In a controversial decision yesterday, President Obama and his administration announced that the permit for the Keystone XL pipeline was to be denied on the grounds that it is not in the nation’s best interest to put a pipeline through a sensitive aquifer in Nebraska.  While conservation of this aquifer is important, what this country needs is jobs.  The proposed pipeline would create over 20,000 jobs constructing and maintaining the pipeline, which would stretch from Hardisty, Canada to Port Arthur, Texas.  It would also take off the strain that the Middle East has on our oil prices by diminishing their share in U.S. oil sales.

The pipeline would also grant us more energy security.  While the majority of our oil already comes from Canada, we still rely heavily on oil that comes from or moves through unfriendly countries.  Venezuela, whose president Hugo Chavez is a socialist wannabe dictator, supplies the United States with over 10% of our imported oil and might stop if we aid our Columbian allies.  Also, while Saudi Arabia is happy to sell us their oil, it must pass through the dangerous Strait of Hormuz which Iran’s military is ready to close due to our sanctions on their bank and nuclear system.  If the Strait is closed, gas prices will go up to over $6 a gallon.

With us dragging our feet to get this approved, China is looking more and more promising to the Canadians every day.  They have already put in a bid to move the pipeline from North to South through America to run East to West and shipped over to China for refinement and distribution.  This would be a lose-lose-lose for us because we would lose the jobs and the oil to our biggest competitor,  and environmentalists would lose because the oil would still be extracted and more supertankers would be crossing the Pacific Ocean to deal with the increase in supply.

The Obama administration insists that the reason they will not grant the oil company permission to build is because it is not in the best interest of the country to do so.  However, I believe that it is simply not in the best interest of Jimmy Carter 2.0’s campaign pocketbook.  This pipeline is in direct competition with the green energy companies that funded Obama’s campaign in 2008 and will be in the 2012 campaign.  So far, green energy companies alone have donated over $55 million in campaign money according to IWatch News analysis.  And I thought there wasn’t going to be any lobbying in the White House under this president.  Just another campaign lie and a check in the loss column for Captain Hopenchange.