IN RESPONSE to a Washington Post article about the Keystone XL oil pipeline, Rep. Henry A. Waxman (D-CA) wrote:

The pipeline editorial rests on the premise that this carbon-intensive fuel will get to market with or without Keystone XL. But this is highly questionable. There are multiple legal and political hurdles before a large pipeline could be built to Canada's west coast, including unified opposition from more than 70 First Nations with aboriginal land and water rights in the pipeline and tanker routes. That is why Alberta's energy minister said in June that without new pipelines "our greatest risk in Alberta is that by 2030 we will be landlocked."

What is certain is that if the pipeline is built across the United States, the life-cycle carbon emissions of our fuel supply will increase significantly. This year's weather disasters underscore the folly of such a policy. We should be cutting carbon pollution to protect American families from irreversible climate change, not increasing our reliance on the dirtiest source of oil available.

So it's okay to kill jobs in Canada as well as the U.S. to protect us from ourselves.