Greg Awtry

There is one indisputable fact I have learned about the Keystone XL pipeline. The more one knows about the pipeline, its contents and the actual route it takes across Nebraska, the more one becomes alarmed at the sheer stupidity of this project.

Before I even begin to explain how stupid this is, I want to “pre-apologize” for the number of times I am apt to write the word “stupid” in this editorial.

Let’s begin with how stupid our federal government is. While TransCanada loves to call this a “crude oil” pipeline instead of “tar sands,” the fact is that our federal government determined tar-sand is not crude oil, as defined by the House Ways and Means Committee. Why is this important?

Crude oil is taxed at eight cents a barrel which is used to fund the Oil Spill Liability Trust Fund needed to clean up oil spills. Because the House Ways and Means Committee defined tar-sand as neither crude oil nor petroleum product, the tar-sand gushing through the Keystone XL pipeline will not be taxed as is American oil! How stupid is that?

So, we found someone who sits on the House Ways and Means Committee. It is Adrian Smith, Nebraska’s Third District U.S. Representative. It would be stupid of him not to do everything in his power to make sure his committee redefined their definition of “oil” to include tar-sand so it would be taxed at the same rate as American oil, and keep the Spill Fund flush with enough money to clean up the spill when it happens in his district!

Adrian Smith refuses, saying it would be better to include it in overall tax reform. (How many times have I used the word stupid, so far?)

More stupid Keystone XL stuff:

Last week I sat through a portion of the York County Commissioner meeting and listened to extremely well informed residents try their best to explain their issues about the pipeline. I also watched a well informed TransCanada representative address the board. It was clear to everyone in the room that the people who knew the least about the pipeline were the York County Commissioners! How is this possible?

A foreign corporation is about to slice open their (our) county from stem to stern and pump Diluted Bitumen (DilBit, or tar-sand) just a few feet from our surface waters, a couple hundred feet from some residents’ homes, and directly over the aquifer we use for drinking water and irrigation! With the exception of one stupid question about how long TransCanada would pay the county property taxes, (stupid only because the commissioners should have known by now), they sat there like deer in the headlights, concerned only about ending the meeting by noon.

By noon! I would call that stupid considering TransCanada uses terms like “forever” when talking about easements, and “40 years or more” when talking about the life of the pipe. The county commissioners are talking about “noon!” I think someone has their priorities in the wrong place. The commissioners missed a golden opportunity to educate themselves from a room of people who could have helped them understand the consequences of the KXL. So they better get in the game. This is a big deal!

More stupid Keystone XL stuff:

Remember when Sen. Johanns and Gov. Heineman wrote Washington complaining the Keystone XL was crossing the Ogallala Aquifer? Then TransCanada made its own big deal out of changing the route. Johanns and Heineman applauded TransCanada and quickly leaped into their lap. Here comes another “stupid”… TransCanada’s “new” route actually crosses more miles of the aquifer than its first route!

More stupid Keystone XL stuff:

Nebraskans, can’t we all agree that it is stupid to run a 36 inch DilBit pipeline carrying hazardous material directly over and in some cases directly through the Ogallala Aquifer, easily the state’s single most valuable resource, when it is absolutely unnecessary?

I fully understand TransCanada wanting to get its customers’ oil to the Texas refineries. I understand they want to do this as cheaply as possible, which is to run the pipe on the most direct route from Alberta, Canada to Steel City, Nebraska.

What I don’t understand is TransCanada’s unwillingness to recognize that Nebraskans intend to protect the Ogallala Aquifer at all costs, and no amount of oil, property taxes or jobs can ever be traded for the very natural resource that makes life here possible.

It is just plain stupid to mix a tar-sand oil pipeline and the Ogallala Aquifer. I know it. I think you know it. I think TransCanada knows it, but doesn’t care about it. Our Governor and U.S. Senator once knew it, and our Congressman knows it, but refuses to do anything about it. And that is just plain stupid!

Finally, the last thing I have learned is that the people know a lot more about this stupid pipeline than do York County Commissioners, United States Representatives, U.S. Senators and Governors. So Nebraskans, now left with a complete leadership void, will have to fight this one ourselves.

The Holt County Supervisors just passed a resolution opposing tar sand oil pipelines. If you feel York should do the same, here is the contact info for the York County Board of Commissioners. Knock yourself out!

