With the Republicans taking complete control of the legislative branch in 2015, all they need is a president to rubber stamp the following irresponsible act of belligerence.
If passing the Keystone XL Pipeline in the House and “bypassing ... the Endangered Species Act and Clean Water Act wasn't bad enough, get a load of what OUR Republican Wisconsin Congressmen voted against; a Democratic motion to protect the taxpayers from paying for costly oil spills. From Roll Call:
LIABILITY FOR OIL SPILLS: The House on Friday refused to require the Keystone XL Pipeline to pay into the Treasury Department’s Oil Spill Liability Trust Fund. Sponsored by Democrats, this motion to HR 5682 (above) sought to blunt an Internal Revenue Service ruling under which crude extracted from tar sands is exempted from mandatory support of the oil-spill fund. The ruling spares TransCanada Corp., the Keystone owner, from having to pay 8 cents per barrel into the fund to help cover the cost of cleaning up any spills. Congress established the fund in response to the 1989 Exxon Valdez grounding, which spilled hundreds of thousands of barrels of crude into Alaska’s Prince William Sound. A yes vote was to require the Keystone XL Pipeline to contribute to the Oil Spill Liability Trust Fund.
Guess who voted yes? Rep. Mark Pocan, Ron Kind, and Gwen Moore.
In a breathtakingly irresponsible vote to exempt big oil from paying for spilled tar sand oil? The same guys taking charge in 2015; Rep. Paul Ryan, James Sensenbrenner, outgoing Tom Petri, Sean Duffy, and Reid Ribble.
Why not right? The press is not covering this. Our Republican representatives have been voting like this for years. Search my blog for "roll call" or "ribble" and you'll see what I mean.
If passing the Keystone XL Pipeline in the House and “bypassing ... chrxl.blogspot.com
ReplyDelete