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By the time Barack Obama leaves office in 2016, the United States will surpass Russia and Saudi Arabia as the largest producer of crude oil and natural gas in the world. This isn’t enough for our Republican-controlled Congress, because their jobs depend on maintaining our fossil fuel addiction. Today, the White House announced that the president will veto any attempt by Congress to further enrich the petrochemical industry and force the construction of the Keystone XL Pipeline.

For years President Obama has been stalling his decision on the pipeline, which would transport oil from Canada’s tar sands down to refineries in the Gulf of Mexico. Proponents say the pipeline would create 40,000 jobs; the State Department has put the figure closer to 4,000 [PDF].

White House spokesman Josh Earnest told the Associated Press that Obama would veto any bill designed to begin construction on the 836-mile, 36-inch diameter pipeline.

Earnest pointed to the ongoing State Department examination of the project, and stressed that Congress shouldn’t be able to override the “well-established” review. Now the president can please the base that elected him to two terms while plausibly denying that he does not oppose the project, just attempts to leapfrog his administration’s review of the project. Mmmm, politics!

Here’s hoping (“here’s” being Future Generations Of Living Organisms On Planet Earth) the president pulls a Cuomo.