Tom Shellington
17 Arbor Heights
York, NE 68467
(402) 362-4382
Email: shelltw@windstream.net

Bill Bamesberger
705 Highland Road
Henderson, NE 68371
(402) 723-5740
Email: billb@mainstaycomm.net

Paul Buller
1007 Road H
York, NE 68467
(402) 362-2442
Email: No email!

Kurt Bulgrin
714 Road U
Waco, NE 68460
(402) 366-6458
Email: kurtbulgrin@hotmail.com

Jack Sikes
1329 E. Nobes Road
York, NE 68467
(402) 362-2178
Email: jsikes4171@yahoo.com

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A loyal York News-Times reader dropped off an interesting article the other day. It was a “report” or newsletter from a Nebraska congressman. He was writing about what a mess it is in Washington and how Congress can’t get along,

He said, “Nebraskans are eager for change, believing that changes in many policies and programs are long overdue.”

On the back of the congressman’s newsletter were poll results taken from 25,000 people who took the time to voice their opinion.

Some of the questions and answers are:

Would you favor eliminating Saturday mail delivery if it would save tax dollars? Fifty-five percent said yes.

Are you willing to accept substantial cuts in federal spending if the cuts seem to be equitably shared by all segments of society? A whopping 86 percent said yes.

Do you favor an increase in the share of the federal budget devoted to defense related items? Sixty-two percent said yes.

Would you favor mandatory registration of all privately owned handguns in the United States? Only 49 percent said yes.

In view of the continued rise in hospital care, would you support mandatory cost controls imposed by the federal government on hospitals? Fifty-three percent said yes.

Do you favor gradually raising the eligibility age for full Social Security retirement benefits? Only 31 percent said yes.

There were other stories the congressman covered in his newsletter. He spoke about the federal budget process as being the most controversial and confusing exercises in government. He writes about how we need to cut spending, but Washington is engaged in a monumental “tug of war” on budget issues.

He also discusses how we need complete and thorough tax reform, saying the nation’s economic problems can be traced to the ever-increasing tax burden on all its citizens.

So here’s my question. Are you the one in 10 who thinks Congress is doing a good job, because their job approval rating is near only 10 percent? As the congressman points out, we the people are fed up with the inability of Washington to govern, to solve the nation’s problems, and to set a course for a positive and prosperous future.

The fact is most of our problems today are the fault of Washington’s failures. Congress is very good at pointing out the problems. It is very bad at solving them.

Do you need proof? Well here’s some proof for you.

The congressman writing this newsletter was Representative Doug Bereuter. It is a four-page newsletter he sent to Nebraskans in the summer of 1981. That was 32 years ago folks. Rep Bereuter was complaining about the very same problems that exist today because all they did for the past three decades was to talk about the problems and make promises to fix them.

Bereuter was complaining about the large federal budget of $695 billion (in 1981) that it would take to run the country. Today we spend that amount in only 69 days as our federal budget is now near $4 trillion dollars a year.

And with all that extra money taken from our pockets and sent to theirs in Washington, you would think they could do something with all those dollars that would garner the respect of more than one in 10 Americans.

Can you believe that in 1981 Congress was trying to fix Social Security, cope with the post office’s financial problems, legislate gun registration, reduce federal spending, properly fund the military and struggle to balance the federal budget?

This 31-year-old newsletter could have been written yesterday, as all those issues still exist today, proving Congress is not only inept, but incapable. The time has come to stop talking and start fixing, and it must begin with the voters who need to stop listening to empty promises and start demanding that we don’t face another 32 years like the past 32.

If the current crop of Nebraska representation, Johanns, Fischer, Smith, Terry and Fortenberry can’t right the wrongs, then we need to fire them and hire someone else who can. Shame on them. Shame on us.

With all due respect to Rep. Doug Bereuter, it is obvious his newsletter written in the summer of 1981 vividly points out that Congress’ biggest problem is… Congress!

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Most of you have played poker at one time or another.

You risk treasure in hopes of benefiting by holding the winning hand. That’s what is happening between TransCanada and Nebraskans. They want us to risk our most valuable treasures, land and water, while all the time they hold the winning hand that will benefit them by the billions.
C – Cornerstone Bank

Finally the table stakes have risen too high, as more Nebraskans are unwilling to gamble on a foreign company’s word that a 36-inch pipe full of poison chemicals will have no impact on our land and water, forever.

