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Subscribe to RSSIt’s not just Benghazi anymore.
One of the most controversial energy projects in the nation also has become a flash point in the drama surrounding who may become the next secretary of state – and it’s coming from the left instead of the right.
Back on Nov. 28, “OnEarth,” published by the Natural Resources Defense Council, dug into U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice’s financial disclosures and found that she and her husband have a stake in TransCanada, the company pushing for the Keystone XL Pipeline to be built.
NRDC officials say it's an important issue that must be discussed during the nomination process. But the timing of the report raises questions, as it is being surfaced by an environmental activist community that has previously given support to another potential secretary of state candidate – Massachusetts Sen. John Kerry.
NBC News' Mark Murray explains why the partisan divide over the potential nomination of U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice is intensifying.
The decision on whether to approve the pipeline goes through the State Department.
“If confirmed by the Senate, one of Rice’s first duties likely would be consideration, and potentially approval, of the controversial mega-project,” Scott Dodd at “OnEarth” wrote. “Rice's financial holdings could raise questions about her status as a neutral decision maker.”
Dodd noted that “Rice owns stock valued between $300,000 and $600,000 in TransCanada, the company seeking a federal permit to transport tar sands crude 1,700 miles to refineries on the Texas Gulf Coast, crossing fragile Midwest ecosystems and the largest freshwater aquifer in North America.”
Bill McKibben, an anti-pipeline activist, told the publication: “It’s really amazing that they’re considering someone for Secretary of State who has millions invested in these companies. The State Department has been rife with collusion with the Canadian pipeline builders, and it’s really distressing to have any sense that that might continue to go on.”
Susan Casey-Lefkowitz, the NRDC's director of international programs, sounded a less strident tone a day later: "What's most important is that she rid herself of her holdings in TransCanada and other tar sands-related companies, and we're confident she will do that ... What's most important is that we have a good, thorough review done.”
Danielle Droitsch, a senior attorney for the NRDC and director of the Canada Project, told First Read: “We think Ambassador Rice has the credentials to be secretary of state, but if she were nominated, and then appointed, these holdings would have to be addressed.”
She added that “high-level officials dealing with Keystone should not have any conflicts of interest.”
The likelihood is that, if nominated, Rice will have to divest herself of her TransCanada investment to avoid a conflict of interest.
Will new Obama appointments come this week? Is there a way to get both John Kerry and Susan Rice into the Obama cabinet? NBC News' Chuck Todd and Time's Joe Klein join the discussion.
The environmental group’s effort to shed light on Rice’s financial interest in TransCanada could be just an attempt, if Rice is nominated, to get a “thorough review” and make sure it has a staunch ally in trying to thwart the project, as Casey-Lefkowitz said.
But could it also be a signal that the NRDC prefers another candidate for the job – Kerry, the other of the final two candidates reportedly being considered for the post?
After all, environmental groups have strongly supported Kerry in the past and have a long working relationship with him. Like they would for most Democrats in a presidential election, for example, the NRDC and the League of Conservation Voters, among others, ran ads in the 2004 election boosting Kerry.
LCV even endorsed Kerry before the New Hampshire Democratic primary that year, although it has notably not spoken out about Rice.
Droitsch, however, would not address whom the NRDC prefers for the job.
“We’re trying to signal that the pipeline decision has to be conflict-free,” Droitsch said. “That would pertain to any potential nominee. The president has the prerogative to nominate the person he believes is best for the position.”
The Senate will then raise questions, however, she said. And “now is important to raise the issue ... We want to make sure that anyone who’s being considered would be free of those conflicts. That’s our primary interest right now.”
The NRDC, which has been very involved in efforts to block Keystone, is the environmental interest group most pressing the issue of Rice’s financials.
But others might not be as keen to see Kerry leave Capitol Hill. After all, consider that green groups already spent a lot of money trying to oust Republican Scott Brown from the Senate – and were successful.
But if Kerry becomes secretary of state (or even defense secretary), his seat would become vacant, raising the potential for a costly and competitive special election.
“Who cares if the U.N. ambassador has a TransCanada stock. Who cares if the head of the FDA has TransCanada stock,” said a Democratic strategist and ally of the administration who is a veteran of confirmation battles.
