Home / General / Our Solution to the Ukraine Problem? Keystone!

Our Solution to the Ukraine Problem? Keystone!

Comments

By Erik Loomis

On March 6, 2014

At 7:07 am

In General

486 Views

Paul Ryan may be slightly disingenuous:

“I think when you have the world’s super power, having a foreign policy that in my opinion is weak, and a defense policy now that shows weakness, I think it invites aggression,” he added. “I think it creates a vacuum that is filled by these types of actions.”
Bolduan pressed Ryan on what Congress could do in response to international crisis.
“Well, I think we should move forward on natural gas exports very quickly,” the former GOP vice presidential nominee insisted. “I think we should approve an LNG terminal in the east coast to go to Europe. I think we should approve the Keystone Pipeline. And I think we should show that the U.S. is going to be moving forward on becoming energy independent.”
“Moving forward with the Keystone pipeline!” Bolduan exclaimed. “That development would take years, though, to actually make that happen.”
Ryan argued that the controversial pipeline would be a “signal” to Russia.
“The signal is very, very important,” he declared. “And I think showing that this [invasion] is going to make us move in that direction helps give our allies the kind of resources they need, and reduces Russia’s grip on this.”

There’s no question that the one thing that will cower Putin is if Obama decides to pipe some Canadian fossil fuels through Nebraska to Gulf Coast posts. It’s hard to see how his Crimean policy can stand up to that bravery.

energy, keystone xl pipeline, paul ryan

N__B

If we use the greenhouse effect to turn the earth into a Venusian hellscape, then the Crimean problem will be solved.

Q. E. fucking D.
- McAllen
  
  Well obviously if we kill off all human life Putin won’t have the manpower to invade Ukraine. Really, Obama failing to accelerate global warming is his second Benghazi.
  - N__B
    
    if we kill off all human life Putin
    
    and Paul Ryan will still be alive.
Derelict

Honestly, I’m surprised that Ryan did not also plump for eliminating the Estate Tax and the Capital Gains Tax. Nothing strike fear into the heart of a commie like upper-tier tax cuts!
- KeithOK
  
  You forgot about regulatory relief. Tax atory relief will certainly be too much for them.
- Zachary Smith
  
  Sometimes my browser does the ‘replies’ correctly and sometimes it doesn’t, so this is a free-standing comment.
  
  A number of posts have already remarked about how Ryan is just a middling hack using any crisis to advance his nutty agenda. The best previous example I can recall was that of Tom DeLay:
  
  *** Nothing is more important in the face of a war than cutting taxes. ***
joe from Lowell

Here, let me try:

We can’t afford to look weak in the face of Russia’s aggression. Obama’s feckless foreign policy only invites this type of behavior. We need to immediately boost infrastructure spending and increase tax levels on dividend income. It will send a message to Vladimir Putin.
- J
  
  touché!
- Kurzleg
  
  Right. Yours is no more of a non-sequitur than Ryan’s. Sure, there’s a superficial plausibility to Ryan’s, but like most GOP policy prescriptions, it has little or nothing to do with the actual problem and everything to do with implementing their favored policies. Every crisis, real or imagined, is seen solely in terms of how it can be leveraged to implement the GOP agenda.
  - joe from Lowell
    
    Every crisis, real or imagined, is seen solely in terms of how it can be leveraged to implement the GOP agenda.
    
    That’s a real problem, and I don’t see any way around it other than repealing Obamacare.
    - slavdude
      
      We also need a constitutional amendment to protect marriage. That’ll show ’em.
TT

I blame Obama’s refusal to negotiate and thus force GOP capitulation on the debt ceiling for inviting Putin’s aggression in Crimea. Nothing invites further thuggery quite like standing up to thuggery in the first place.
- Snarki, child of Loki
  
  Clearly Obama needs to take his response to GOP thuggery to the next level.
  
  Send Ryan and his ilk off to the FEMA gulag. That’ll be a signal that Putin understands!
Hogan

He pulls a knife, you pull a gun. He invades a country, you build a pipeline. It’s the Wisconsin way.
- Warren Terra
  
  Excellent.
- Gus
  
  Actually the Wisconsin way would involve getting drunk somewhere in there.
  - Aimai
    
    Plus: cheese.
  - Kurzleg
    
    Michael Feldman of “Whad’ya Know?” “fame” once claimed on his show that Wisconsin drank more brandy per capita than any other state.
    - wjts
      
      Mike Royko once proposed an alternative slate of events for the Winter Olympics. One of them was Wisconsin-style Snowmobiling, which involved guzzling a pint of blackberry brandy (plus beer chasers) before driving a nighttime course through woods, over patios, between phone poles, and under fences without getting decapitated.
      - Helmut Monotreme
        
        Wait …without getting decapitated? Cause it seems half the snowmobilers whose accidents I read about in the paper are doing it wrong.
        
