The Congressional Record is a unique source of public documentation. It started in 1873, documenting nearly all the major and minor policies being discussed and debated.
“REPUBLICAN FRESHMAN QUARTERLY REPORT” mentioning the U.S. Dept. of Energy was published in the House of Representatives section on pages H7611-H7618 on July 30, 2008.
The publication is reproduced in full below:
REPUBLICAN FRESHMAN QUARTERLY REPORT
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of January 18, 2007, the gentleman from California (Mr. McCarthy) is recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the minority leader.
Mr. McCARTHY of California. Madam Speaker, tonight we come with a quarterly report from the freshmen Republicans. This is something that we promised to do when we were first elected, and we continue to do it each and every quarter because we want to come back to the American people and tell them what their House is doing.
Tonight, for many of you and many of your houses it might be summer school, and last week I just got my daughter and my sons' report cards. They did very well, if you were concerned about that, Mr. Heller. But what the report will be from this Congress on this night is not good.
In less than 2 days, this House is scheduled to adjourn; adjourn without solving the energy crisis, or even allowing a vote on this floor. So tonight as the freshmen Republicans come to you to talk about this quarterly report, something has happened in the last 2 weeks.
You know, in the minority party here, Madam Speaker, one thing that these freshmen Republicans will do is they don't sit back.
{time} 2115
Even if the majority party, the Democratic controlled House here, will not allow a vote on the floor, we believe the American people are hurting; we understand the American people are hurting when it comes to the energy crisis with the price of gas over $4 a gallon, the heating fuel costs which continues to not only hurt the individuals, but it hurts the nonprofits, it hurts the school districts. As we continue to move forward, some districts in my area are talking about even maybe going to 4 days a week, some are talking about charging if the kids want to even ride the bus to school. So we talked about, how can we go about helping America? How can we help solve this problem?
So collectively as freshmen and as Republicans, we got together along with our leader, Mr. John Boehner from Ohio, and we decided, let's go on the all-American energy tour and let's actually sit down and talk to some experts.
So not last weekend, but the weekend before, we went together to Golden, Colorado. In Golden, Colorado they have the National Renewable Energy Laboratory from the Department of Energy. Here, they study from wind, from solar, to hybrids, to hydrogen cars. We drove them. We looked at them. We went through with the biomass, different ways about where the future will go in energy and how we can actually become independent and have an American energy program that creates American jobs. Because, as many of you know, in America today we use 20 million barrels of oil a day but we only produce 7. So to solve this problem, we really need all of the above. We need more wind, we need more solar, we need to actually be able to conserve more, but we also have to be able to explore more.
So just as we went out and looked at the renewable energy and we looked to where you build the windmills; you build them where the wind blows. Where do you put out the solar panels? You put them out where the sun shines. Where do you explore for oil? Where it is, underground.
From there we traveled up to Alaska. We landed in Fairbanks and we went up to ANWR. We went out and looked exactly where we are already drilling today. We went out to the first place where the Alaskan pipeline starts. The Alaskan pipeline, when it starts right there, it sends 700,000 barrels of oil a day. It takes 9 days to get from the beginning to the end. But in 1989, that used to produce 2.2 million barrels a day. Every year that we do nothing, it loses 15 percent. That is 15 percent less barrels of oil coming down. America is still using 20 million barrels, but only producing 7.
And as we looked around, we looked for environmentally friendly ways to do it. We found that in the past you would take 64 acres, today you would only take maybe 16, maybe 6. You could actually drill down and drill out 8 miles because of technology advancements, and that we could do it in an environmentally sound way. And as we went to ANWR, just a few miles over, we found that there is another 10 billion barrels.
We found out that if ANWR was allowed to be drilled, where this body will not even let it come up for a vote, it would add 1 million barrels a day. And 1 million barrels a day added inside that pipeline, what would it mean to you back home? What would it mean to the average citizen? It would mean 50 cents less in the gasoline per gallon that you buy.
Our Federal Reserve Chairman was before our committee just 2 weeks ago, and he said 1 percent added in production would decrease the cost by 10 percent. That is just a 1 percent addition. One million barrels of oil would lower the barrel $20 a barrel from what you see out on the market.
We have a plan. We have an idea. But tonight, and unfortunately when we come to you, the power of the idea will not win on this floor. Not because the desire is not there, but because the majority party will not allow it.
Today we had a very big vote, like many of our votes here. But do you know what the vote was today? By one simple vote. If you wonder if that one votes ever makes a difference, that one vote made a difference today, because on this floor by one vote the Democrat-controlled Congress voted to adjourn, voted to adjourn while the gas prices were over $4 a gallon; saying to the American people that, as I listened to the Speaker the other day, she is trying to save the planet. She is looking at the longevity of the world. I am looking back for the constituents back home that can't afford to continue to live the way this economy is going.
