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Alec Baldwin calls for an 'Occupy Pipeline' movement
Actor urges people to protest the Keystone XL oil pipeline with a sit-in similar to the Wall Street demonstrations.
Thu, Oct 20 2011 at 3:28 PM
Photo: ZUMA Press
Could "Occupy Wall Street" spin off an "Occupy Pipeline" protest? According to Alec Baldwin, that may be the perfect recipe for magnifying the public outcry against the proposed $7 billion Keystone XL pipeline.
The project, which would stretch more than 1,700 miles from Canada's tar sands to refineries in the Gulf of Mexico, has been a target of environmental groups, with hundreds arrested last month outside the White House in protest. Celebrities including Mark Ruffalo, Daryl Hannah, Robert Redford, Kyra Sedgwick and Ian Somerhalder have spoken out against its construction.
"If approved, the pipeline construction would allow greater exploitation of the environmentally destructive tar sands, ripping up some of the world's last, most intact rain forests and wildlife habitat that has taken 10,000 years to evolve," Hannah wrote with Greenpeace director Philip Radford. "The pipeline also threatens communities along its route with toxic oil spills. And by opening a new source of highly polluting tar sands, it could cause even more global warming, as James Hansen and 19 other prominent climate scientists have warned. This is why Keystone XL is opposed by Nebraskan ranchers, communities near the dangerous refineries in Texas, the nation's largest environmental organizations, and so many more."
Yesterday, Baldwin joined the growing chorus fighting the pipeline by suggesting over Twitter that people converge on the project's HQ in Omaha, Neb. "Keystone Pipeline is HQ'ed in Omaha," he wrote, adding the hashtag: "#OccupyKeystonePipeline"
Baldwin, who recently visited with Occupy Wall Street protestors, also linked to a NY Times article that describes TransCanada’s threats against American property owners to use eminent domain to obtain the land for the project.
In a 2010 Huffington Post article written right after the historic spill in the Gulf, the 53-year-old expressed his disgust at Big Oil and urged Americans to push the country in a greener direction.
"The Gulf of Mexico, at least that part of it that is ours to maintain and fish and enjoy, belongs to every American," he wrote. "Just like the Great Lakes, the Grand Canyon, Monterey Bay, The Rocky Mountains, Cape Cod, Park Avenue, the Lincoln Memorial, the Little League ball field in your town, the place you have coffee at every morning, or take yoga or the place you go to have coffee and make fun of yoga. What is happening down there is happening to you and to me. Because resources like the Gulf ARE this country. They belong to us. And if you aren't so goddamned fed up with this crap from the oil industry that you want to scream, then maybe you need to have some tar balls fall out of the sky on to your front lawn before you get it."
To learn more about the environmental consequences of the pipeline, jump here.
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Really good interview on the Adam Carolla podcast today! Deff got to check it out http://bit.ly/sr2iDM
Ha! No one showed up to protest. Awesome star-power you have there...
you don't know what you're talking about. Exxon cleaned up the spill, paid for all of it and it wasn't major damage. do you know that wind farms kill HUNDREDS of THOUSANDS OF BIRDS every year......our footprint is not without effect, never has been. the cost of EPA regulations is killing jobs and our effort for energy independence.
Alec would have a hard time finding an oil pipeline, let alone protest one. They are all of 36 inches wide and far less conspicuous than a windmill farm. The also don't kill the wildlife or disrupt migration patterns. Oh yeah, they also provide cheap fuel and tens of thousands of jobs.
Keep pretending you're a business exec, Alec, and let the real job creators do the hard work.
I suppose Mr. Baldwin will be getting to the protest on horseback?
And I am sure all of your computers are powered by gerbils running on a treadmill. What a bunch of hypocrits.
Pipelines are the safest way to transport fossil fuels until technology leads us to the next energy source.
It's too late anyway to say something they've been building for over a year already laid in the ground :(
Alex, to you personally!! Be as Brave as Daryl Hannah and Put your liberal ass where your mouth is, go get arrested!!!
I have a testimony and a solution to this problem: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100001314918976#!/note.php?note_....
This is a one page briefing with a growing list of sources.
I'd have to hear the facts about any environmental issues from a more reliable source before I would be against the pipeline. No offense, but all of these Green Peace and Al Gore fanatics tend to exaggerate the facts a bit when they set out with their noble cause.
How about straight from the people who are in KXL's path?
http://tarsandspipelines.wordpress.com/
Where would you get your facts? Fox news? Any other oil industry sponsored media outlet? Don't kid yourself, news is controlled by the corporations, and do their best to cover up any pipeline spills and do their best to distract us with stories of cute kittens and bad mothers.
Sure go ahead and do something stupid like that. Violating people's private property rights and demonstrating that you are against progress and development. And then you can wonder why gas prices are high and unemployment is as well.
Steve, the reason gas prices are so high is not because there is a lack of pipelines. Trust me I have first hand witnessed technology that would put an end to refining oil. Technology is suppressed. Oil is a means of control. Why do you open your mind a little and start viewing other perspectives. Why do you stop believing everything you read and go out and do your own research, then you won't say such foolish things.