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Three refineries in his district are eagerly awaiting Canada’s secure oil so they can reduce reliance on imports from abroad. He, too, has visited the oil sands.

“I was pleasantly surprised,” he chimed. “Sure, you have a monster hole in the ground. But then I also saw reclamation where there was strip mining. It was similar to the rest of the landscape. And then I went south to the in-situ [projects], where there is more traditional oil production like we are used to in Texas.”

But a few blocks away closer to the White House, a back lane leads to a refurbished architectural studio, the headquarters of 350.org, a grassroots group that has taken to the streets the fight against Keystone XL. Jason Kowalski, the group’s policy director, is convinced President Barack Obama will stand by the environmental movement that helped re-elect him and reject Canada’s “dirty oil.”

This is Obama’s first big chance to show us that he is really serious

“It’s not very often that folks like Barack Obama get the chance to make a big decision like this,” the young activist said. “Here is a guy that people feel a connection to … and here is a chance to go ‘Yea or nay, more carbon or less carbon, more climate change or less climate change.’ This is his first big chance to show us that he is really serious.”

They are some of the voices filling the streets, the offices, the power rooms of Washington as the president gets ready to take a stand on whether to give a permit to the pipeline between Alberta and the U.S. Gulf — after twice rejecting it and causing Canada’s mad scramble to find new markets, particularly China.