tar sands

"But I thought it was a done deal." So wrote a member in response to our amazingly successful campaign to collect public comments against the Keystone XL tar sands pipeline.

I wrote back to encourage her, and it got me thinking of how any time corporate power wants somethiing, companies declare that it has already happened and is inevitable. If something like Keystone XL is a "done deal," then why it isn't it done yet?

Big Oil not only gets more than $10 billion each year in taxpayer subsidies, it has a special tax loophole that lets its get away with importing dirty tar sands oil without paying taxes on it, leaving the government's oil spill disaster fund high and dry.

Coming to a river near you: self-regulated tar sands pipeline owners who would rather ignore pipeline corroision than prevent costly and damaging spills.