Just when it looks like Washington is starting to work again with Congress passing a no-drama budget deal, Senator John Thune stinks up the joint with another threat to take the global economy hostage... just to free the Keystone XL pipeline:
Congressional Republicans might try to stall an increase in the nation’s debt ceiling until the Obama administration clears the way for construction of the Keystone XL pipeline, Sen. John Thune, R-S.D., told reporters Wednesday.“There are some things Republicans would like to see happen,” Thune said. “It could be approval of the Keystone pipeline. That’s something we think has a real impact on the economy” [Denise Ross, "Thune: Debt Ceiling Could Hinge on Pipeline Fate," Mitchell Daily Republic, 2013.12.18].
Senator Thune is saying the debt-ceiling/Keystone XL quid pro quo that Rep. Paul Ryan suggested Sunday is just one possibility for more kamikaze politics. Sometimes, a kamikaze run is justified, like Russell Case's last flight to save the world from alien a-holes. But you don't blow up the global economy just to get one oil pipeline that America doesn't need.
John! Listen up! No more default brinkmanship. You've passed a budget. Now pay America's bills, keep the markets stable, and forget Keystone XL.
The very first thing that came to mind when I read this was how much has Keystone XL paid Thune?
Make it three Roger and Deb.
In an email a friend sent me today, he offered the following:
"It's so cold in Washington, D.C., that the politicians have their hands in their own pockets".
Thune is not smart enough nor clever enough to put the brakes on the debt ceiling. What we are seeing here is a number 3 man in the senate minority that is really full of number 2. I would say that to his face except it is difficult to find which one he is speaking from. We must all keep in mind that this so called threat will be right smack dab in the middle of primary season, what a more perfect time to show South Dakota and the rest of America what a clown John Thune really is along with the rest in the car, if he could ever try to pull this off. Just more nothing in a long line of nothing from a do nothing obstructionist senator from a do nothing obstructionist party.
Make it 4. Has anyone pressed John on the facts of KXL? Do you suppose he knows the real job creation #'s? Does he pay any attention to the KXL execs who say that it will increase gas prices in the Northern Plains?
Or maybe someone would ask him if the $53,800 the Koch's have paid him for his support was enough to justify the taking of South Dakota private land owned by a foreign company as being conservative.
Psssst...Senator John... it's on page 27 of this report...you should read it.
http://kochcash.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/07/Embargo_Report.pdf
I can see the headline now. "Thune sells out family farmers to the Koch Brothers and foreign business."
As soon as Little Johnny starts cutting all my money going to prop up his failing state, so that his rich supporters in South Dakota have to start paying their way, then we might start solving the debt problem. Until then, Little Johnny is just posing as a fiscal conservative.
Thune is a real tool.
In the event the line ever touches SD, they should be required to have shut-off valves as near rivers and aquifers as possible. There would be something like 58 gallons of oil per foot of pipe, or 300,000 gallons per mile. Thune should be wondering what happens to SD economy if north end of Ogallala Aquifer is polluted or if a leak occurs on Cheyenne, Bad, White, river or any of another multitude of streams that drain into the Missouri..
Idiots in SD legislature have not required any bond or per barrel taxes. Montana would not even let Trans-Canada hired surveyors even enter Montana without a large bond.
Required fund? Sen Maher's bill http://legis.sd.gov/Legislative_Session/Bills/Bill.aspx?Bill=161 would have required .02/barrel with a 30Mil cap and re engaged when the fund dropped to 5mil. Voted against coming out of committee was only Russ Olson, Gray excused, voted against it later. Gov Rounds boys, you to Jean, took one for the party and kept it off his desk, and not all made it back in 12.
I'm shocked and amazed to hear of political horse trading going on in Washington.
