Albert Bender: Tribes prepare to battle Keystone XL Pipeline

Another thing is certain, Native Americans are preparing in case Obama approves the heinous project: Native communities are set for massive civil disobedience to stop the pipeline from crossing the Northern Plains. Indian people are in special training called the “Moccasins on the Ground Tour of Resistance” from South Dakota to Oklahoma.

For Native people, the pipeline means death. The Keystone oil is extracted from tar sands in Canada. Because of the pipeline, Native people there have been exposed to contaminated water, and arsenic has been found in moose meat, a staple of their diet. In Alberta, extraction of tar sands oil already has been linked to a 30 percent elevated rate in rare cancers and rare autoimmune disorders. This pipeline means genocide!

In Rapid City, S.D., representatives of 11 Native American nations angrily stormed out of a May meeting with federal government officials in protest of the pipeline. Tribal officials refused to meet with low-level government representatives. Oglala Sioux President Bryan Brewer said, “We will only talk with President Obama."