Tonight, we are going to listen to a lot of the different freshmen that actually went on the tour, been a part of it, seeing what is going on in America today. And first we are going to start off with my good friend from the State of Michigan, District 7, back in Battle Creek, Tim Walberg.
Mr. WALBERG. I thank the gentleman from California, and I thank him for his good words and bringing us really to perspective what is going on here.
I wish I could have joined you on the trip to ANWR as well as to Golden, Colorado and seen what you saw up close and personal. But, frankly, I felt it was more important at that time to look for the pictures you would bring back and hear the testimony that you and other good colleagues and friends of mine would bring back, but for me personally to stay back in Michigan, a State that at present is a one-
State recession, that has the highest unemployment rate in the Nation, sadly, that was at one time the greatest manufacturing State, and, more importantly, was the motor capital not only of the United States but of the world, a place called Detroit, Motown, Motor City, all of the above, that established the pattern for what transportation was all about and, I contend, still is; and yet is frustrated by a government system, both in the State and here, with the leadership in Congress, Madam Speaker, that will not do what is necessary to allow us to continue to not only keep our faith to our people, not only keep our position as the greatest Nation on this earth in every area, including transportation, but rather at this point in time is willing to say that the process of saving this planet as our Speaker intends to do involves a Democrat energy plan which was stated very clearly.
And I bring this with some comedy as we look at the picture, and yet it is a stark, painful reality that this plan will not work. And that plan is what? Drive small cars and wait for the wind. If we do that, as the title of an old movie said, it will be Gone With the Wind.
We need to do something, Madam Speaker, now for the people of this great country, for my great State of Michigan, and all of those concerned to produce energy that deals with the reality of what this country needs.
I am tired of living in a State right now where our Governor says with great pride that she rides her bicycle to work to the State capitol from her Governor's residence every day with her escort of security people following her on their bicycles as well. The motor capital of the world with a Governor riding a bicycle. Now if that was for conservation purposes, fine, I support that. For purposes of austerity, I support that. But promoting this because of necessity? I can't accept that.
This morning I sat on the floor of the House and I looked up. And I looked up to the highest point of this Chamber directly above the Speaker's rostrum, Madam Speaker, and I see engraved there in a stone-
carved monument to us this statement. It is a statement by Daniel Webster, and I read from the paper because I can see it better in front of me right now. But Daniel Webster said this many, many years ago: Let us develop the resources of our land.
How up-to-date is that? Let us develop the resources of our land, call forth its powers, build up its institutions, promote all its great interests, and see whether we also in our day, in our generation, fellow colleagues, freshmen, Republicans, standing here for the defense of our great country, Daniel Webster said, and see whether we also in our day and our generation may not perform something worthy to be remembered.
I submit to you that that is what we are doing, standing here tonight.
Under an adjournment resolution that will take place sometime in the next 24, 48 hours, sending us home, most likely as it appears without doing anything to give an opportunity for my Governor to get in her flex fuel hybrid Tahoe again, if she determines so, to go to her residence.
Well, we can jest about that. I could talk about a lot of statistics. But tonight, while you were in ANWR, I had the privilege of, on five occasions in my district, South Central Michigan, going to various gas stations and pumping gas into constituents' vehicles as they would allow me. I would simply say, ``Hi, I'm Congressman Tim Walberg. If you will share with me your ideas and concerns on energy and the price at the pump, I would be glad to pump your gas while you tell me your stories.'' I came away with plenty of stories. I came away with plenty of pictures.
Just Monday afternoon in Battle Creek, Michigan, a mother, single parent, one child, came to the pump with a small mini van. She left it running. And when I questioned her about that, she says, ``I'm afraid it won't start if I turn it off.'' She said, ``I'd be glad to talk to you.'' And I said, ``How much do you want me to fill it?'' And she said, ``$11.'' That's just a little over 2 gallons.
She began to tell me her story of how she is working two jobs, and the gas that she was putting into her vehicle that day would get her through 2 days of work and her transportation to each of those jobs and back. Those are stories that talk of reality.
Another story that I wrote down came from a lady who said, ``Because I'm a truck driver and the high price of fuel has damaged the economy so badly, my employer started limiting the miles given to older, higher paid drivers such as myself. My income last year dropped a full 30 percent. Then I was injured on the job and denied workers' comp. I finally began receiving my disability payments after 4 months. During those 4 months, however, I was scraping up every cent available to pay for LP gas to heat my trailer home. Because I spent every available cent on heating fuel, food, and electricity, I could not pay the taxes on my paid-for home. I am now in default, and my home will be forfeited in October for back taxes.''
