According to a press release from the Lakota People’s Law Project, child activist Greta Thunberg will be visiting North and South Dakota this week. She will visit the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in South Dakota on Sunday, October 6. On Tuesday, October 8, she’ll visit the Standing Rock Indian Reservation. Standing Rock straddles the North…
It’s Ridiculous That the Army Corps Won’t Take Responsibility for Failing to Address Trespassing by #NoDAPL Protesters
The violent protests against the Dakota Access Pipeline cost the State of North Dakota nearly $40 million. That dollar figure is based on what it cost to have law enforcement, first responders, the National Guard, and various state/local agencies address the situation. There were a lot of factors at play during the protests but one…
Saudi Attacks Should Make Us Thankful the Environmental Zealots Have Been (Mostly) Losing Their War on American Oil Development
Over the weekend the American news media was obsessed with another salacious (though ultimately not nearly so salacious as initially reported) story about the Trump administration. Largely overlooked in that furor were coordinated drone attacks on roughly half of Saudi Arabia’s crude oil production facilities. Though the Saudi national oil company, Aramco, acted quickly to…
Elizabeth Warren’s Attack on the Dakota Access Pipeline Is Why So Many Republicans Tolerate Donald Trump
Why do so many Republicans support someone like Donald Trump? I get asked that question a lot, most recently by a couple of reporters who work here in North Dakota. They don’t understand why someone like President Donald Trump – a serial philanderer with only a rhetorical adherence to the mores of social conservative, an…
Plain Talk: Expanding Capacity for the Dakota Access Pipeline, and What Can We Really Do to Stop Mass Murder Attacks?
“Nothing changes with respect to the operating pressure.” That’s what Glenn Emery said of the expansion of the Dakota Access Pipeline on this episode of Plain Talk. He is the Vice President of Commercial Operations and Business Development for Energy Transfer Partners – the company which owns DAPL – and he says the construction of…
What Have the Anti-Oil Activists Ever Done for Us?
A few recent headlines in the regional media are interesting, given their juxtaposition. Our state’s battle to be reimbursed for the heavy costs of handling the violent and often unlawful #NoDAPL protests against the Dakota Access Pipeline continues. “North Dakota’s congressional delegation is calling on President Donald Trump’s administration to address the state’s year-old request…
Video: In Floor Speech Senator Cramer Thanks National Guard for “Defending Our State” From #NoDAPL Protesters
Today is Military Appreciation Day, so as you might imagine that means politicians giving a bunch of speeches about how much we all, you know, appreciate the military. These speeches wouldn’t be particularly notable, given how they tend to blend into one another, but I thought something in Senator Kevin Cramer’s address on the Senate…
Holding Political Extremists Accountable for Violence and Vandalism Is Not an Effort to “Chill Speech”
The ACLU opposes SB2044, a bill which clarifies law around tampering with critical infrastructure like power plants or pipelines and ups the penalties for doing so, and for the life of me I can’t figure out why. According to the organization the bill is an assault on protected speech. They said, on the occasion of…
Plain Talk: Energy Transfer Partners Talks About DAPL’s Impacts, and Should the Christchurch Shooting Video Have Been Censored?
On this episode of Plain Talk, Vicki Granado from Energy Transfer Partners (the company behind the Dakota Access Pipeline) talks about that projects impacts on North Dakota’s economy, taxes, as well as its impact on national politics. Also, in recent days there has been an effort by the tech industry and governments around the globe…
Rep. Ocasio-Cortez Says Something Pretty Stupid About the Dakota Access Pipeline
Yesterday the CEO of Wells Fargo appeared before a House committee where he was grilled by progressive media darling Rep. Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez. Her questioning, both juvenile and vapid, was an illustration of the left’s tactics in 2019. After demanding to know why Wells Fargo was “financing the caging of children” (no, really) she went on…