Keystone a pipeline to filthy future

• Tom Steyer: Secretary Kerry rightly called climate change one of our greatest challenges


• Steyer: If President Obama is to be a climate leader, he must reject the Keystone XL pipeline


• Steyer: Pipeline unlocks tar sand oil and leads to unchecked development of dirty fossil fuels


• He says U.S. can't lead on climate change abroad while polluting our own backyard more

Editor's note: Tom Steyer is an investor, philanthropist and advanced energy advocate. He is president of NextGen Climate Action, which focuses on stopping climate change.

(CNN) -- Over the weekend on his trip to Indonesia, Secretary of State John Kerry implored the global community to take action on climate change, calling it "the greatest challenge of our generation." Speaking to students, he underscored what we all know to be true: that climate change is an undeniable fact and a danger that we can no longer afford to ignore.

Around the globe, President Obama and his chief diplomat are pressing for urgent action to combat the effects of climate change and reduce carbon pollution before we pass the point of no return. But the decision that will either solidify or irrevocably weaken Obama's legacy as a leader on climate change lies much closer to home in the proposed Keystone XL pipeline, which would pump heavy tar sands crude through America's heartland.

The world was watching in June when the President drew a line in the sand during his speech at Georgetown, where he declared that the Keystone XL pipeline would be approved only if "the project does not significantly exacerbate the problem of carbon pollution."

Today, the world is still watching, and if President Obama is to remain a global climate leader, his choice is clear. Keystone XL fails the President's climate test, and he must reject it.

If approved, Keystone XL will unlock the Alberta tar sands, spur investment in and production of dirty fossil fuels at an irreversible rate and undermine the President's global efforts to reduce carbon emissions.

And while the flawed Final Environmental Impact Statement released by the State Department last month was touted by TransCanada Corp. as proof that the Keystone XL pipeline would not substantially increase carbon emissions, substantial oversights and serious questions about the report's integrity mean this question is far from resolved.

Oil industry apologists insist that the Keystone XL pipeline will not have an impact on carbon pollution, because without it, the tar sands would come out of the ground anyway. But the oil industry has acknowledged that it needs additional pipeline capacity to keep up with increasing production.

Longterm impact of Keystone Pipeline

A report by the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers predicts that existing pipelines will be full by the end of 2014. And Keystone XL, which would transport up to 830,000 barrels per day, is only part of the solution. To meet its aggressive 2030 production goals, the industry would need all five of its proposed pipeline projects and then would still fall short.

Others claim that rail is a viable alternative to pipelines and that the tar sands will be developed with or without new pipeline capacity. But they are ignoring key facts.

The oil industry needs to build a pipeline straight through the U.S. to access refineries on the Gulf Coast, which allows tar sands oil to be sold at higher world market prices.

Tom Steyer

Industry and Canadian officials have conceded that rail is not a substitute for Keystone XL in terms of capacity. Not only that, rail is significantly more expensive. The State Department estimates that shipping tar sands by pipeline costs about $8 to $10 per barrel. Make the switch to rail, and the price shoots up to $15 to $17 per barrel, with some estimates as high as $31. For investors, that means rail is only a short-term solution to get the tar sands to market, not a long-term economical alternative to new pipelines.

The truth is, the oil industry needs to build a pipeline straight through the United States to access refineries on the Gulf Coast, which allows tar sands oil to be sold at higher world market prices. Keystone XL means producers' profit margins go up, and we're locked into an endless cycle of investment, production and pollution.

At the end of the day, Keystone XL is not just another oil pipeline; it's a gateway to the unchecked development of one of the world's dirtiest fossil fuels.

Secretary Kerry was right: Climate change is the greatest challenge of our generation, and it is our responsibility to preserve our planet for generations to come. But America cannot lead the fight on climate change abroad while allowing even more pollution to be produced in our own backyard. To truly be a global leader on climate change, President Obama must first make the right choices here at home. He must deny the Keystone XL pipeline.

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The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of Tom Steyer.

3 Doors Down bassist charged

3 Doors Down bassist Todd Harrell smiles for his mugshot after being charged with driving under the influence. He joins the club of other smiling celebs:

Justin Bieber

Bruno Mars

Lindsay Lohan

Mel Gibson

"Teen Mom" Jenelle Evans

Jenna Jameson

Floyd Mayweather Jr.

Paris Hilton

Dina Lohan

Mischa Barton

O.J. Simpson

Mickey Rourke

Nicole Richie

Michelle Rodriguez

Shia LaBeouf

Haley Joel Osment

Kid Rock

Matthew McConaughey

Robert Downey Jr.

Christian Slater

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• Police found Todd Harrell "slumped over the steering wheel" at an intersection


• Harrell "showed signs of impairment," police say


• The musician still faces a vehicular homicide charge in Nashville from a crash last year


• 3 Doors Down may be best known for its song "Kryptonite"

(CNN) -- The bassist of the rock band 3 Doors Down faces a driving under the influence charge after his arrest Tuesday in Mississippi.

Police found Todd Harrell "slumped over the steering wheel" of a vehicle stopped at an intersection in D'Iberville, Mississippi, a police statement released Wednesday said.

Harrell, 42, "showed signs of impairment and was arrested and charged with 2nd offense DUI," police said.

The musician was charged with vehicular homicide in Nashville, Tennessee, last April after his speeding car allegedly clipped a pickup truck, sending it down an embankment and killing the driver, according to a Davidson County, Tennessee, sheriff's spokesman.

Harrell showed signs of impairment and acknowledged he had consumed hard cider and taken the prescription pills Lortab and Xanax after that incident, police said. The case is still pending.