This is reality that we are talking about here. It is not simply price at the pump; it is lifestyle, it is living conditions. It is keeping a home that is paid for.
``I can't afford a cheaper vehicle,'' she said. ``I can't afford to repair the one vehicle here that would get a few more miles per gallon than the old F-150. I'm a careful shopper, but the rising price of groceries is also directly related to the energy crisis.''
Let me read one last story that was told to me. This was by a wife from Jackson, Michigan whose husband was in sales, which ultimately diminished and ultimately was lost because of the fuel prices.
She makes a number of points, but in the last point she says, ``At approximately $175 per week in gas costs, we can no longer afford to send our children to Catholic school. That was a choice, yes, but a choice made specifically for our children's interests. They cannot go to camp, they cannot have the braces which they need. The money I would have put aside for college is now being spent on gas. We cannot tithe to our church, nor can we donate to the myriad of other charities we routinely helped. Every decision is weighed based upon''--and get this again. ``Every decision is weighed based upon the extreme cost of leaving the driveway.''
Now those are life stories. Those are stories that make an impact upon me as a congressman representing South Central Michigan, the Seventh District of Michigan.
These are stories that go way beyond the political partisan haggling that goes on here, that goes beyond even making jokes about a plan that will not work, cannot work, and isn't going to be allowed to work to drive small cars and wait for the wind.
Daniel Webster said this, again: ``Let us develop the resources of our land, call forth its powers, build up its institutions, promote all its great interests, and see whether we also in our day and generation may not perform something worthy to be remembered.''
{time} 2130
I submit to you, my colleagues tonight and, Madam Speaker, that that is what we are attempting to do here and now; not to produce something that we will be remembered about, but something worthy to be remembered, that we fought for, this great country, the resources that allowed us to be blessed, that allowed us to expand our capabilities and allowed us to bless other nations all over this globe because we used our resources, we built up our land and powers, and we have done something worthy to be remembered.
I thank you for the opportunity. I look forward to sharing in the banter back and forth about reality tonight. But I think that would be beyond the facts and figures that I could put forth, probably the most important thing I can start with tonight, and I yield back my time.
Mr. McCARTHY of California. Well, I thank the gentleman from Michigan as he tells of the personal stories within his district of the suffering, of the pain.
But as I said earlier, what did this Democrat-controlled Congress do? Today it voted to adjourn, adjourn for an entire month, as many across America dreamt about maybe going on a summer vacation, but told their kids, no Disneyland this year; we can't afford even to drive there.
But, as the Republicans, we don't sit back and just complain. We believe that we can lead. When you look at Congress, you look at the opinion polls, it is down at 9 percent. Many across America are now beginning to call this Democrat-controlled Congress the ``No Drill Congress.''
And we won't even bring up appropriation bills. One of the major jobs of this Congress is to fund government. 13 appropriation bills they are supposed to bring up each and every year, but the majority won't even bring them up because they are afraid of an amendment coming on the bills. The amendment would say, let's create an energy plan. And what would that energy plan be? It would be all of the above. It would expand solar, it would expand wind, it would explore, it would go beyond for the new technologies at the same time, and it would lower the price of gas and create an American energy independent program that creates American jobs.
We have other members from the Freshman Class here with us tonight. Our next speaker, you may have heard him just a little bit ago talking about the National Guard in Nevada, and he continues that leadership now as he begins to talk to us about the energy. Representing Reno, Sparks, Carson City, the majority of Nevada, coming from the Second District, I yield to my good friend, Representative Dean Heller.
Mr. HELLER of Nevada. Thank you very much. I appreciate the comments, and I appreciate you putting this together. I am proud to be part of the quarterly report that we have going on here today, spend some time with the folks back home and let them know what is going on here in Washington, D.C. and what we are trying to do to help them. And I want to thank you again for putting us together.
And you know what is great is to be able to listen to the gentleman from Michigan talk about the experiences that he has within his district. And I think we can do that with Louisiana, with Ohio, Tennessee, California, but I want to give a couple of examples of what I am seeing in Nevada.
I have got a pretty large district. I joke with my colleagues sometimes about the distance that I have to drive, 15 hours to get from one end of my district to the other. I go home most weekends and probably drive 500 miles. In fact, this weekend I am driving out to Elko, which is going to be another 500-mile drive. But that is okay. That is okay.
