‘Uncivil’ Disobedience is Name of the Game for Dakota Access Pipeline Protesters

by Sean Hackbarth, Contributing Author: Passions haven’t simmered down at a North Dakota construction site for the Dakota Access Pipeline.

Energy opponents continue to use water and cultural concerns to mask their true, anti-energy agenda.

One of those national leaders, Jane Kleeb, who fought the Keystone XL pipeline in Nebraska, wants to replicate her “success” in North Dakota. Only her idea of success means less energy for her fellow Americans.

And Bill McKibben, who equates fighting energy development with world war, wants to turn the Dakota Access Pipeline into a presidential campaign issue.

The involvement of a man who has written, “We have to keep 80 percent of the fossil-fuel reserves that we know about underground,” shows us what this protest is really about.

It isn’t about water or cultural concerns. It’s about making it so hard to get energy from where it’s produced to where it’s consumed that production stops. “Block the infrastructure, block the development,” Rob Port wrote last month.

It’s simply a “keep it in the ground” strategy involving arrests and destruction.

McKibben, Kleeb, and their friends don’t like the shale boom at all and want to take us to a fantasy world where fossil fuels aren’t used. But that’s ignores history. These energy sources have lifted billions of people out of poverty, fueled our economic prosperity, and allowed so many of us to live healthy lives. Abandoning politically incorrect energy will leave many of us living shorter, harsher, more-miserable lives.

Blocking energy infrastructure like the Dakota Access Pipeline holds America back at a time when we’re enjoying an energy renaissance, as Matt Koch of the U.S. Chamber’s Institute for 21st Century Energy explains:Yet we run the risk of losing the advantages due to the politicization by environmentalists of the pipeline and transmission line projects needed to move energy to where it is needed. Many areas in the U.S. are already missing out on the full benefits of our energy revolution because it has been difficult to move our energy from where it is produced to where it is needed.Along the pipeline’s construction route, August was marred with arson and threats of violence — all the while law enforcement and security personnel displayed tremendous patience and restraint.
Things continued to be ugly over the Labor Day weekend, NPR reports:n a statement, the Morton County Sheriff's Department said protesters marched from their encampment onto private lands, where the pipeline is being constructed.

"Once protestors arrived at the construction area, they broke down a wire fence by stepping and jumping on it," the sheriff's office said. "According to numerous witnesses within five minutes the crowd of protesters, estimated to be a few hundred people became violent. They stampeded into the construction area with horses, dogs and vehicles."

Morton County Sheriff Kyle Kirchmeier said it "was more like a riot than a protest."
Protesters hit dogs with sticks clashed with security guards, and Green Party presidential candidate Jill Stein acted very unpresidentialvandalizing construction equipment. A warrant for her arrest has been issued.

An important detail to this is construction is happening on private land, not on a reservation.

[To get up to speed on the issue, The Bismarck Tribune has a timeline of past stories.]

Tensions are so high that the National Guard will provide backup for law enforcement as we wait for a federal judge to rule on injunctions that may or may not delay construction or protests.

UPDATE: A federal judge denied the Standing Rock Sioux's request for a temporary injunction to stop work on the pipeline.

In the meantime, the protest has turned into a cause celebre. Movie stars make a blurry video supporting the pipeline protesters. Protesters are collecting hundreds of thousands of dollars in donations to support a long-term protest: propane; water; food; and blankets.

The Dakota Access Pipeline is expected to create 8,000 – 12,000 jobs, add $156 million in local sales and income taxes, and has the support of business and labor unions.
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Sean Hackbarth is a policy advocate and Senior Editor, Digital Content, at U.S Chamber of Commerce. He twitters at @seanhackbarth and is a contributing author at the ARRA News Service.

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