And to make things worse, the people of Nebraska are playing with a short deck. All the Jacks, Queens and Kings (Federal Representatives, Senators and the Governor) have gone to the TransCanada side of the table. Nebraskans have tried to go to the draw but have pulled a pair of real losers in Adrian Smith and Lee Terry.

Adrian thinks pumping toxic oil through his district is fine. He also doesn’t want to put the eight cents per barrel tax on Canadian oil right now, even though American oil has to pay the tax to replenish the Oil Spill Liability Trust Fund, which could be tapped in case of a large spill. He has yet come up with a logical explanation for that one.

Lee Terry, knowing the final public hearing would be in Nebraska, bulldozed ahead with his short-sighted legislation to bypass the State Department, nullifying our voices and obviously not giving a damn about what Nebraskans would say at the public hearing. How disgusting is that?

It is time to stop being politically correct with these two. In regards to the Keystone XL, Adrian Smith has been about effective as a plunger in an outhouse, while Lee Terry needs to run off and join the circus where his talent as a clown will get the respect he can’t get from folks who desperately want to protect our land and water.

And while we are at it, Governor Heineman and Senator Mike Johanns were the two who wrote Obama and Clinton expressing their deep concerns over the pipe’s original route through the aquifer, only to completely flip-flop when TransCanada did its so called “re-route” where it now plans to go over even more miles of the Ogallala Aquifer!

If they used their heads on this critical issue, one could only assume it was so their mouths could make noise, their brains could hold their hair up, while their ears were of no use at all, as they too made up their minds before the final public hearing in Grand Island.

Oh, then we have Sen. Deb Fischer, a self proclaimed land and water lover. She told the Lincoln Journal Star last week that the Obama administration should “move ahead” with the proposed Keystone XL pipeline.

In the same interview she said, Obama should “review comments made at the final hearing.” Which is it Deb, move ahead, or listen to the people? The Third District put her in office and now she wants a foreign corporation to slice us open like a butchered hog, place a poison tube right through our middle, sew us back up and tell us to go home and we’ll be OK? Deb needs to take a trip to Kalamazoo, Mich., and Mayflower, Ark., then get back to us.

Let’s get serious. The nation’s final KXL environmental hearing was held at the same venue as the Nebraska State Fair. Had this been an actual state fair, this current crop of elected officials would have been thicker than flies over at the bovine barn. But their minds were made up and nothing their constituents would say, nor over 800,000 comments submitted to the State Department, means anything to them. That says a lot about their view of democracy, doesn’t it?

Their absence was a glaring embarrassment on a day when the nation came to Nebraska to listen to the people, and our state leaders didn’t want to hear a word.

Now that the environmental phase is closing, the final phase in the review process begins. That is to determine whether the Keystone XL is in the “national interest” of the United States of America.

Eight different federal agencies will weigh in, along with a comment period for the citizens. But once again, Nebraska’s Washington contingency will lend deaf ears to the debate because they have already made up their minds.

Over the coming weeks we’ll be addressing why a foreign company, TransCanada, whose only interest is to ship foreign oil to the coast of Texas where it will be refined and much of it loaded on ships destined to foreign markets, is neither in the best interest of the U.S. nor the state of Nebraska. It would be nice if we could have that conversation with open-minded Nebraska politicians, but they have played their cards and left the parlor.

In Kenny Rogers’ famous ballad he sings, “You got to know when to hold’em, know when to fold’em, know when to walk away, know when to run …” Last week’s public hearing clearly shows Nebraskans are no where close to walking away from this issue, showing TransCanada we’ll be staying strong until “the dealin’s done!”

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In 10 days the entire international oil industry will be focused on a small rural town in Nebraska.

Or will it?

On April 18, 2013, the U.S. State Department will hold the nation’s final Keystone XL public hearing in Grand Island, Nebraska.

In conjunction with the hearing, the public has been submitting electronic comments to the State Department for weeks, but there is one small catch. The State Department won’t make these “public” comments public!

It seems the State Department contracted with a company to handle all these comments, a company called Environmental Resources Management (ERM), ironically the same company TransCanada hired to help them with their environmental study.

ERM will then roll all these comments up in a nice tidy package to be used by President Obama and John Kerry when they finally make the decision on the Keystone XL.

Now we find out the public comments will not be made public unless a Freedom of Information request is filed with the State Department, and the chance of receiving any information before the pipeline decision will most likely be too late! This smells worse than toxic odors in the Mayflower, Ark., tar-sand spill!

