Terry, L Rep

<p style=" border: 0px; margin: 1em 0px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(74, 74, 74); font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 19.200000762939453px; orphans: auto; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">See also Representative Lee Terry of Nebraska, who describes himself as "light green" and calls himself "a renewable Republican." But that doesn't mean he is willing to accept facts as they are on climate science. "Is it really 97 to 3?" Terry asked <a href="http://www.esquire.com/blogs/politics/xl-pipeline-pros-and-cons-11446071" target="_blank" style=" border: 0px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(51, 119, 187) !important; text-decoration: none;">Esquire</a>. "I don't think so."

While Terry has collected more than <a href="http://www.opensecrets.org/politicians/industries.php?cycle=Career&cid=N00005321&type=C" target="blank" style=" border: 0px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(51, 119, 187) !important; text-decoration: none;">$330,000</a> in oil industry cash, his constituents at Bold Nebraska celebrated his receipt of the "<a href="http://boldnebraska.org/terry-unicorn" target="blank" style=" border: 0px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(51, 119, 187) !important; text-decoration: none;">#1 Climate Denier Award</a>."

Terry isn't the only member of Congress whose position on KXL is at odds with his constituents. In South Dakota, Senator John Thune and Representative Kristi Noem, both Republicans, have been backing the project, which will run through thousands of acres a valuable ranch land. The ranchers they represent in Washington are disappointed that families in South Dakota may suffer to advance someone else's cause.

"They want to push this agenda with these jobs and look good," rancher Dwayne Vig told the <a href="http://rapidcityjournal.com/news/pipeline-stokes-tension-between-ranchers-lawmakers/article_ce68a176-3d59-5bd5-8345-1021a2cbf1d3.html" target="_blank" style=" border: 0px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(51, 119, 187) !important; text-decoration: none;">Rapid City Journal</a>. "But they are not ranchers. I know John [Thune] comes from a ranching family, but he's not a rancher."

He's also not a scientist, but that doesn't stop soon from pushing a project that research indicates will result in catastrophic climate change.

"It's dismaying to see that there are still so many members of the House of Representatives who actually denied that climate change is happening, and then even more who may say, 'oh it's happening, but we shouldn't do anything about it,'" says Tiernan Sittenfeld of the League of Conservation Voters. "That is in our view absolutely outrageous -- people out of touch with basic facts, with science, with reality."

In fairness, one must point out that politicians don't merely parrot industry claims and spout junk-science rationalizations purely for the campaign cash it brings in. Some, like Iowa Representative Steve King, who gets little campaign money from Big Oil, do it just because it's <a href="http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2013/08/07/2429331/steve-king-climate-religion/" target="_blank" style=" border: 0px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(51, 119, 187) !important; text-decoration: none;">a cheap sop to constituents</a> who might be persuaded that climate change could do them some good, in that "we'd probably raise a little more corn."