BFT3K

It's not more efficient - that's the point. Why should we enable a foreign corporation to transport the dirtiest of goop across US land, only to be sold on the international market?

Are you American? Do you think Americans should have to bow down to foreign corporations?

Amendments were added to the bill by the Dems, but were rejected by the anti-American Koch sucking party...

Republicans have been trying to convince the American people that the Keystone XL pipeline will reduce our dependence on foreign oil and that it will create American jobs. Yet on Tuesday they voted to table an amendment introduced by Sen. Edward Markey (D-MA) and Sen Tammy Baldwin (D-WI) that would have required keeping the pipeline oil in the United States for domestic use. Republicans unanimously rejected bringing up the amendment to a floor vote. So much for reducing America?s dependence on foreign oil. As critics have repeatedly pointed out, the proposed Keystone XL pipeline will not reduce U.S. dependence on foreign oil because the oil will be exported, after it passes through America?s midsection. Republicans proved that point by explicitly voting down any efforts to keep the pipeline oil here.

Republicans also rejected an amendment proposed by Sen. Al Franken (D-MN) to require that if the pipeline is approved, it must be built with American iron and steel. Every Republican, except North Carolina Senator Richard Burr, voted to table that amendment as well. So much for caring about American jobs. Every Democratic Senator approved of the Franken amendment, including pipeline supporters like Heidi Heitkamp (ND), Joe Donnelly (IN), Mark Warner (VA), Joe Manchin (WV), Claire McCaskill (MO), and Jon Tester (MT). Every Democratic Senator except Heitkamp, Warner, and Manchin also supported the Markey-Baldwin amendment.