You might ask why Obama and Secretary of State John Kerry must decide. Two reasons: (1) the pipeline crosses an international border and (2) Obama and Kerry must determine if the foreign company’s (TransCanada) request to make billions by slicing open our nation’s heartland is in our “national interest.”

Listen folks, this pipeline is clearly not in the United States’ national interest. First of all it is a publicly held foreign company simply trying to make money for its stockholders.

Second of all it would be constructed to do one thing and one thing only: to pipe foreign oil to Texas refineries so it can be sold on the world market which is about 25 percent higher than the price tar-sand oil is selling for in Canada.

In other words the price of this oil will go up once it reaches our southern coast. Yet there are people, including Nebraska’s own Third District Congressman Adrian Smith, who tell us it may lower the price of fuel. What economics class did he take!

Will the Keystone XL create jobs? Sure it will, temporary ones, and nowhere close to the over-exaggerated claims made by TransCanada, politicians and the national media.

When the dust settles on the construction of this pending disaster, real numbers say it will create 35 permanent jobs in America, 13 of them in Nebraska according to the this state’s own DEQ report. By contrast a typical super Wal-Mart will employ nearly 200 people. Now you tell me is the Keystone XL is in our national interest?

Some folks say because Canada is one of our largest trading partners, denying the pipe will make them mad. Hey, Canada doesn’t own that oil, oil companies do, and don’t for a minute think all those oil companies are in Canada and the U.S. China has already invested billions of dollars into the Canadian tar sands, as has Korea, Thailand, France, England and the Netherlands.

That’s who owns the oil that will be pumping through Nebraska’s Sandhills and the Ogallala aquifer! National interest? Certainly, but whose? Not ours, that is for certain!

So, let’s talk about safety. TransCanada would have us believe this pipe, nine times larger than the pipeline that spilled in Arkansas, will be safe. But Scientific American reported just last week that “pipelines in the upper Midwest that routinely carry oil from tar sands have spilled 3.6 times more oil per pipeline mile than the U.S. average.”

The facts are that pipeline companies are having a very difficult time keeping this highly pressurized DilBit oil inside the pipes, evident by major spills in the Yellowstone River, the ongoing disaster in the Kalamazoo River and now the Mayflower, Ark., spill, along with dozens of other smaller spills.

TransCanada talks about how it can detect leaks and shut down the pipeline. But in many cases the public finds the spills first.

In Michigan, the Enbridge control booth operators misread the readings for 17 hours, and never did detect the nearly 1,000,000 gallons of tar-sand oil that was gushing into Talmadge Creek, and ultimately into the Kalamazoo River. The public found the spill. Just imagine if that were to occur in the remote and sparsely populated Sandhills.

The bottom line is that big oil money, and millions of TransCanada dollars, have bought public opinion. We know big oil is a major contributor to political campaigns, and one could make the case that it has worked considering Nebraska’s entire Washington contingency and governor are in favor of the pipe.

Well, thank goodness for the people of Nebraska. Hundreds of courageous landowners and concerned citizens in our state have done nearly everything in their power to counter big money with common sense. Their love of the land is born from a pioneering spirit that is alive and well.

They have proven Nebraskans can make up our own minds, and they have shown our opinions are not for sale at any price! Had it not been for these brave stewards of the land, the Keystone XL may have already been buried in our soil, just ½ inch away from our water supplies.

Now these dedicated people, who have sorted through all the corporate and political spin to expose the real truths of this pipeline, and who are trying to save our most valuable resources from being decimated by a foreign company, deserve your support.

They will line up by the hundreds to testify. Their comments won’t be hidden from public view because the York News-Times will be there in your behalf, when they gather a week from Thursday in the small Midwestern town of Grand Island, Nebraska to fight for all of us.

Publisher’s note: Let this editorial serve as an invitation to York’s mayor, the entire city council, York county commissions, Speaker of the state legislature, state senators, Nebraska’s federal congressmen and senators and our governor to attend this final opportunity to hear from the people who put them in office. There could be nothing on their respective pubic calendars more important than this project which will have a lasting and potentially dangerous effect Nebraskans. Let’s see if they can show the courage of their constituents and be in Grand Island on April 18, to hear the people of this great state.

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I hope I can keep my propensity to use four letter words to a minimum, because right now I am mad.

