Political fiction is what really kills jobs

In politics the line between reality and fantasy is often hard to decipher. The recent ruling by a Nebraska court regarding the Keystone XL pipeline offers another example of this situation.

The ruling voided a law the Nebraska legislature had enacted that approved the pipeline. This means more legal action will soon follow and the decision on the pipeline will be delay by several months. This is also another occasion for conservatives to talk up the benefits of the project.

The first argument they make is that the Keystone pipeline creates jobs. Data shows that the construction will create thousands of temporary jobs but in the end the pipeline will only create35 long term jobs. It should be noted that during the debate over the 2009 stimulus package Republicans clearly were not in favor of creating what they called "menial and temporary" jobs.

The second claim they like to make is that the Keystone pipeline will reduce gas prices. Unfortunately even the company arguing for the project was only willing to say that the pipeline "could" reduce prices. The reality is that standard free market principles still apply. So while much of this oil will be sold outside of the US, the portion that does remain within our borders will be subject to global oil pricing. In order for the new pipeline to actually lower prices it would have to generate a significant additional supply which lowers the demand. Given that this project will only produce at maximum 830,000 barrels per day or less than 1% of the daily world total a noticeable drop seems unlikely.

Finally, they also claim that the Keystone pipeline will lead to energy independence for the US. Outside of the fact that much of this oil will not be used domestically the US is already on the way to energy independence thanks to lower usage rates and a boom in production for domestic energy sources. In fact under Barack Obama the US is on pace to produce record setting amounts of domestic crude.

Of course the Keystone pipeline isn't the only topic that conservatives debate from within their political bubble.

The head of the NRA stated, and many conservatives believe, that the president wants to take away your guns rights even though the only legislation he has signed regarding guns have expanded gun rights.

Even though the stock market hit record highs, companies are making record profits, the top 1% is taking home more money than ever, and corporations are sitting on record amounts of cash Republican insist that Barack Obama is "anti business".

A majority of Republicans believe the president is not a US citizen. No amount of logic or documentation will convince them otherwise even though everyone in the know abandoned this conspiracy theory long ago.

Many conservatives believe that as president Barack Obama has raised taxes yet the actual data shows the US tax burden fell to its lowest point since 1958 under Obama.

Republicans also insist that government spending is out of control under Barack Obama even though once you account for inflation and population change federal expenditures have fallen more during his presidency than any other president over the past four decades.

The reality is that voters can chastise congress and the president for failing to accomplish anything but as our system is currently configured there is absolutely no reason for the politicians to change their tactics unless the electorate stops accepting fiction as fact.