OPINION - Shields and Brooks 11/6/2015

"Shields and Brooks on Keystone pipeline politics, Ben Carson claims" PBS NewsHour 11/6/2015

Excerpt

SUMMARY:  President Obama rejected the Keystone XL pipeline after seven years, and the October jobs report offered a brighter labor outlook.  Judy Woodruff discusses the week’s news with syndicated columnist Mark Shields and New York Times columnist David Brooks, including claims about Ben Carson’s past, questions about Marco Rubio’s finances and revelations in a new biography about George H.W. Bush.

JUDY WOODRUFF (NewsHour):  But, first, a White House decision finally on the Keystone pipeline, a rough week for some Republican candidates, and wins for conservatives on Election Day.

First, we turn to the analysis of Shields and Brooks.  That’s syndicated columnist Mark Shields and New York Times columnist David Brooks.

Gentlemen, welcome.

MARK SHIELDS, syndicated columnist:  Judy.

JUDY WOODRUFF:  It’s great to have you here.

So, that Keystone pipeline decision, David, the president finally — seven years later, we now know he’s against it.

DAVID BROOKS, New York Times:  Yes.  Well, first of all, it could be mythical.  With oil prices so low, they might never build it anyway.  So, it really doesn’t matter at some level.

But pretending it matters, I do think it’s an anti-environmental, anti-science move.  His State Department and many other experts decided, if the oil is going to come out of the sands, it’s a lot cleaner to have it go through the pipeline than to put on trains or trucks and send it over to China through ships that way.

And, so, if the oil comes out of the sands, which it’s going to do if it makes economic sense, we might as well do it in the cleanest way possible.  So, to me, this is just a political decision to placate some people who he’s offended with some of his other decisions.

JUDY WOODRUFF:  Political decision, Mark?

MARK SHIELDS:  I don’t think anyone could accuse the President of being impulsive.  It was seven years, five exhaustive studies.

(LAUGHTER)

MARK SHIELDS:  And I think it became a symbol for both sides, bigger than it was really.

I don’t think it was going to be an environmental disaster.  And I don’t think, with gasoline $2 a gallon cheaper than it was the day that Barack Obama was nominated, the urgency had abated.