You know, the difficult part about this is that I try to meet my constituents in my district. Every year I try to travel as far as I can, and the exorbitant cost now that it is, just to visit with my constituents, is becoming incredible. I drove about 50,000 miles this year. And had I done that 2 years ago, in trying to visit with my constituents it would have cost me actually $90,000 less, $90,000 extra dollars to drive because of the non-actions of this particular Congress.
But I want to put a face, just like the gentleman from Michigan did, on what is going on here in the State of Nevada. As I drive across the State, I can give examples.
I have a daughter, and many of you have children that are in sports. And it is a shame that playing in some of these competitive teams, once you get to a competitive level you find yourself traveling great distances. She happens to be playing out of Reno, and she has to go down to Las Vegas or maybe to Sacramento, maybe up to Oregon, across the State to Elko or somewhere of that nature. So it is getting pretty expensive for parents, and I am having parents starting to complain that they can't go to the away games. It is difficult for them to get to the away games because of the cost of travel because of the high fuel costs.
Another example of that, I was in a small town called Lovelock, and they have a restaurant over there called Sturgeons, and I was talking to the general manager. And they were talking about the price of eggs. The price of an egg, since the beginning of the year has gone from 7 cents to 13 cents.
Now, Lovelock is not that far out of the way. From Reno it is probably an hour and a half or so. So you wouldn't think that travel costs would be that expensive. But it is the cost of everything, because of the inaction of this particular Congress, that is causing these problems. It isn't just the price of fuel. Of course it is the price of poultry.
When we start taking all of this corn and the grains and the byproducts and start turning them into ethanol and using what could be used for feed for cattle, for poultry, for hogs and everything else, everything is going up and getting very expensive very, very quickly.
I think ethanol is a mistake right now. I think we need to take a look at other ways, other ways of providing energy, and that is why we went on this trip to ANWR.
But I want to give one more example, and that is a particular family that came to visit me last week. The Anderson family came in, one of my constituents, family from Nevada, and they came out here. They have a couple of children and they want to show their children Washington, D.C. And I was fortunate enough to have them come by my office. And I believe he is a dental technician and she is a nurse, and they have a young daughter that plays volleyball, very good at volleyball. Their son is a very good baseball player. And they are talking about how difficult it is for them to provide, and the problems that they are facing now with these high fuel prices.
They are very good athletes, and so they want to make all of their events, and it gets more and more difficult.
To tell you how difficult it is getting, in my home State of Nevada, according to the USA Today, because of fuel prices for airlines, they are cutting 10 percent of their flights. Well, we are one of five States they are going to cut more than 10 percent of their flights into Nevada.
Now, for a State like ours that relies heavily on tourism and traffic, you can imagine the impact that that is having. But it is not just coming into the State, the lack of 10 percent flights. It is the lack of 10 percent flights now that are going out. And they talked about how difficult it is to get a flight now and the exorbitant cost it is.
I think an airline industry today just announced that the extra bag is not going to be $25, it is going to be an additional $25 on top of that, for a total of $50 so that they can compensate for these huge costs.
I want to banter back and forth more. I want to talk about our trip to ANWR. I want to talk about our experiences in Golden, Colorado. I think they were great. I want to give others a chance to introduce themselves. And thank you again for the opportunity to be here. And I will yield back to you.
Mr. McCARTHY of California. Well, I thank the gentleman from Nevada for the leadership he continues to show in this work that we are trying to do within the energy.
Tonight, when we went up to ANWR, one thing that I found most interesting when we talked about is how you can do it environmentally friendly. One thing that they showed when we were up in Alaska, that in the 1970s, it took them 20 acres and they would go down 1 mile. 1980s it took them 16 acres.
But you think about technology, and the greatest way for America to understand technology, think of that very first cell phone. It came in a bag. It was about the size of a brick. Today it is a very little phone, and you know within that phone that it has more technology in the cell phone today than we had on the Apollo when it landed on the moon.
But you expand with that technology. Today, present, it takes only 6 acres, so your footprint is much smaller. But what they are able to do when they drill down, to go out 8 miles across, what does that mean to the American people?
One, that we are able to explore much further, to do it in an environmentally sound way, have a much smaller footprint, and actually have fewer wells to drill.
There is a plan to be able to go forward that allows exploration, wind and solar, but the Democratic-controlled Congress will not even allow it to come up on to the floor.
This is becoming, Madam Speaker, a ``No Drill Congress.'' But the American people continue to suffer.
And tonight we wanted to hear from our good friend from Ohio, Jim Jordan. I yield to my friend from Ohio.
Mr. JORDAN of Ohio. I thank the gentleman for putting this hour together. I thank the folks who are participating and those who were able to go on our trip when we went to, we were up in ANWR, up in Alaska to see.
