Profiles in Courage this ain’t. As Hillary Clinton points out when asked directly whether she would approve the Keystone Pipeline, the proposal for this project came to State in 2009, which meant that Hillary had almost four years to deal with the issues. Under her tenure as Secretary, the State Department concluded that there would only be a limited environmental impact from Keystone, later demanding (and getting) a route change to lessen even that risk.

So where does Hillary stand on this? After six years, she won’t tell you … unless you make her President:

Q: As President, would you sign a bill — yes or no, please — in favor of allowing the Keystone XL Pipeline? HC: Well, as you know, I was the Secretary of State who started that process. I was the one who put into place the investigation. I have now passed it off, as obvious because I’m no longer there, to Secretary Kerry. This is President Obama’s decision, and I am not going second-guess him, because I was in a position to set this in motion, and I do not think that would be the right thing to do. So I want to wait to see what he and Secretary Kerry decide. If it’s undecided when I become President, I will answer your question!

Really? That’s how this works? One runs for President and refuses to answer on key issues that are in one’s proclaimed area of expertise, and just expects voters to buy a “trust me”? Funny, I thought that people ran for office to put their own policies into place and to argue for their benefits, not to defer to the current officeholders on open issues.

The people in the crowd seem very unimpressed with this answer, which is understandable given its unimpressive character. It may explain a lot about why Hillary’s favorables are sinking faster than the Titanic.

Bruce will have more about Hillary’s energy policy in a later post. Stay tuned.