“If she [Rice] were to be nominated, she would go through a process by which we look for financials conflicts. Maybe this stock would be identified as something that posed a conflict, and she would sell," the strategist said. "But she hasn't gone through that process, because she's not a nominee to anything. If they want to say that if she is the nominee, she should sell the stock, that's fine. But you can't legitimately hit her for having it now. And that is likely why NRDC backed off and no other environmental groups have piled-on.”
What really is going on here likely has less to do with Rice and whether she should ascend to secretary of state, and more with the NRDC leveraging pressure on the president and the administration to make sure the pipeline is rejected again once it comes up for approval. And that could be soon.
The next step in that approval phase, in fact, could come as early as next week, Droitsch said. TransCanada has applied for a shortened pipeline in hopes of having that approved – something the NRDC strongly opposes. A Supplemental Environmental Impact Statement could be released by the State Department as early as next week, Droitsch said.
“It is critically important for there to be independent decision-makers, free of conflict of interest, who can take an independent view,” she said.
She then tied the administration’s decision on the pipeline to climate change, an issue that has regained prominence as a result of Hurricane Sandy. In the days following Sandy’s landfall, in fact, New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg endorsed President Barack Obama for his leadership on climate change.
How Obama decides on the pipeline “signals where the U.S. is headed in terms of importing dirty fuels, inconsistent with an administration that is committed to fighting climate change,” Droitsch said.
“We’re confident President Obama understands the seriousness around the issues surrounding this pipeline. Approving it sends the wrong signal about our country’s commitment to climate change. Yes, he’s under a lot of pressure, but the public is very concerned about this. It’s not a decision I know he’ll view lightly.”
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Sort of makes you wonder if anyone else has a "conflict" in this government of ours?
The only ones with a conflict are the gopers themselves.
...Seems NOT being a natural born citizen would be a conflict to become POTUS but who is trying to find the truth?
So I see the tea holes and republican'ts have found a new target, since the one they used against President Obama failed. Perhaps they should wake up and smell the coffee. Susan Rice IS going to be our next SOS...get over it.
dont sound like your fellow dems in washington will let that happen, sounds to me like there is an unspoken want for kerry instead of rice.
I'm a lot more concerned about Rice's investment with companies doing business in Iran. When the SHTF there, whose side is she going to be on? Ours or Iran's?
The Keystone pipeline would probably be the only issue where Rice would do the right thing for America. Of course, even a stopped clock is right twice a day.
As for man-of-the-people John Kerry, his Rhode Island yacht was not available for comment.
Everybody in this effin administration is a hypocrite. All the " Obamanites" function with the attitude that there's 2 sets of rules......one for them.......a completely different set for everybody else. This entire administration is a complete paradox........made up of people who like to orchestrate,control,manipulate,create the outcome & make up the rules & stories as they go along to pull it all off. Whatever the issue is........this entire administration wants it both ways at the same time. Give me 1 plausible reason why I should trust anybody involved in excuses,fall guys,& having scapegoats. People involved in this administration can't tell the truth about anything........including the budget & how to deal with the deficit. Annnnd in Washington,DC......teamwork & working together for the good of this nation.....is a abstraction of storybook romance........yea, America has changed a lot over the last 68 yrs..........& some of it ain't so damn good......
How greedy and how stupid. She should have rid herself of these holdings long ago. There is no way selling them now would make me believe she has no conflict of interest. Did I miss something? Is she a Republican? Is she the only person in America that could be Secretary of State?
yeap you missed a lot if you think 2% is only one party , look at history a lot Dims get in office and belong too 98% within 10 the belong in the 2% , THERE IS no lower or middle class in either party.
You have to know that Obama will nominate Rice for Secretary of State now that Hillary Clinton has been praising her for her work as UN Ambassador. But if Rice becomes our next Secretary of State then we will be the worst for it. She has NOT been a very capable UN Ambassador nor will she be a very capable of Secretary of State. She would be better replacing Debbie Wasserman Schultz as the Democratic Party Chairman IMHO
She is a good Lair and would blindly cut her own neck too serve king Obama and that all you need, After all it's second term and this one will be much longer than 4 years it's a life term.
looks like obama is going to have a bad week. psy with his anti-american song will be at the white house this weekend for a party, rice with the pipe line deal, obama trying to get $60 billion for sandy relief. has the making of a bad week. not to mention the whole fiscal cliff thing.