You know, the thing I just feel so strongly about is, Americans realize we live in the greatest country ever. But they are frustrated. They are frustrated by the fact that this Congress, if you saw the news yesterday, this Congress has run the largest deficit in history. $482 billion is the projected deficit this year.
They are frustrated that this Congress won't act on increasing the supply of energy, won't act on drilling more offshore, drilling more in Alaska, won't act on bringing down the price at the pump, bringing down the price of energy, won't act on those things that are necessary to help every single family across this country.
A few months ago, in our district, I had the opportunity to be in one of our Federal judge's courtroom for the ceremony where new Americans take the oath of citizenship. And I don't know if you have ever had a chance to participate in those ceremonies, Madam Speaker, but when you get an opportunity, it is an emotional experience to watch these, in my case, it was 36 new Americans, raise their hand, take the oath and become an American citizen. And when they completed that oath, the smile on their face, when they now realized that they were a citizen of the greatest country in the world, it is special to see. And frankly, those Americans, those new Americans, as all Americans, deserve better from their Congress.
The idea that we are going to leave here without taking an up or down vote on increasing supply on drilling offshore, on drilling in ANWR, is just wrong, and they deserve better.
One of the things that we learned that the gentleman from California has pointed out in some of his comments and remarks, when we were in Alaska, I will just be frank with you. If ever there was a place that we should be producing oil, it is in ANWR. Alaska is a beautiful State, except in ANWR where we were. When you went and looked across that area, this was a desolate, barren place that has over 10 billion barrels of oil waiting to be brought to production, waiting to be helping with our supply needs, waiting to be helping with the price at the pump that families are paying, and it is just something that we need to go do.
And as the gentleman points out, technology is our friend in this area. The footprint needed now on the surface to go down and get a much larger area subsurface is so small, and we can do it in an environmentally safe way.
I thought it was interesting, and my colleagues will recall this as well who were on the trip, that we flew over ANWR in propeller planes, prop planes, so we were flying pretty low to the ground. When we flew over ANWR I didn't see any wildlife. I am sure it was there, but I just thought it was sort of ironic and somewhat of a coincidence. We didn't see it. As I told the press, we didn't see caribou, we didn't see, you know, polar bears. We didn't see Bambi. We didn't see it. What we saw was a barren, desolate place which, as I said, has over 10 billion barrels of oil that needed to be brought to market.
But when we were on the ground, as the gentleman from California pointed out, in the Prudhoe Bay area, in that production are, where we have been taking oil out of the ground, bringing it to market for 30 years, when we were on the ground there in that area, at the pipeline itself, mile marker 0, pump station Number 1, we saw the caribou. They were right there. In fact, we saw one caribou trotting across the airport runway where we landed the plane as we flew into the Prudhoe Bay area.
So the idea that we can produce this in a way that is going to be friendly to wildlife, it is already there. We saw proof of that firsthand. This is something we need to do.
As I said, the American people get it, and the fact that their Congress doesn't is frustrating. It is frustrating them. It is frustrating for those of us who want to drill more, who want this legislation to pass so we can get started on bringing down the price right away.
They get it. And I am confident what is going to happen over the August recess, you know, is there is an old line in politics that most politicians don't see the light; they feel the heat. And I think when some of these Members go back home, they are not just going to feel the heat from the August summer weather, they are going to feel the heat from families and constituents back home who tell them, we need to drill; we need to go get more supply.
The American people get it. It is time that this Democrat-led Congress get it. I am still confident we can get a vote on this before the election, hopefully, when we come back in September, and we are going to continue to push on that.
And with that I would yield back to my good friend, the gentleman from California.
Mr. McCARTHY of California. Well, I thank the gentleman from Ohio. And the one thing that he was talking about was we flew over ANWR. We took a few photos. And what you will see here, here is a photo of ANWR. You wonder, where are the animals? Where are they at?
And people wonder about, well, how far away is this from where we are currently drilling? It is within 70 miles. 10 billion barrels of oil sitting right there. It would not take you 10 years to begin.
Mr. JORDAN of Ohio. Will the gentleman yield?
Mr. McCARTHY of California. Gladly.
Mr. JORDAN of Ohio. One of the arguments we hear is just what the gentleman brought up, it is going to take 8 to 10 years to bring this production. We forget about the fact that, as you indicated, ANWR is only 70, 75 miles away from the existing pipeline. We have already got that infrastructure in place.
And as the gentleman indicated earlier, it used to be 2 million barrels a day moving through that pipeline. Today it is 700,000. If it gets to a certain level, it drops to a certain low level, it becomes physically, the feasibility physically is just not there to continue to maintain it. And frankly, from an economic standpoint, there needs to be a certain volume of oil moving through that every day.
