In British Columbia in western Canada, massive and widespread opposition has emerged to try to stop another pipeline intended to bring molten tar sands oil from central Alberta to an oil tanker port in Vancouver on the Puget Sound. On October 22, thousands of people took to the streets of the provincial capitol Victoria to make their views known to the provincial legislature and Premier Christy Clark. Two days later the protest spread across the province as more than 60 local communities joined hands in solidarity against the pipeline plan, with significant media attention
Texas Land Commissioner Calls Blockaders "Eco-anarchists"
An elected official, Texas Land Commissioner Jerry Patterson, called the blockaders names in an October 16 op-ed piece that begins, inaccurately: "I've recently learned that a bunch of out-of-state, self-appointed "eco-anarchists' think they know better than Texans and have arrived to save us from ourselves. They're trying to block the Keystone Pipeline Gulf Coast Project, the pipeline that's under construction in East Texas that will create thousands of jobs and lessen our dependence on foreign oil."
This provoked a number of hostile letters and comments in opposition in the Dallas Morning News and elsewhere around the state. The Tar Sands Blockade is a native Texan effort with supporters from other states.
National mainstream media coverage, like the Times, has been spotty and behind the curve: on October 15, the Washington Post "discovered" the three-week old civil disobedience in the treetops; on October 17 an Associated Press report said "a battle is brewing over an unlikely project, an oil pipeline;" and on October 19 the Los Angeles Times reported on 78 year old Eleanor Fairchild's October 4 arrest (with actress Daryl Hannah) to protest the pipeline's damage to her farm and livelihood.
Regional mainstream media coverage has been somewhat more attentive, with the Fort Worth Weekly running a lengthy, balanced overview piece on October 17. Similarly, regional TV has aired some coverage, but the Tar Sands Blockade of TransCanada's pipeline has apparently not yet been covered by any national TV news network or program.
(Note: You can view every article as one long page if you sign up as an Advocate Member, or higher).