He only could have a bad week if he cared , He could careless about people just his own goal of power
Holiday "Jingle Bells" from the White House
Susan Rice, Susan Rice
YouTube all the day
Just some "bumps in the road" to hide
Now two percent-er Kerry on the way
That was pretty lame here's how it go's
Romney lost, Romney lost
he did not like chevrolet
O what fun it is over the river and threw the woods in my brand new chysler and jeep!
Don't give up your day job, 40 Chairs.
Let's keep it simple. The Rice family is looking out for themselves. That's what people do. Everything else is a show, a game, a mask, etc. Just like they who go to church and then vote for a president who supports abortion? The election was about the economy and the candidate who is going to give more won. Nothing else really matters. I belong to a union. Have a nice fat pension waiting for me. Guess who I voted for?
They should be considering her for the gas chamber for policies leading to Americans being hauled out of embassies and torn to shreds by angry mobs. Whats her score 16(that i can think of, there is more). Well i guess they deserved to die for believing America was changing anything over there. Did anyone notice last week Obama told Morsi to take some control. They dont want him, now why would obama want the Muslim Brotherhood to ingnore the chants of the people that want real democracy and "take control". I hope to see a headline that says a mob took care of that dictator to one day. They got close sent him running
That is because he has a dream, He is learning by watching how to become a dictator
You should be given the gas chamber for such a sick pile of horse manure and s--t of a post.
on a totally different issue:
The Federal Reserve said Friday that consumers increased their borrowing by $14.2 billion in October from September. Total borrowing rose to a record $2.75 trillion.
this tells me one thing, bankruptcies will also increase.
obamanomics.
That tells me consumers are happy Obama was elected.
well duh, that obamanomics, looks like your filing for bankruptcy also
Your post makes no sense.
bankruptcies only give Obama more control of lower man
This doesn't make sense to me. As a Canadian living and working in the US I was told I couldn't buy Canadian company stocks so how could she unless the stock is sold on the NYSE.
They don't live by the same laws that you and I do. Just ask Mary Jo Kopechne or others like her.
Who are "they"?
how about Obama making issue with investing in other country pre election, BTW Fed Thirft saving plan (fed 401) has more options off shore then here in US.
My My Golf, I sure hope you are "Paying Your Fair Share"
Rice is a poor choice for the position. Obama should withdraw her from consuderation and select a better candidate. Rice doesn't have the background for Secretary of State. WE need or want the frigging Keystone pipeline. That is just more foreign oil and doesn't help us at all.
Being UN Ambassador is a great background for the job.
There is a difference between holding a title and actually being competent at a job.
Sounds like an investor in a good cause. Jobs, jobs and oil independence.
So Ms Rice has a bit of excess baggage! So does Obama, being in the form of two relatives both who are here illegally, His Aunt Zeituni is living in Mass in public housing, getting disability....then there is his Uncle Onyango Obama who showed up in 1963 was ordered deported in 1989 appeal was dismissed in 1992 and is still here..In April, he was arrested for a DUI where his blood-alcohol level was .14 in a state where the legal limit is .08. So, naturally, he was treated like every other criminal right? Bear in mind that he ended up getting his driver’s license back the very same week that Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick was appointed co-Campaign Manager for Obama’s reelection campaign.....
Obama was dead set against the Keystone Pipline and I wondered what caused his change in position. His personal wealth climbing by 10 million dollars in the last 3.5 years while most Americans are going backwards explains a lot of his policies. Claiming to be for the workers while suddenly making millions of dollars pretty much says it all. Just wait till the free i-phones disappear. We'll see how much the left loves this bunch of crooks.
careful Frank they are go to put you on watch list for point out he is in 2%
I'm getting sick and tired of hearing this stuff about attacking Rice. I don't care which direction its coming from. The Right or the Left. It was okay that Dick chaney had ties with Halliburton, (defense contractor) when he was appointed by George Bush. And, how about Congress members who have stock invested in Oil?
And how about Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, who made millions from his stocks in those big banks that got bailed out by taxpayers? If anything, he should have been put out of Congress!
Its just another excuse for people to stop Rice because she is black. I see no color when it comes to looking at qualified candidates when votin, Ambassador Rice as a respectable lady whose career has beens trashed and trashed just to make sure Sen. Kerry empties his senate seat, so Massachusetts can elect and put ole Sen. ousted Brown by Sen. elect Warren) back into congress.