Les there were two bills on this in 2011. HB 1189 and SB 180. Both were good bills for public safety and environmental stewardship and both were moved to the 41st day in their respective committees. Also there was a non-partisan flavor attached to both the creation and similar deaths of the pieces of legislation telling me one of them should be brought back and passed before the Public gets stuck paying for any future spill before the courts force the perps to pony up in the event one occurs.
I'm with you Charlie. A cleanup fund is just wise governance and has nothing to do with support of, or opposition to the pipeline.
Terrorists have done much damage to our nation, including the murders on 9/11, but they couldn't shut down our government and slow down economic recovery by shutting down Congress. Credit John Thune and his GOP leadership pals in the Senate and House with providing wreckage that was out of reach to terrorists.
This is the guy who won his U.S. Senate seat by portraying our state's most effective servant in the Senate as the "chief obstructionist." From CNN, here's one of many, many samples of Thune's ridiculous hypocrisy:
"I am echoing what I hear people say in South Dakota about their senator and as they travel around the country having to deal with the chief obstructionist label. And I believe that is embarrassing to South Dakota," Thune told NBC's "Meet the Press" in September, while seated next to Daschle.
http://www.cnn.com/2004/ALLPOLITICS/11/03/senate.southdakota/
Interesting words from an empty suit who never served one day in the military. If South Dakota Democrats give this guy another pass, they should disband the party and leave politics forever.
This isn't horse-trading, John. This is economic suicide. Horse-trading is a South Dakota Senator voting for food stamps to get a Delaware Senator to vote for crop insurance.
If there is horse trading going on here JT, it's not right but still pales in comparison to the party line who sold their souls to the devil on the ACA whether it was right or wrong.
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I have more reasons to personally support XL with mineral interests and projects underway dependent upon the pipe. That being said Charlie, right is right. Eminent domain is a armed robbery, but taking their land and not protecting landowners and taxpayers is a crime beyond the immoral action of eminent domain. Who was paid what to guarantee Keystone no cost to cross SD..?
Cory and Les, my response was glib. My read of Thune's quote is that there are "some" things he'd like to see happen and that KXL "could" be one of them, leaving GOP options open for any number of issues that might come into the debt-ceiling negotiations. I'm guessing Thune was trying to come up with a South Dakota-based issue that readers of the MDR can relate to. Given last October's hysteria during the shutdown and debt-ceiling standoffs, I'd say the benign outcome of the budget deal of a few days ago will be the model for the debt-ceiling resolution. Political sturm und drang will no doubt precede it, but Pubs know they'll incur plenty of wrath from their biz-oriented supporters if they push the economy to the edge of that cliff again.
This is exactly what we need to focus on.......SD politicians. We have no control when it comes to US legislators in other states. Our vote only counts with our SD delegation. Jana, thanks for posting on what Thune is up to with big oil and how much he is getting paid. Also the other comments have great merit. Many people are so hung up on congressmen and senators from other states. I feel we need to keep the focus right here in SD and study what our own politicians are getting away with and find out what corporations and lobbyists own them. Follow the $$$$$$.
'The fact that we are here today to debate raising America's debt limit is a sign of leadership failure. It is a sign that the US Government can not pay its own bills. It is a sign that we now depend on ongoing financial assistance from foreign countries to finance our Government's reckless fiscal policies. Increasing America's debt weakens us domestically and internationally. Leadership means that "the buck stops here." Instead, Washington is shifting the burden of bad choices today onto the backs of our children and grandchildren. America has a debt problem and a failure of leadership. Americans deserve better.' ~Obama
Quick check: we are not debating raising the debt ceiling. We are debating whether or not America should pay its bills, and whether or not we should threaten not to pay our bills (and thus plunge the world economy into grim chaos) to win concessions on other political issues.
Cory, your statement reminds me of a family member who had debt on every property owned. A year or to later I asked how they bought another large property. Oh, I paid cash for it. Cash for it? Yep, bills were paid and cash for new property with re-fi's(raised their debt ceiling, but it's not about the debt, it's abut the comfort)I later found out. Stagger on. At what point is it better to bite a bullet and take some pain? You should teach pain in class Cory, it is something most of us don't understand but ultimately will when we hit the impending implosion.
