@Smokin Joe : When is the first hard freeze so the machinations of the Community Organizer Obama comes to an end?
Not soon enough.
Every day the line is not complete, nearly 500,000 bbls of oil are not transported by the safest and most economical means possible. That means rough $2.5 million dollars a day that oil companies can't save in transport costs, which comes out of the pockets of royalty owners, oil companies, and ultimately, the state tax coffers.
Consider, too, that means BNSF remains the means to haul the oil, and one of Obama's Cronies is making money. When Warren Buffet bought stock in BNSF it was just a good move, and predictable that rail would be a major means of transporting oil. Now, though delaying that pipeline reeks of crony capitalism on the Obama Administration's part.
The land is not tribal land, and it is not Reservation land. In fact, the protesters are camping on private property the landowners sold to the pipeline company. It's hard to run cattle with that many jackasses in the pasture.
The only way to stop this is to make it hurt back.
Anyone who might consider spending time at either of the Tribal casinos (Prairie Nights Casino and the Grand River Casino and Resort) should boycott them until such time as the protesters have cleared out (off of private land) and the line is complete and operational. I will never again set foot in one of those facilities. The more people who boycott them, the better as far as I am concerned.
These jerks are messing with the economy of an entire region, not just here, but at the other end of the pipeline, too. The capacity of the line is roughly half of the oil production of North Dakota, and to put that in perspective, North Dakota is the second largest oil producing state in the US, only trailing Texas.
In the meantime, the delay of the project delays tie-in pipelines, reduces funds available for everything from additional drilling and completions for the oil companies, to buying presents for Christmas for royalty mineral owners, to funds available to the State of North Dakota in a year where there are going to be some serious budget reductions.
Consider some of the most vicious protesters are from out of State, and the vast majority of arrests and warrants issued (which include the top of the Green Party ticket) are for out of state people. About a million dollars in damage to equipment has been done, and I'd bet when the 'camp' of some 2000 people finally packs up and gets off the private land they are on, quit barricading roads people use to go to work and send their kids to school on, and let the permitted and lawful pipeline to be completed, the mess they leave will be more than the pipeline will make in 20 years.
