China promised to phone Obama and thank him........

February 9, 2012


Just
as he promised he would do if the United States rejected the Keystone
XL pipeline, Prime Minister Stephen Harper headed to Beijing earlier
this week on a four-day trade mission in which he is expected to seek a
deal to sell millions of barrels of Canadian oil to China. Since China
is aggressively pursuing energy deals around the world to support its
economic expansion, expect Harper to come home with an official
signature on the dotted line.
Harper is accompanied on the mission by dozens
of Canadian business executives, including several from Syncrude, the
consortium that produces thousands of barrels of oil daily from the
Athabasca oil sands. That's the place the Keystone XL pipeline --
proposed by TransCanada, another north-of-the-border energy giant --
would have funneled 700,000 barrels per day to the United States, if not
for Obama's rejection. Some portion of the estimated 20,000 new jobs
that would have been created here will also be exported to China.
Meanwhile, here in the United States, besides
continued high unemployment, drivers endured the most expensive January
gas prices ever, according to the Los Angeles Times. "January is
typically a month of falling gasoline prices because fuel demand falters
in the slower travel weeks that follow the year-end holidays," the
Times reports. "Not so this year."
The nationwide average price of regular gas
was $3.37 per gallon last month, compared with $2.71 in January 2010 -- a
24 percent increase. And things are going to get tougher for gasoline
buyers because prices traditionally rise in February and March as spring
approaches. That's when refiners must switch over to more expensive
federally mandated formulas that result in slightly lower emissions.
According to USA Today, energy experts expect prices to be in the
$4-per-gallon range this summer.
Obama rejected Keystone over purported
environmental concerns, which had in fact been addressed already during
the three-year review of the project by the State Department. But just
two years ago, Obama's State Department approved a similar pipeline
constructed by yet another Canadian firm -- the Alberta Clipper by
Enbridge. At the time, State said approval was granted because "the
department found that the addition of crude oil pipeline capacity
between Canada and the United States will advance a number of strategic
interests of the United States. These included increasing the diversity
of available supplies among the United States' worldwide crude oil
sources." It also didn't hurt that several thousand "shovel-ready jobs"
were created, at no cost to taxpayers, at a time when U.S. unemployment
was above 10 percent.
An estimated 10,000 conservatives are
attending the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) today. The
Keystone issue and Obama's feckless energy policy should weigh heavily
on their minds as they consider the importance of conservative unity
this fall behind his opponent, whoever it may be. There is no reason why
Harper should ever have had to add Keystone to his agenda in China this
week.http://washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/op-eds/2012/02/canadas-harper-talks-oil-china-us-faces-4-gas/253826