Jana thank you for the link. That's great!
Another run at a pipeline fund will probably fail miserably in 14 with XL currently standing on shaky turf. Who wants to share the blame with Obama for ruining this project?
Better to share the blame with XL when the taxpayers shoulder the cleanup costs Les?
We know the profits are privatized. Is it the SD GOP's goal to socialize the risks for this Canadian company, Les, because that's how it appears when they kill a pipeline bond or cleanup fund. Kind of like what the GOP did for the gold mines.
The gold mines at the very least provided hundreds of SD jobs for 100 years. XL on the other hand will provide jobs for enough South Dakotans to count on one hand for enough years to count on one hand. Let's throw the Canadian company another tax break that other state's aren't giving them to do what they were going to do anyway. We'll just take it out of what we were going to use to educate our kids.
Sen Maher ran the clean up bill in his GOP state of mind. You tell me what is going on. Obviously the Oval Office on the river has the goods on our boys n girls down Pierre way.
The leadership in Pierre comes under more scrutiny and JT decides to shut down the government as payback for his 30 pieces of silver.
Does anyone one have any comparative numbers as to what other states were able to extract from Keystone? As I recall the others all were competent enough to get the most for their citizens than Pierre.
Speaking of John and his 30 pieces of silver from the Koch brothers, I think it's time to revisit what Bill Moyer had to say in his his essay on the end of democracy. Then change the reference from Washington D.C. to Pierre and the same game applies.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/bill-moyers/watch-the-end-game-for-de_b_3817228.html
Thune and the Republicans and their puppet masters aren't very smart, but they think the American public is too dumb to sniff out their plans. Using a power play to extort construction of a pipeline, rather than to let the thing emerge from the normal process (one that is fair and based on established fact and law) would de-legitimize it. Congress intervened in the high-level radioactive waste issue in the 1980s by short-circuiting the scientific and legal process. By doing so, it created thirty years of non-solution that totally de-legitimized the process of siting a repository.
It's a pretty stupid move, because Obama has pretty much signaled he's going to approve this XL monstrosity. So, Obama's approval is not what Thune is after.
Thune and the people who pull his strings know this, so Thune's gambit is to make you think that forcing the XL pipeline on Obama is his plan. But buried in his proposal will be something he will not disclose, and it is the real plan: make sure no one in the public, not environmentalists and not landowners, can stop it. He will do this by trying to pass a proposal that strips every one of their Constitutional rights. Let's be clearn: Thune will use Obama as the shield, and then strip every one of you of your rights to oppose this project.
Thune's proposal, if it will be of any use to the puppeteers, will set up a government-imposed taking of everyone's rights. He will say it's just to prevent "environmental extremists" from opposing the pipeline in court, but what he really wants to do is take away the Bill of Rights in this case to establish a precedent so that Republicans can do it over and over.
Now, when Thune attempts to impose his governmental taking of our rights, does he not think people won't figure this out? And when they figure out their rights have been stripped, does he not worry that some folks will use 2nd Amendment solutions or find other more creative ways to oppose the XL pipeline? Thune needs to ask himself whether he wants to create a lawless government that has to be resisted by a citizenry who won't accept government tyranny.
Well said Donald. Do you think anyone in the media will ever grill John on this? Do you think John will ever take part in a substantive debate on the issue outside of the choreographed dance of the legislature?
Bigger question. Do you think John has a conscience to know what he is doing?
John, you are doing your damndest to take private land from South Dakotans. You are compounding it by not honestly addressing the risks in an honest way. Lastly, you are threatening democracy to serve those who make you wealthy. See you in church.
It appears XL may proceed over Buffets objections, or contributions to a president. We now have the experience of rail over pipe when it all cools enough for data.