Wednesday 14 December 2011

by: Bill McKibben, Los Angeles Times 

http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/commentary/la-oe-mckibben-congress-20111214,0,3498758.story

It was one of those uncomfortable moments when you suddenly realize you're in the wrong place, that you're a rube from the sticks in a sophisticated city whose customs you don't quite understand.

Politico was sponsoring a "Washington Year in Review" symposium last week, and they'd invited me to be part of the energy panel. So even though I'd spent barely three weeks in Washington this year (and the most memorable nights were spent in its central cellblock for protesting outside the White House [4] to block the Keystone XL pipeline), I found myself traveling down from Vermont to share a stage with Rep. Ed Markey (D-Mass.) and Rep. Lee Terry [5] (R-Neb.).

I was a little nervous, because Terry had recently introduced a bill to force the rapid approval of the Keystone pipeline, overriding the president. But we talked back and forth amiably enough, as I explained why the jobs figures for the proposed project he kept repeating were wrong. Markey pointed out that the Canadian tar sands oil that would be transported through the pipeline, far from enhancing U.S. energy security, was destined to be sold abroad. It was all "agree to disagree" harmony.