What did Big Oil know and when did they know it?

According to multiple sources the State Department will issue its long awaited Final Environmental Impact Statement on the Keystone XL tar sands pipeline later today.

The early spin today is that “environmentalists will be disappointed”.  But consider the source.   Last week, Jack Gerard, the head of the American Petroleum Institute, told Reuters that  “It’s our expectation it will be released next week” Apparently Gerard cited sources within the administration.

“We’re expecting to hear the same conclusion that we’ve heard four times before: no significant impact on the environment,” Gerard said.

Two facts are important here:

1)   Jack Gerard is saying the pipeline won’t impact the environment.  This is about as surprising as the sun setting in the west.

2)   Jack Gerard was apparently briefed by “sources within the Administration” on the timing and content of the report.  Before the environmental community.  Before Congress.  Before anyone else.

If that doesn’t prove once and for all what a corrupt process this has been, I don’t know what will.  The oil industry, which has had this process rigged since the word go, are the first to know, because of their cozy and corrupt role in this process.

Even so, the report that comes out today may in fact show what we already know, that the Keystone XL pipeline will by any measure fail the President’s own climate test. Even a corrupt process like the one we’ve seen can’t beat back such a fundamental truth.

Last June, President Obama noted that he and others in Washington needed to be less concerned with ‘well connected donors, and more concerned with the judgment of posterity.’ And in the recent State of the Union, he implored, “It should be the power of our vote, not the size of our bank account, that drives our democracy.”

We intend to hold the President to his word.