        BigHank53
        
        The French judges would sneak out and move the wires down.
neal peart

Even the liberal Tom Friedman … http://www.nytimes.com/2014/03/05/opinion/friedman-why-putin-doesnt-respect-us.html?hp&rref=opinion
- rea
  
  You know he’s not compeltely babbling here–he’s calling for a carbon tax and investment in alternative energy.
  
  But he’s still suffering from the delusion that what is going on in the Ukraine is somehow all about us.
Tybalt

When former national candidates begin referring to importing Canadian natural gas as “energy independence”… I think we Canucks ought to registering some serious concern.
- c u n d gulag
  
  Look, you folks up North are smart, and said no to having that “Shit-funnel of Black Greasy, Sandy Death” ruin everything in its path, on its way to either of your coasts.
  
  So the energy companies knew immediately where to turn – America!
  
  Where there are more rubes, and the politicians are not only corrupt, but can be easily and cheaply bought!
  - Warren Terra
    
    either of your coasts
    
    I think it’s a cliche rather important to the Canadians that they have not two but three coasts (though I’ll concede one is of limited use for shipping).
    - DrS
      
      (though I’ll concede one is of limited use for shipping).
      
      For now…
- OzarkHillbilly
  
  What I want to know is how do we achieve real energy independence by selling it to others?
  - c u n d gulag
    
    FREEDUMB!!!!!
  - BigHank53
    
    If you translate “energy independence” from wingnutese, one of the possibilities is “billions of tax-free dollars in the Koch’s pockets”.
  - Epicurus
    
    Exactly! We’re not even importing this swill, the Canucks are going to sell it to China. Again, how does this benefit the US? Oh, it DOESN’T! Yet another political scam…when will we learn?
- Warren Terra
  
  Think of it as your chance to get rid of Alberta.
  - Rhino
    
    Hey, I’d rather live in Alberta than the USA… It’s sort of like how plague is preferable to Ebola.
c u n d gulag

American people, we have a “Plutocrat Gap!”

We must match ~~The USSR~~ Putin and Russia, Energy Oligarch and Plutocrat, for Energy Oligarch and Plutocrat!!

We simply MUST close that gap, and surpass Putin and the Russkies!!!

Our lives, our children’s lives, and the very existence of our “Exceptional” country, depend on it!!!!!
- Bartleby
  
  I can’t believe that film came out when it did. It’s still fucking great.
  - Kurzleg
    
    Yup. Terry Southern nailed it on that one.
jackrabbitslim

How is it that people talk about Putin like he has rational or logical reactions to anything? He’s a goddamn former KGB megalomaniacal dictator. If there’s a real-deal supervillain in the world right now, he’s the closest thing to it.
And I’m not talking about Paul Ryan here, because he’s just obviously so full of shit and shilling for his moneyed masters.
- c u n d gulag
  
  Authoritarian followers just LOOOOOOOOOOOOOVES them some strong Authoritarian leaders!!!
- Gregor Sansa
  
  The Koch brothers would like a word with you.
  
  (Yes I know the picture isn’t what people say but it’s too perfect anyway.)
  - LeeEsq
    
    The Koch brothers are like Lex Luthor in his corrupt CEO interpretation. Putin is more like a meglamoniac Silver Age villain.
  - jackrabbitslim
    
    Fair enough. There’s a very Kray brothers vibe to that.
- Aimai
  
  I don’t know why people think that Putin *isn’t* rational or logical, within his particular frame of reference. He wants to restore Russian greatness and control and Ukraine has always been part of that. The US frame of reference is completely irrelevant to him unless we make it relevant through sanctions or something, and even then its only as relevant as the sanctions are painful to people around Putin who Putin needs for other purposes. It was perfectly rational to try to force Ukraine to stay in the Russian sphere of influence.
  - jackrabbitslim
    
    So, I’ve been watching Vikings on the history channel and I feel like there’s a parallel there. You’re right that Putin’s actions make sense in those terms. I guess it seems easier to think of him as crazy than as a basically alien conqueror-type who gives no fucks what the world thinks. Because that shit is really scary.
    - Hogan
      
