Matt Wuerker for March 28, 2013

Typical fantasyland, emotional lies from the left.

The Keystone Pipeline will help millions of families with lower bills, while that Solyndra mirage will only help a few of Barry’s friends.

This cartoon represents part of the problem. It is not an either – or situation we are in. Green energy is not capable of maintaining our energy needs yet and fossil fuels can. This doesn’t mean we abandon green energy implementation. That can continue while at the same time we develop our fossil fuel reserves. We still have an opportunity to grow our economy and add to our energy independence with the Keystone pipeline. Obama’s administration has cleared it to be started, he just needs to sign off on the project.

If we quit giving subsidies to big oil and gave them for green energy it wouldn’t take us long to catch up to the rest of the free world! We are NOT number1 in this.the pipeline will run near where I live, and over a big aquifer that supplies clean drinking water to people, livestock and pets in 7 states. NOW it does. if that famously leaky pipeline goes thru, about a 99% chance it will become too polluted to be a clean water source.

There may be a limited number of temporary jobs to build the pipeline, but cleaning up the spills will provide many, permanent jobs—because we don’t know how to clean up tar sands.

the only problem the picture on the left is costing us a fortune in tax money and most of it does not pay for it self and in the long run will end up in land fills

There shouldn’t be anything “left” or “right” about this kind of policy issue. The supply of fossil fuels is not endless. I don’t know when we will run out, I think no one really knows, but we do know that we will run out eventually. At some point we will need a new source of energy. In addition, burning fossil fuels is not good for the environment.+This is not a new problem — the human race has shifted its energy supplies several times before, and I’m sure we can do it again. But we need to put money into research. I’m quite sure that more fission power plants will be built — of course they bring their own problems — including the possible proliferation of nuclear weapons. Fusion so far doesn’t seem to be working out, after more than fifty years of very expensive research. If we had put all the money from fusion research into “green” or “alternative” energy, we would be way ahead now.

I’d really like to see a link to provide evidence to your point of “more jobs being opened by them than any other.” Right now the hiring on the part of the drillers and oil companies is incredibly strong. They can’t fill all the vacancies they have.

I have a couple of friends working in Pennsylvania and Colorado that are working 60 hours a week on average and they are still trying to hire more people. It’s a lot more than just North Dakota.

That’s our own fault. We had the opportunity to become a leader in green energy production, but blew it because too much money is tied up in oil. The pipeline and oil in the US is still too limited to provide complete energy independence, especially over the long term. Green energy can, except that many of the patents for materials and production are now held overseas.Of course, the plan was never to become energy independent in the first place. We have a global economy now, and the more hands a product has to pass through to get to the end consumer, the more money there is to be made.

As long as the planet Earth keeps paying a tithe to planet America the subsidies for the solar cells(which have to be replaced every five years) can continue. The fantasy world pictured is totally dependent on rare minerals imported from Mongolia. Of course increasing the demand for a finite resource will lower the cost because no one would dare disappoint America.

Boy O Boy someone is sure looking thru rose colored glasses.

We could be SO much farther along in ‘green’ jobs if the same old , ah, let’s say ‘traditionalists’ would get out of the way of progress. Pathetic.

Forgot to put “Out of Business” signs on about half of those “green energy” companies, though for the sake of argument the failure rate on “green energy” companies in in excess of 90%.

“Think about a time in the near future when the poles are free from ice.”Yeah, they’d have to drink their vodka warm!Seriously, fossil fuel is not going to get cheaper. Global demand is increasing far faster than supplies. Keystone is all about making it easier to export oil, not making domestic oil cheaper. Renewable energy is the future, and the countries that dominate those technologies will dominate the world in a few generations.

Thanks to Bruce & singlespeed for some great comments. Our individual choices make a huge difference collectively. I think we should give strong support to basic R&D that leads to breakthrough innovations. I’m not so keen on subsidizing profit driven companies, whether they are in the fossil fuel business or the renewable energy business. I would support placing tariffs on imports from any nation that subsidizes production.

Hiring, hiring – but what about buying the products?

Moving tar sands from Canada to the Gulf through a pipe can’t be easy. Its consistency is not like that of water. Why don’t they refine it in Canada, or just on the US side of the border? Isn’t that just common sense?*Answer: They want to refine it in the Gulf so it can be exported more easily. And they don’t want a glut of gas in the center of the country because it would drive down prices.*In other words, the pipeline will have little impact on US oil and gas prices. And we are going to risk environmental disasters in the heart of our food-producing areas so that oil companies can boost their export business.*The best gov’t money can buy!

Is this a scene from the new Wizard of Oz movie?

And how many US oil companies are there? Standard Oil? Now BP (British Petroleum.) ROYAL DUTCH Shell? I remember Pure, Esso, Sinclair, and many other firms bought up by others bigger and more profitable. Now we have Exxon/Mobil, arguably the MOST profitable company in the world, getting continued subsidies. Rather than compete on a level “capitalistic” playing field, they prefer to keep their money, spend ours, and complain about the relative pittance given to alternative energy.

first off, everyone who refers to the US as “we” is living in a state of self-deception. “we,” the working people, decide nothing, own nothing, and profit nothing from any of it.second, technology itself is neither good nor bad; it’s all about who controls it. the ruling class controls it still.third, so-called green jobs are an illusion. once installed, solar and wind run themselves. wind and light are free. jobs will disappear, inevitably. answer, spread available work around and keep spreading it around so that everyone has work (at 40 hours pay).fourth, the ruling class will never develop renewable energy. they can’t make enough profit. therefore, WORKERS TO POWER!