Bill Maher once said most Americans are dumb and uneducated. But what's really frightening is, he wasn't kidding. Many of us really are.
Support for the Keystone XL pipeline reached a two-year high in the latest ABC News/ Washington Post poll, with the public overwhelmingly saying it would create jobs.
Two-thirds favor government approval of the pipeline, not realizing it will only move oil from Canada via the Gulf Coast refineries to China—and would not make America any more "energy independent", but would only further enrich investors like the Koch brothers (billionaires who are attempting to buy democracy).
But what especially shows how dumb Americans really are is that eighty-five percent of them believe the pipeline would create jobs (the media propaganda machine must be paying off).
Views that the pipeline would create a significant number of jobs far outstrip concerns that it poses a sizable environmental risk (like contaminating the water supply in the Great Plains). Notably, among those who see a risk, 45 percent still support the pipeline anyway, apparently persuaded by the perceived jobs benefit. Ha, ha, ha!
Per TransCanada (the Canadian corporation that is using eminent domain to steal land from American property owners), the Keystone XL would only create 20,000 jobs. Even if this were true, and even if all those jobs were permanent and full-time, that's not much of a "job creator" when considering the U.S. has close to 48 million Americans unemployed (if we were counting "discouraged workers", those who are no longer counted as part of the labor force).
Van Jones, the liberal co-host on CNN's Crossfire, made the claim that the Keystone pipeline creates "35 permanent jobs" after construction was completed, according to a government report.
Politifact looked at this claim and rated it TRUE:
"When looked at as an average annual job, it works out to about 3,900 jobs over one year of construction or 1,950 jobs each year for two years...the project would provide jobs for about 35 permanent employees and 15 temporary contractors."
Some people have argued that the pipeline is safer than trains and trucks for transporting this dirty and toxic oil through America's heartland; but why transport it at all if it's not going to be primarily used for domestic consumption, but instead is sold on the world market to profit a few wealthy uber-wealthy investors? What do average Americans get out of the deal besides a few measly jobs after taking such a huge risk to the poisoning of the water supply in the middle of their food belt?
Spoiler alert: NO. It will NOT reduce the cost of gas at the pump. That would only happen if we kept and hoarded all that oil, and we had a glut of oil, and an over-supply of oil—only then would it bring down the cost. But with China's growing middle-class buying so many cars, no matter how fuel-efficient we become, the demand for oil will still rise in China, keeping the price high for oil speculators and commodity manipulators like JPMorgan and the Koch brothers.
Some people have suggested that initiating a 3% "infrastructure tax" on people with annual incomes over $1 million a year (on both regular wages and capital gains income realized from stocks and CEO stock-option grants) would do far more to create millions of permanent and good-paying jobs—and would also do far more to lift the economy than by exporting America's natural resources to China.
Later Bill Maher said America IS a stupid country, and shows us further proof while referencing an article in Newsweek: "How Dumb are We?" Although, Yale political scientist Jacob Hacker notes: "The problem is ignorance, not stupidity. We suffer from a lack of information rather than a lack of ability."
Maybe more Americans could cure their ignorance and lack of information by learning to read—or reading a little bit more—and not just watching corporate-owned cable news shows, many who actively seeks to dumb down this country to push their own agenda.
UPDATE:
- Read my other post: China's Keystone XL Pipeline (Alan Grayson's take)
- ALSO: TransCanada is so afraid of this resistance they are urging police to treat protesters as terrorists, including an absurd glitter terror case in Oklahoma.
- ALSO: Read this update from Daily Kos for more
details about the jobs myth.
"U.S. International Trade in Goods and Services -- January 2014"
ReplyDeleteWe lost over a billion dollars per day in January, and this includes our trade in services. The nation's deficit in goods with the People's Republic of China increased to $27.8 billion in January from $24.5 billion in December. Note that the January import average price per barrel of crude oil ($90.21) was the lowest since February 2011 ($87.17).
www.census.gov/foreign-trade/Press-Release/current_press_release/ft900.pdf
On a similar note, this same 'jobs' argument is also made for more offshore drilling. The United States uses roughly 25% of the world’s oil, 7.5 billion barrels per year, but we have only 2% of the world’s proven oil reserves. The simple truth is we cannot drill our way to energy independence or lower gas prices. Offshore drilling would provide less than 10% of the oil we use in the United States. While we are all familiar with such political B.S. supported by the enormously profitable oil industry, as “drill here, drill now, pay less,” it’s simply not true. Americans are under the misconception that all oil drilled here would stay here and prices would be lower. The fact is opening new areas for offshore drilling would not save consumers a dime because all that oil would enter the world market to be bid by the highest bidder (China). Like the Keystone pipeline, all this drilling is nothing more than another temporary jobs program. I don’t have a problem with keeping a thousand people employed, but at least let's figure out if the benefit really outweighs the risk.
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