His group may be best known for its song "Kryptonite," but it had a string of hits in the early 2000s, including "When I'm Gone" and "Here Without You."

Harrell is one of three founding members of the group that formed in Escatawpa, Mississippi, in 1994, according to allmusic.com. The band toured regionally before eventually being discovered at a music showcase in New York.

The band's major label debut, "The Better Life," has sold more than 6 million copies, according to the Recording Industry Association of America.

CNN's Andre Dykes contributed to this report.

There is no white boogie man

• Yolanda Young argues that reaction to the Michael Dunn verdict inaccurately blames race


• Young: Reaction creates irrational fear for those wanting to drive up news ratings


• Young calls the shootings of Jordan Davis and Trayvon Martin "freak incidents"

Editor's note: Yolanda Young is the author of the memoir "On Our Way to Beautiful" and the publisher and CEO of Lawyers of Color. Follow her on Twitter @yolandayoungesq

(CNN) -- It's happening again.

Moments after the jury in the "loud music trial" returned with its verdict against Michael Dunn -- guilty on three counts of attempted murder and a mistrial on charges of murdering teenager Jordan Davis -- a rash of commentaries began popping up.

Writers are now expressing the kind of trepidation and angst that would have us believe that black children are not safe because a white man is lurking around every corner, waiting to shoot down a young man minding his own business.

One of the first to weigh in was The Atlantic's Ta-Nehisi Coates, who equated Davis' murder to the selling away of slave children, a daily occurrence in the antebellum South.

"Jordan Davis had a mother and a father. It did not save him," Coates wrote. "Trayvon Martin had a mother and a father. They could not save him. My son has a father and mother. We cannot protect him from our country, which is our aegis and our assailant.

We cannot protect our children because racism in America is not merely a belief system but a heritage, and the inability of black parents to protect their children is an ancient tradition."

O'Mara: It's not about 'stand your ground'

Does Coates really believe this? More important, does he want his son to internalize this, like one child in a photo taken outside the Duval County Courthouse, holding over his face a sign reading "I Could Be Next" with checked boxes next to the words "loud music," "Skittles" and "hoodies."

I'm not sure if these public voices reflect or inspire the outrage, sadness and fear resounding among black people on social media and article comments. What I do know is that African-Americans' fear that black boys are being hunted down at every turn by white men is just as toxic as the fear white people have of the black boogeyman.

Jordan Davis' parents on forgiveness

Michael Dunn prosecutor talks to New Day

Dershowitz: Dunn could go free on appeal

Such histrionics create an irrational, unproductive fear for those mainly interested in driving up news ratings, tilting elections and increasing donations to special interest groups.

Indeed, John Roman, a senior fellow at the Urban Institute's Justice Policy Center, found (PDF) that of the 53,019 homicides from 2005 through 2010, white-on-black homicides accounted for only 3.9%, while black-on-white homicides were 8.77%. White-on-white and black-on-black homicides accounted for 44.14% and 43.18%, respectively.

Still, this narrative has been in high drive since the public first learned how Trayvon Martin was killed by neighborhood watch volunteer George Zimmerman. In the two years since, black parents have added "beware white gunman" to the long list warnings they issue to their black sons.

"The talk" dates to 1863, according to The Boston Globe's James H. Burnett III. That year, the Emancipation Proclamation freed slaves who then had to figure out how to navigate a world of Southern whites still seething over the Civil War.

Unlike the hyperbole of today, freedman warnings really were a matter of life and death. In "A Festival of Violence: An Analysis of Southern Lynchings, 1882-1930," Stewart E. Tolnay and E.M. Beck documented 2,805 victims of lynch mobs killed in 10 Southern states.

"The scale of this carnage means that, on the average, a black man, woman, or child was murdered nearly once a week, every week, between 1882 and 1930 by a hate-driven white mob," their report says.

After Dunn mistrial, misgivings about Florida law

From this most deadly period, the survival conversation evolved to meet the challenges of Jim Crow, the civil rights movement, the war on drugs and police profiling.

Much of modern-day talk centers on the reality that store clerks, police and people generally do view black men with suspicion, says analyst Corey Dade. But the headline of his NPR essay "Florida Teen's Killing: A Parent's Greatest Fear" is overwrought.

So too was Jeannine Amber's piece in Time magazine after Zimmerman's acquittal.

"We may never know exactly what happened the night Zimmerman shot Martin, but black parents know this: A neighborhood-watch man saw a brown-skinned teenager -- a boy who could have been one of ours -- wearing a hoodie pulled up against the rain and assumed he was up to no good," Amber wrote.

"That suspicion set into motion a chain of events that left the boy dead. How do we protect against that?"

We can't.

What happened to Davis and Martin were freak incidents, not unlike a plane crash, rare disease or natural disaster.

Starting the discussion with a presumption that such an event is a probability carries its own dangers. It presupposes white people -- men in particular -- have a pathology as great as the one put on black men: that they are violent beasts.

We can't justify feeling imperiled by the idea that white men are gunning us down while rejecting sweeping generalizations regarding black men, some of whom are responsible for many of the murders in urban cities.

These fears only work to further polarize our communities when we need to work together to alleviate the mistrust we have of one another.

Instead, we must begin to peel away centuries of the conscious and subconscious uneasiness that allows white jurors to believe that a skinny kid can make a grown man fear for his life.

Black parents have long balanced cautioning kids without having those concerns become full-blown paranoia.

I fear we are losing this balance.

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The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of Yolanda Young.