Philadelphia - Not only civil rights, rights for minorities, Muslims, Mexicans, walls to stop migrants and the opportunity to elect the first female as the President of the United States. Energy is another important issuew that is going to characterize the next presidential election.
Energy became a topic of the presidential electoral campaign when Donald Trump, the presumptive republican candidate, expressed support to the Keystone XL pipeline as a means to strengthen US economy by getting a piece of profits from it.
The Keystone XL pipeline, conceived by Canadian concern TransCanada to carry sandy crude oil from Alberta to Texas through Montana, North Dakota, South Dakota, Nebraska, Illinois, Kansas, Missouri and Louisiana, was rejected by the Administration of the President of the United States, Barack Obama, a democrat who opposed the Keystone XL to drop oil consumption and fight against climate change in so doing.
The position on the Keystone XL pipeline of Mr. Trump, whose Republican Party has deep ties with the oil industry, is opposed by former State Secretary Hillary Clinton, the presumptive candidate of the Democratic Party. Mrs. Clinton criticized the Canadian pipeline, arguing that climate change is a major threat to the national security of the United States.
The opposition to the Keystone XL of Mrs. Clinton is due to the pressure of environmentalists that characterize an important electoral base of the Democratic Party. In fact, while serving as State Secretary Mrs. Clinton declared herself to be inclined to approve the pipeline as a means to import oil from Canada and decrease US dependence on oil imports from Saudi Arabia and Venezuela in so doing.
The change of mind on energy issues of Mrs. Clinton, a centrist democrat who had to make concessions to the left wing of her Party to clinch the nomination, also regards shale gas. On the one hand, Clinton has been a long time supporter of shale gas extraction in the United States as a means to help US allies in Europe to decrease energy dependence on Russia and make the United States a major world exporter of gas in so doing.
On the other hand, Clinton, due to pressures from environmentalists, declared herself to be in favor of tighter regulations on shale gas extraction. She also favored shale gas extraction only whether local communities agreed on it, and opposed gas drilling in the Arctic Ocean off Alaska's coast: a move that even President Obama, who's more left-wing than Clinton, favored.
Mr. Trump, by his turn, openly favored shale gas extraction arguing that the United States needs a huge quantity of cheap gas and oil in order to strengthen its position within the world economy.
Mr. Trump, a bombastic billionaire who clinched the republican nomination as an outsider despite proposing a temporary ban for Muslims entering the United States, the revision of NATO and the need to cooperate with Russia on global issues regardless of Moscow's aggressive behavior in Europe, also vocally endorsed shale gas extraction as a means to ensure Americans cheap gas for their cars.
Clinton, Trump to face Israel's rapprochement to Russia
In addition to the Keystone XL pipeline and shale gas, Mrs. Clinton and Mr. Trump will have to face another energy problem tied to Israel's recent evolution on energy issues. Israel, a long time ally of the United States, strengthened ties with Russia after PM Benjamin Netanyahu invited Russian national energy major Gazprom to take part in the exploitation of Israeli gas fields in the Mediterranean basin.
The decision to invite Gazprom to share Israeli gas fields is tied to the appointment as the new Defense Minister of Avigdor Lieberman, an hawkish far-right politician with deep ties with the Kremlin that favors the enlargement of Russia in the energy market of Israel.
Lieberman, in fact, believes Gazprom can help Israel ship liquefied natural gas to foreign markets, supporting the economy of Russia in a period of deep crisis due to the economic sanctions that the United States and Europe applied on the Kremlin over the annexation of Crimea and the occupation of eastern Ukraine.
The plan of Lieberman opposes the one of former Defense Minister, Moshe Ya'alon, who argued the need to export natural gas from Israeli gas fields in the Mediterranean Sea to Europe through Turkey, in order to help the European Union decrease energy dependence from Russia and Algeria.
The recently energy move of Israel towards Russia is also tied to the deteriorating relations of Israel with the United States after President Obama pushed for the lift of Iran sanctions amid the opposition of PM Netanyahu.
Israel also expressed concerns about a statement by Trump regarding the need to solve the dispute between Israel and Palestine by considering the reasons of both the parts involved in the crisis: a statement that the republican candidate issued without condemning terrorist attacks made by Palestinians with the same emphasis.
On the other hand, the democratic establishment complained the decision of PM Netanyahu to address Congress making the case of Obama's effort to lift Iran sanctions, aligning the position of Israel with the one of US republicans in so doing, while negotiations with Tehran were still occurring, a move that democrats described as an insult to the United States.
Now, following the new pro-Russian course the Netanyahu government assumed on energy issues, the United States has one more reason to be concerned because of the behavior of Israel that risks to alienate Turkey, a major NATO member state, and endanger both energy and national security of Europe.
This is one more major topic both Clinton and Trump have to give an answer to.
Matteo Cazzulani
Strategy XXI
@MatteoCazzulani