Too bad Colin Powell is retired. He is a good man, had the position once and guessed it right that going to war in Iraqu was wrong, while not going along with the lie, Bush pushed him out. He knows what is expected from the job as Secretary of State. He is highly distinguished, and is a republican. Maybe that would shut the mouths of those far right folks who can't see beyond their noses when a qualified candidate is starring them in the face again, if the President nominated him.
Well this tiime it was the LEFT who brought it up....that's life
Actually Joanie...it WAS Colin Powell who convinced the UN that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction and that going to war was the right thing to do.....Make sure you know your history before making a comment.
maybe if she didn't spit on those who where killed then she would be ok. Too bad she was not there with them
you also seem to forget that Colin Powell was fired for going on CNN and giving out battle plans before Desert Storm started
I need someone to explain to me why this "tar" needs to be piped to Texas.
Why not build a refinery up closer to the Canadian border?
In my small mind , it would seem that would be a less expensive and not as much of a threat to the enviroment.
I have not seen or read anything that would indicate that building a refinery closer to the source has been considered.
Every time the price of oil based fuels drops below a certain level those refineries start catching fire all over the place. Might not be safe to live too close to one of those things when the oil companies feel the need to boost profits.
THE COST. cheaper to pipe in rather than build an entire refinery.
They want to pipe it to Texas so that once refined it can be put on tankers and sold to other countries.
Ports to export once refined
The Rice is done, maybe over done.
Time to move on from the side dish to the main course - John Kerry - Dem's owe him
Why do Dems owe him?
Kerry owes the democrats, he gave Bush a 2nd term.
Happy it all depends on how you look at it if there was no second Bush term there would be no Obama O well!
Dirty politics. Both Rise and Kerry too much baggage. Clinton is hard to replace.
the old dike is easy to replace
The Democrats are ALL racists!....How dare they question the almighty BO and his decisions! ......
And your point is..?
All she needs to do is divest herself of this stock and there is no problem.
How much of her 40 million is in oil???
cant do that, obama has vested do much trust, now she holds stock in the very company and idea he opposes, she is no good to him now. she is tarnished.
40 million?? Where did you get that number from?
Not familiar with research procedures????
I did and her net worth is $23.5 million so just another Republican lie.
What part of in excess of 23 million, presents the most difficulty???
23 million/40 million =ows???
oil????
iran????
Forget about Susan Rice, select Charlie Crist, he's a political whore that will obama's dirty work.
Same crap....leftist corruption, deceit...do as i say not as i do, I'll try to hide it oh i didn't do anything wrong....it just goes on and on with the hypocrisy.
The rw trolling lies and BS on here is astounding. Unlike you Faux Noise and Rush suckers, WE point out when one of ours has a legitimate "problem" and not all this trumped up Benghazi BS you liars are trying to pin on the woman as a reason to block her nomination. Cut your crap already. Remember when Anthony Weiner was caught with the internet pics? Did the DEMS try and deny he had them and do everything to protect him like repubs do with their filth:AKA Vitter, Sanford, Ensign, Gingrinch, et al?, NO, not at all! The DNC chair to The President did not excuse what he did was inappropriate and said he needed to get help as well and his activity hurt his family and the reputation of the office he holds".
None of YOUR louses would have done the same and so far have yet to do it. Go lie on one of Faux Noise's forums and have your rw propaganda clusterf--k over there. Adults would like to talk here.
Although the Media says liberals are anti war,not all are.Man in wars takes the power of life and death to himself,but because of man's sin of pride at Eden,God has reserved the power of life and death to Himself and appointed man once to die,we all die,and death can mean eternal separation from God for man if his relationship with God is not restored through Jesus Christ's Cross and Gospel.Thou shall not kill,means murder,because the power of life and death belongs only to God,man takes it in wars and kills the innocent along with the guilty,and the Bible says God doesn't kill the innocent.Wars kill innocent children,and Jesus says if you do it to one of the little children,you to it to me.The first murder,Cain killed his brother Able,and God didn't kill Cain,but put a mark on him and warned that whoever kills Cain will have to answer to God,because the power of life and death belongs only to God,and God sees all men as brothers.This mark on Cain is the same mark of the beast 666,of Revelation,who will play God and take God's power of life and death in wars.So taking God's power of life and death even in wars is a sin,the sin of Genesis chapter 3,pride.Satan lied to man when he said man can eat the Forbidden Fruit and be as God,and know good and evil as God,and live forever-man can't be as God,nothing is equal to God.
What that have to do with the price of Rice in Canada?