Too Late To The Party...

You may recall my screed-ish blog  from yesterday (I'd link to it, but hell, it's right below this one...) singing the praises of journalism's Brave New World. Uh, just never mind all that. I was drunk and optimistic when I wrote it. Now I'm sober and realistic, and I realize we're all doomed.

Anyway, I was doing some additional perusing on the Amazon Kindle Singles website last night while drinking and charting out the rest of my life, when I discovered, much to my chagrin (because it was an idea I also had) as well as my delight (that someone else thought it was a good idea, too, and jumped on it) that a story idea I'd been kicking around in my head for a while had apparently been kicking around in someone else's head, too...

The proposed Keystone XL pipeline has enflamed the bitter fight over America's energy future. Opponents of the 1,700-mile pipeline, which is designed to bring oil extracted from Canadian tar sands down to the US, say it represents a furthering of a dead-end oil-based energy policy that is unsustainable and poisonous, and have turned the permit requests to build the pipeline into an environmental litmus test for President Barack Obama. Supporters of the Keystone XL say it represents a step toward America's energy independence. Beyond the Beltway, the real story of this pipeline is one about American frontiers - the lengths to which we go for oil and the intrusive effects that quest causes all the way down the line. Steve Mufson, a reporter for The Washington Post, journeyed by car along the length of the proposed pipeline to see what this policy debate looks like at the ground level. Each segment of his trip touched on different issues: climate change and the oil sands; the U.S. energy trade with Canada; the North Dakota shale boom and its woes; prairie populism in Nebraska and pipeline politics; the Ogallala aquifer and the threat of leaks; Native Americans and their desire to protect land, water and burial sites along the old Trail of Tears; the fight of ranchers and farmers against a Canadian company’s right to eminent domain; and why both oil sands producers and Texas refiners want to see the pipeline completed. As long as the world relies on fossil fuels for transportation and industry, we will face unappealing choices. The Keystone XL pipeline serves as a larger metaphor, illuminating the vast energy infrastructure it takes to sustain the American lifestyle and the debatable choices we must make in pursuit of short-term comfort. Which risks, now and in the future, are we willing to take?

It's a great concept, and I'm glad someone did it. My idea (which, BTW, is not the story pitch I alluded to in yesterday's blog) was similar, but I wanted to start at the Montana border where the pipeline will enter the US, then travel the length of the proposed route down to the Texas gulf coast. My plan was to begin in the early fall during Montana's upland bird season, with the dogs in the truck and a kayak strapped to the cab, hunting, fishing, photographing and interviewing my way as closely along the pipeline route as possible, taking a look at the issue in much the same way, but with a slightly different, more outdoorsy, hunting/fishing-based conservation perspective.

But now such a story looks a bit redundant (although I hasten to add that if there are any cash-infused editors reading this who think otherwise and would like to send me on such an odyssey, feel free to call me...). Seriously though, this looks like a good read, and a good example of the kind of journalism the format is capable of. Think I might check it out...