This place is right next door, 75 miles away. And the infrastructure is in place. It will take a lot less time to get that oil to market and help every single family.
{time} 2145
Mr. McCARTHY of California. The gentleman makes a very good point because in 1970 when this was created, back then when Jimmy Carter became President of the United States, he had full intention of drilling in ANWR because that's where the oil is. That's why you put the windmills where the wind blows and the solar panels where the sun shines. You discover where it's at.
And what the Member did talk about was if you look here, this is where we currently are, and ANWR is just to the side. And you're wondering just how large is it. It's 19 million acres. We're looking at only talking about 2,000 acres.
To put it in perspective, as you go out when school starts back up, you go to your high school football games, I want you to look across that football field when no one's there. I want you to just look out at it, and I want you to take one little postage stamp and set it on the field. That's the equivalency. That's how much we want to be able to talk about being able to get 1 million barrels of oil a day out of ANWR, a postage stamp on a football field.
The gentleman from Ohio brought up a very good point that we have this infrastructure, this pipeline. It produces 700,000 barrels a day. Once it goes to 300,000, it will no longer produce then. You have to have more than that.
Now I would like to yield to my good friend, a new member from the freshman class from the First District of Louisiana, Steve Scalise.
Mr. SCALISE. Thank you. And I want to thank my colleague from California for putting this together. I think it's very important that while our country is facing a national energy crisis, the only debate that's going on on the House floor is right here tonight with Members of the freshmen class that are sick and tired of the delays and the inaction of the leadership of this Democratically controlled Congress.
Madam Speaker, I think today might have been one of the lows of that 110th Congress, the fact that the only real vote that was taken today on this floor was a vote to adjourn Congress for 5 weeks. The fact that Congress passed a resolution to adjourn for 5 weeks and take a vacation at a time when our country is facing a national energy crisis--we should be here debating solutions to this problem. We should be here talking about the proposals that are on the table. And there are a number of proposals that are on the table to debate.
If the leadership doesn't want to have a straight up-or-down vote, there's going to have to be some reckoning because the American people are sick and tired of it. I think if you look right now--and it's ironic, and it is very unfortunate, that many of the families in my district, in my colleagues' districts, throughout this country, families are canceling their summer vacations because they can't afford the price of energy to go to the places that they wanted to go this summer.
So what is Congress doing to address that big problem that's facing our country? Today Congress voted by one vote, voted to take a 5-week vacation at a time when American families are canceling their vacations. I think that's a low point for this Democratically controlled Congress, and I think they're going to have a hard time answering to the people why they won't bring up a vote.
What are they afraid of? Are they afraid of debating these ideas that we put on the table?
I filed a bill called the GAS Act, Grow American Supply. Removes the barrier that exists. There's a congressional ban on drilling in the Outer Continental Shelf. I come from Louisiana. We know how to drill in an environmentally safe way. People know that you can drill and not do harm to the environment. In fact, now the environment thrives in the areas where drilling occurs. The best place to go fishing in south Louisiana is next to an oil rig because the fish congregate around that area. It's an estuary for them.
By the same token, when we went on that American energy tour when we were in Alaska, we went to Mile Marker Zero, the beginning of the Alaskan pipeline, and we saw three caribou approach about 40 yards away. They were just walking to us. They weren't afraid of us. They were walking towards the pipeline, and we found out back when they built the pipeline 30 years ago, some of these same radical groups that don't want to explore natural resources in America today, some of those same radical groups were saying, ``Don't build the Alaskan pipeline. You'll destroy the caribou population.'' They were there.
You can't find them now because guess what happened? After they built the pipeline, the caribou population increased by about five times, a five-fold increase in the caribou population because they like the warmth of the pipeline and they mate around the pipeline. So it's actually helped the environment. You can peacefully coexist with the natural habitat by safely and environmentally friendly drilling in exploration for our natural resources.
So we put all of those different solutions, the all-of-the-above plan that my friend from California talked about in a bill called the American Energy Act, and everybody in this room cosponsored it. I would encourage all of my Democratic friends to cosponsor the bill as well because it is a comprehensive approach to a major national crisis that's facing our country.
It doesn't just talk about exploration and drilling for oil. It talks about renewable sources of energy, the things that we found at the National Renewable Energy Lab when we went and looked at the wind and solar and the hydrogen technologies that are being advanced.
But even the people that are advancing those technologies will readily admit that those technologies alone will not meet the energy needs of our country 10 years from now, 20 years from now. You're still going to have to have a reliance on multiple sources, multiple approaches to this, including fossil fuels.
