STOP THE PIPELINE! Sit-In At the White House

[Guest Catastrophic Spilling]

As you know, the planet is steadily warming: 2010 was the warmest year on record, and we’ve seen the resulting chaos in almost every corner of the earth.

And as you also know, our democracy is increasingly controlled by special interests interested only in their short-term profit.

These two trends collide this summer in Washington, where the State Department and the White House have to decide whether to grant a certificate of ‘national interest’ to some of the biggest fossil fuel players on earth. These corporations want to build the so-called ‘Keystone XL Pipeline’ from Canada’s tar sands to Texas refineries.

To call this project a horror is serious understatement. The tar sands have wrecked huge parts of Alberta, disrupting ways of life in indigenous communities—First Nations communities in Canada, and tribes along the pipeline route in the U.S. have demanded the destruction cease. The pipeline crosses crucial areas like the Oglalla Aquifer where a spill would be disastrous—and though the pipeline companies insist they are using ‘state of the art’ technologies that should leak only once every 7 years, the precursor pipeline and its pumping stations have leaked a dozen times in the past year. These local impacts alone would be cause enough to block such a plan. But the Keystone Pipeline would also be a fifteen hundred mile fuse to the biggest carbon bomb on the continent, a way to make it easier and faster to trigger the final overheating of our planet, the one place to which we are all indigenous.

Where: Lafeyette Park, 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue

When: 10:30 AM – 11:30 AM

Visuals: Over 50 people arrested in-front of the White House with “Yes We Can / Stop the Pipeline” Banners and more.

Spokespeople at the protest include a number of Gulf Coast residents, who have seen first hand the damage an oil spill can cause, will be at the White House to warn fellow Americans of the dangers posed by the Keystone XL. The proposed pipeline could cause a BP style oil disaster in America’ heartland, directly over the Ogallala Aquifer, a source of drinking water for over 20 million people.

Aaron Viles, the director of Healthy Gulf, is one of the leaders of the Gulf delegation to the protest and will be available for interviews beginning at 10:30 AM in Lafeyette Park across from the White House. He has appeared on CNN, the PBS NewsHour, NBC News, CNBC, to speak about ongoing efforts to clean up the damage done by the BP disaster.

http://www.tarsandsaction.org/schedule/