKibben.html\">Bill McKibben<\/a>.<br \/>\n(&#8230;)<br \/>\nOne sign read, \u201cBARACK, GRAB YOUR BALLS.\u201d Another, \u201cI WISH MY BOYFRIEND WAS AS DIRTY AS THE TAR SANDS.\u201d A staffer from the Center of Biological Diversity rocked an impressive polar bear costume. There was a guy in a full fly-fishing getup. But the overall feeling was serious and urgent. This wasn\u2019t a tie-dye and drum-circle affair. Many in the crowd were college students, yes, but there were also a lot of elderly and middle-aged people wearing ties and marching with their children. Some of the demonstrators organized for the President in 2008. Much of the talk focused on debunking TransCanada\u2019s claims that the pipeline will create a lot of jobs. \u201cThe only study that wasn\u2019t funded by TransCanada shows that this will kill as many jobs as it creates,\u201d McKibben yelled. The crowd screamed back. The president of the Hip Hop Caucus,\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/paceebene.org\/user\/31\">Reverend Lennox Yearwood, Jr<\/a>, yelled, \u201cThis is not a game! This cannot go forward!\u201d The crowd screamed louder. Then it circled the White House. I walked around the ring, which was thick with people. On E Street, which sits behind the White House, I passed Louie Psihoyos, director of the Academy Award winning documentary\u00a0<em>The Cove<\/em>, who was also circling the protest with a camera, wearing a wide smile. McKibben made a lap of the circle, shaking hands and pumping his fist.<br \/>\nSo what\u2019s next? The ball\u2019s still in Obama\u2019s court. The State Department is expected to make its recommendation to him by the end of the year. Keystone supporters point to fact that we still consume a lot of oil and the prospect of new jobs. Detractors scoff at those job projections. A particularly questionable TransCanada study suggesting that the pipeline would create 250,000 jobs included positions for dancers and speech therapists, as the\u00a0<em>Washington Post<\/em>\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/national\/health-science\/keystone-pipeline-debate-heats-up\/2011\/11\/04\/gIQA824rpM_story_1.html\">reports<\/a>. (It\u2019s unclear how a crude pipeline will subsidize the arts.) Then there are the increased emissions, the fact that some of that oil will be shipped to foreign markets in Mexico and Venezuela, and the risks of spills\u2014the pipeline would run through the massive Ogallala aquifer. TransCanada\u2019s handling of the mess has been less than slick, too; the company is already\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2011\/10\/18\/us\/transcanada-in-eminent-domain-fight-over-pipeline.html?pagewanted=all\">suing<\/a>\u00a0landowners in Texas and Nebraska under eminent domain.<br \/>\nNow there\u2019s speculation that Obama could\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.latimes.com\/news\/nationworld\/nation\/la-na-keystone-pipeline-20111107,0,236919.story\">delay<\/a>\u00a0the decision until after next year\u2019s election. But TransCanada executive chief Russ Girling has<a href=\"https:\/\/www.therecord.com\/news\/business\/article\/618349--transcanada-wary-of-pipeline-delays-through-nebraska\">said<\/a>\u00a0that a delay could seriously hinder the pipeline by forcing American refineries to sign contracts with other fuel sources. If Obama wants Keystone to go ahead he has to say so, and soon. What the protesters showed yesterday is that doing so will be politically difficult, to say the least.<br \/>\n<strong>Footnote<\/strong><br \/>\n<a name=\"Footnote1\"><\/a>1 Politico\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.outsideonline.com\/outdoor-adventure\/politics\/greed%20to%20do%20a%20%E2%80%9Cspecial%20review%E2%80%9D%20of%20whether%20the%20department%E2%80%99s%20analysis%20of%20TransCanada%E2%80%99s%20Keystone%20XL%20pipeline%20project%20has%20been%20done%20properly.%20%20Read%20more:%20http:\/www.politico.com\/news\/stories\/1111\/67758.html#ixzz1d3JfAQpA\">reported after this article was originally published<\/a>that the inspector general&#8217;s office agreed to do a special review of whether the State department\u2019s analysis of TransCanada\u2019s Keystone XL pipeline project was done properly.<br \/>\nhttps:\/\/www.outsideonline.com\/outdoor-adventure\/politics\/Biggest-Pipeline-Protest-Yet-at-White-House.html<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>MONDAY, NOVEMBER 07, 2011 BIGGEST PIPELINE PROTEST YET AT WHITE HOUSE Thousands of protesters, including environmentalist Bill McKibben and actor Mark Ruffalo, encircled the White House to voice their opposition to TransCanada\u2019s Keystone XL pipeline No one expected it to get this big. Yesterday, a whole lot of people gathered in Washington, DC, and encircled&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v22.2 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>McKibben, Ruffalo, Keystone XL protestors encircle White House - Alex Prud&#039;homme<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/alexprudhomme.com\/2011\/11\/07\/mckibben-ruffalo-keystone-xl-protestors-encircle-white-house\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"McKibben, Ruffalo, Keystone XL protestors encircle White House - Alex Prud&#039;homme\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"MONDAY, NOVEMBER 07, 2011 BIGGEST PIPELINE PROTEST YET AT WHITE HOUSE Thousands of protesters, including environmentalist Bill McKibben and actor Mark Ruffalo, encircled the White House to voice their opposition to TransCanada\u2019s Keystone XL pipeline No one expected it to get this big. 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