So we look at things like oil shale and tar sands where we know we can get billions of barrels of oil. Yet what's standing in the way? The Democratically controlled Congress will not let us have a vote on lifting a Federal moratorium that even exists on exploring those alternative sources of energy.
So I think the more that the American people see this, and the fact that they see every 2 weeks or so the Democratically-controlled Congress brings out another scapegoat, another person to blame. They blamed OPEC and said, ``Let's sue OPEC.'' And then the price rose. And then they said, ``What about use-it-or-lose-it, and oil companies are sitting on millions of acres of leases.'' And then people looked at that and researched it and realized that's not true.
In fact, it's some of these radical environmental groups that filed lawsuits to stop people from exploring for our own natural resources, and that's the biggest delay in bringing oil to the markets so that our people can see a lower price of gasoline.
Mr. JORDAN of Ohio. Will the gentleman yield?
Mr. SCALISE. I will happily yield.
Mr. JORDAN of Ohio. I just want to ask the gentleman a question. He comes from Louisiana.
Isn't it true that the oil production facilities offshore in your State in the gulf that during Katrina, that terrible disaster that hit our country, hit your State so hard, but isn't it true those production facilities withstood that hurricane and there was no spill, no environmental hazard whatsoever during that entire storm?
Mr. SCALISE. My colleague makes a great point because that, in fact, is what happens.
Katrina was a horrible, horrible tragedy. Hurricane Rita came right behind it. So you had two of the worst hurricanes in our Nation's history, came through the Gulf of Mexico within a few week period of time of each other, and many rigs were knocked down. We saw the price of oil go up because our State supply is about 30 percent of the Nation's domestically produced oil. We would sure like to increase that percentage.
But when those rigs got knocked down, one thing that didn't happen is you did not see environmental spills because they do, they do drill today in an environmentally safe way, and you had no disasters because they know how to do it in a very technologically safe way, as my friend from California showed.
The platform, the footprint of an oil rig today is about one-fourth of the size of an oil rig just a few decades ago, and yet they can also drill in a wider area, directionally drill up to 8 miles. So the technology is there.
We have a plan that we've laid out, and if the Democratically controlled Congress has a better idea, put it on the table. Let's stay. Let's roll up or sleeves during this next 5 weeks and solve this crisis rather than taking a 5-week vacation, which is the plan, I guess, the only energy plan that the Democratically controlled Congress had.
That's why I'm proud to say no Republicans voted to adjourn because we want to stay here and work on the solution because, we know, we've got the ingenuity here in our country. We've got the technology to lower gas prices.
Mr. McCARTHY of California. I thank the gentleman from Louisiana. He made some very good points. And one thing you think of this House and you think of America. I still believe this is the most beautiful building we have in all of this country. You would think the power of the idea would win at the end of the day. And you would think of the debates you have here. But when did you ever think that the Democratic controlled Congress would be so afraid of having a debate, to actually allow a vote to take place? They have the majority. They can vote the way they want.
Today they had the majority to vote to adjourn. Now they're going to have to go home and answer to the American people why they are not back working and finding an American independent energy policy to move forward.
Now I would like to yield to my good friend from eastern Tennessee, David Davis.
Mr. DAVID DAVIS of Tennessee. Thank you for your leadership on this subject and so many others. It's good to be with you tonight and many of my colleagues from around the country.
The American people are hurting. Young families are hurting, senior adults are hurting, small businesses are hurting. Energy prices are hurting us all. A family that rents cabins for a living in my district back in northeast Tennessee recently told me they have seen a 50 to 60 percent decrease in rentals during the past spring and summer. They told me that this decrease in rentals may force the family business to go into bankruptcy because they rely on tourists who travel to the beautiful mountains of northeast Tennessee.
Oil prices also affect the cost of many of our daily essentials. Here is just a small list of everyday items that rely on oil for their production. See if you use any of these products. We need oil. We need American oil.
Hearing aids, tennis rackets, eyeglasses, soft contact lenses, trash bags, glue, ballpoint pens, carpets, tires, artificial limbs, bandages, and dentures, to name just a few.
Mr. BROUN of Georgia. Would the gentleman yield?
Mr. DAVID DAVIS of Tennessee. Yes.
Mr. BROUN of Georgia. I appreciate the gentleman going through that list of things.
I used to farm. I'm a medical doctor, as you know, and a lot of things that we deal with in health care are petroleum-based also. But as a farmer, I used not only diesel fuel in my tractor, but I also used oil-based or petroleum-based products to keep weeds out of my crops, to keep bugs out of my crops, and those sorts of things.
Having a shortage of oil is going to drastically affect agriculture, which means it's going to drastically affect food prices to every single consumer in America today. That's another reason why I think it's absolutely critical that we get American oil and stop being dependent upon this Middle East oil and foreign oil.