      Meh. The Cheney administration pretty much desensitized me to that.
    - Major Kong
      
      I think the original Russians were Vikings, so it kind of makes sense.
ChrisS

We’re talking about unchecked aggression here, dude. The Crimean Peninsula is not the issue here, Dude. I’m talking about drawing a line in the sand, Dude. A pipeLINE. Across this Pipeline, you do NOT … Also we should abolish Obamacare.
- Brandon
  
  This will not stand, ya know, this aggression will not stand, man.
- actor212
  
  Yes, a line in the sands of Kansas will surely prevent Putin from incursions into the Black Sea!
LeeEsq

Paul Ryan? Disingenuous? That simply can’t be possible. He is the most sincere person in all of politics.

The fact that Paul Ryan is disingenous unforuntately makes him a lot smarter than the average GOP congress-critter.
Brandon

He is not the first conservative I’ve seen argue that Obama should approve Keystone to show Putin who’s boss. Tar sands oil, natural gas to heat a continent, same difference right?
actor212

Ryan argued that the controversial pipeline would be a “signal” to Russia

So would dropping a nuke, but I don’t think we should do that either, ya putz.
- steverinoCT
  
  No one like us, I don’t know why,
  We may not be perfect, but Heaven knows we try…
Graham Shevlin

As has been pointed out elsewhere, the one thing that is likely to make Putin modify his approach would be a cutback in oil and gas and other Russian product purchases by Western countries, which would in turn reduce the ca#h flow of Putin and the rich guys around him that are beneficiaries of his implementation of “trickle-down”. Authoritarians like to dispense largesse to mollify the people and rivals. Take away that ability and they suddenly begin to look a lot less powerful, and that is often the beginning of the end of their time in charge.
- Kurzleg
  
  So, more fracking?
- dr. fancypants
  
  As has been pointed out elsewhere, the one thing that is likely to make Putin modify his approach would be a cutback in oil and gas and other Russian product purchases by Western countries…
  
  I’m having a hard time seeing how western countries refusing to buy Russian oil and gas matters one whit. Since we’re talking fungible goods here, we’re not going to drive down the price for Russian hydrocarbons by buying someone else’s, unless no one is buying their oil.
  - Hogan
    
    Ah, but what if we buy all the oil in the world EXCEPT the oil from Russia? THAT would show them.
Sly

If 9/11 proved anything, it was that the Bush Tax Cuts ought to have been made permanent and we shouldn’t allow for prescription drug re-importation.
Helmut Monotreme

Every crazy act on the part of petro states abroad is seen as a reason to double down on carbon energy in the US. The problem isn’t their carbon vs our carbon it’s carbon in general. The wholesale adoption of a sensible blend of renewable energy sources, would mean we could tell the oil and fossil fuel exporters of the world to drink it for all we care.
Malaclypse

“And we MUST build the Keystone Pipeline” will never have the same ring as “And Carthage must be destroyed.”
Rob in CT

Look, obviously Keystoneghazious is the key to all this. The IRS should head up the effort.

There, that makes just as much sense as GOPers have been making on Ukraine.
hickes01

One of my favorite Koch/Fox News themes of the summer was that we had to build the Keystone pipeline or China was going to steal the oil. I literally screamed at my TV, “How the fuck is the oil going to reach China if there is no pipeline!”.
keta

A friendly reminder that the annual “Which Douchenozzle Can Utter the Stupidest Fucking ThingaThon,” aka CPAC, is now under way. My guess is that this Ryan Keystone comment won’t even crack the top ten when the whole shebang is over.

Oh look! Ryan’s upping his game in an effort to make the medal round!
- Kurzleg
  
  He then told a story of a “young boy from a very poor family” who received free lunches at school “from a government program.”
  
  “He didn’t want a free lunch,” Ryan insisted. “He wanted his own lunch, one in a brown paper bag, just like the other kids.”
  
  “He wanted one, he said, because he knew a kid with a brown paper bag had someone who cared for him. This is what the left does not understand.”
  
  Or C. he doesn’t get any lunch at all. It’s almost like Ryan hasn’t heard about childhood hunger.
  - Jeremy
    
    The idea that we want to prevent kids from having “a full stomach and an empty soul” really seems to get Maslow’s hierarchy of needs backwards. But it does seem perfectly in line with Donner Party conservatism.
Pingback: Paul Ryan Can See Russia From His Pet Political Issue | Konfeksiyon Tekstil()