I just finished reading an Omaha World-Herald article about Adrian Smith and his ill-conceived views on the Keystone XL pipeline.

The article states, “Smith told The World-Herald last week that he has been impressed with what he’s heard about the environmental safeguards that come with the Keystone XL pipeline.” Can you believe that! Adrian has been consistently saying he would base his determination on science, but now says “what he hears” is good enough.

I am guessing what he hears is mostly from TransCanada, the foreign company that wants to slice Nebraska wide open to transport Canadian tar-sand oil, complete with toxins that kill, to the Gulf of Mexico so it can be refined and exported. If Smith was truly listening, he could hear the hundreds of Third District landowners who are desperate to have their congressman help save the Sandhills and the Ogallala Aquifer forever.

Adrian also says, “We know that we want to protect a tremendous natural resource, that being the aquifer and water in general, and we can do that with a good amount of technology.” Or, Mr. Congressman, you could stand with the courage of your constituents and demand they avoid the Sandhills and aquifer all together.

I think what upsets me more than what was written in the OWH article, was the stuff not written.

Surely the reporter knew Adrian Smith voted for the new Pipeline Safety Bill that was signed into law early in 2012. That bill requires two federal studies directly aimed at the tar-sand DilBit oil. One studies the corrosiveness of DilBit to see how it affects the pipe.

The other studies the leak detection practices of pipeline companies. Both must be followed by a review period and regulatory process that won’t be done for a couple years, yet Smith wants to bury the pipe now. I wouldn’t call that basing his decision on science, would you?

Surely the reporter knew that Adrian sits on the powerful House Ways and Means Committee. This committee, back in 1980, declared tar-sand to be neither oil nor petroleum, so when an “anonymous company” recently asked the IRS to make a ruling on tax liabilities based on current law, the IRS had no choice but to rule the 36 million gallons of this toxic brew, gushing just a half inch away from Nebraska’s Ogallala Aquifer every day, will not be subject to the eight cents per barrel Oil Spill Liability Trust Fund Tax.

(American oil has to pay this tax, but the Canadian tar-sand oil gets a free pass, thanks to Adrian’s House Ways and Means Committee determination.)

Adrian has been informed that a spill in Nebraska similar to the one in Michigan could cost up to a billion dollars to repair and restore, and TransCanada is only liable for the first $350 million. After that, the Oil Spill Liability Trust Fund is tapped, but remember, based on Adrian’s committee, the Canadian oil going through the Keystone XL does not have to pay the $23 million a year tax to replenish the fund … only American oil has to pay.

We have asked Adrian to change that provision. He is reluctant to do so, saying he might have to get the Department of Transportation and Department of Energy involved. All right then Mr. Smith, as one well known Nebraskan might say, “Git-er-done!”

We don’t need more ‘timid’ from you on this issue.

March into the next House Ways and Means Committee meeting and say, “Ladies and Gentlemen, we have a problem. I am not about to sit around and let this dangerous oil pass though the nation’s largest fresh water aquifer and cross all of Nebraska’s major waterways without contributions to the Oil Spill Fund. That’s not right and everyone in this room knows it.”

That’s what a leader would do and it’s what we desperately need from you!

But the chances of that happening are about as likely as the chance the pipe won’t leak – slim to none. Instead, Adrian says about the pipeline opponents, “… some people simply don’t want to add any more fossil fuels to the nation’s energy supply.”

That may be true. Some people don’t. But if you, Adrian, had been listening to Nebraskans instead of Canadians, you would have heard loud and clear the issue in your home state of Nebraska has never been about oil. Had you been listening, you would have known all along it is about water.

Well, now Congressman Adrian Smith, you have your chance. On April 18, the State Department will conduct the last hearing in the United States of America on the Keystone XL pipeline. Know where it is going to be? It will be in the largest city in your Third District, Grand Island.

And since you are basing your decision on what you “hear,” then I am sure there is no way you would miss this public hearing. I mean, how could a sitting congressman not take this opportunity to hear from hundreds and hundreds of your constituents regarding not just the issue of the day, but the issue of a lifetime in our state?

For crying out loud, do your %#@& job! (I knew I couldn’t make it all the way through this column without one of those four letter words.)

One last thing, Congressman Smith, since you should be there, you might want to ask Johanns and Fischer to tag along. It is obvious they have been listening to your pipeline sources as well, and a good dose of Nebraska common sense could do the both of them some good too.