So I appreciate the gentleman yielding. But I wanted to add that as just another issue that's extremely critical for us to think about as we look because it's going to hurt the American consumer when they go to the grocery store that they can't buy their groceries at a reasonable price. So it not only hurts people at the pump but it hurts people in the grocery store. It hurts people at their job and in every single other way.
Mr. JORDAN of Ohio. Today in the Budget Committee we had a hearing today where we were talking about the increased price in food. We had two economists that were a part of the panel, and I asked them how much--you think about the fact that every commodity price is up. I asked them, I said, How much of all of these other commodity prices, the price being driven up, is attributable to the price of fuel? And they couldn't give a percentage, but they said it's a lot.
And it's not just a lot. When you think about the farmer and the fact that his input costs and just putting diesel in the tractor to plant the crops and harvest and cultivate the crops, but it's all our distribution. You have got to move all of these products that my friend from Tennessee listed, that my friend from Georgia talked about in agriculture. You have got to move them across this country.
Fuel drives up every single other commodity price, and that's why, again, it highlights and underscores the fact that we have got to pass legislation that allows us to get more supply.
Mr. DAVID DAVIS of Tennessee. Very good points. And I represent a rural east Tennessee district that has a lot of farming as well. You make some good points.
You actually start, when you start to till the ground, you have to have diesel. The cost has gone up to the point where it's almost put some farmers out of business. Then you have to put fertilizer on the ground, if you can afford it. If you don't have the fertilizer, you don't make the product. So it really is hurting people from all backgrounds.
Families are canceling vacations. Police departments are cutting patrols. Small businesses are closing across America. Moms and dads are sitting around their kitchen tables trying to put a budget together to decide if they're going to be able to send their kids to school and buy the products that they need, all while the leadership here in Washington refuses an up-or-down vote on increasing American energy.
Mr. McCARTHY of California. Would the gentleman yield for one moment?
Mr. DAVID DAVIS of Tennessee. Yes.
Mr. McCARTHY of California. So what the gentleman is saying is the Democratic controlled Congress, the majority who controls what comes to the floor, will not even allow a vote? Not even allow a vote on a plan that says all-of-the-above, that says ``yes'' to solar, ``yes'' to wind, ``yes'' to more drilling, ``yes'' to the new technologies for geothermal and others, but you can't even have a vote on this floor?
Mr. DAVID DAVIS of Tennessee. If they will allow us to vote, I will vote ``yes.'' They may decide to vote ``no.'' But we need to be able to vote and vote the will of the American people.
We have 435 distinct, separate districts across America. Out of those 435, I'm sure some will vote ``no,'' some will vote ``yes,'' but it's really up to Speaker Pelosi to allow it to come to the floor for a vote. The American people sent us here to do a job.
Mr. HELLER of Nevada. If the gentleman will yield.
Mr. DAVID DAVIS of Tennessee. Yes.
Mr. HELLER of Nevada. Thank you.
You make a very good point on this.
You have heard me say this before, but this energy policy is a three-
legged stool. We have to conserve; we have to look at renewable sources; we also need to drill for more oil. You can't do one without the other. You'll have an energy policy that fails. You can't do two without the third or that energy policy will fail.
I'll tell you what I got out of this trip to ANWR, which I thought overall really put this in perspective for me. And that is, as was mentioned, we use 20 million barrels of oil a day here in this country. If we do everything we can to conserve--and the American people are moving in that direction, and I applaud that--if we do everything we possibly can for renewable energy, and that is meet our goals--we have a goal here in these Chambers of 15 percent by the year 2020. If we meet those goals, if we conserve, we're still going to need an additional 10 million barrels of oil a day by 2030.
{time} 2200
So where are we going to get the additional 10 million barrels of oil that the American people are going to need if we continue to stop this possibility of going to ANWR, going offshore, looking at shale, looking at all these other prospects, and building additional refineries: Where are we going to get that additional 3 million barrels that we are going to need, even though we're on top of the renewable process and we have conserved, as the American people are doing today? That's the question that needs to be answered.
Mr. BROUN of Georgia. You make a great point, Congressman Heller.
I keep hearing from the other side, from the radical environmentalists, as well as the Democratic leadership that won't let us vote on this bill, that it will take 10 years if we pass a bill--if we're to pass this bill, it will take 10 years to start producing oil. That's hogwash.
We don't have enough refinery capacity in America. We need to build new refineries, and they say it will take 10 years to get them permitted. And that's hogwash. If Habitat for Humanity can build a house in one week that will withstand a hurricane, as we've seen it happen, if America just has the gumption to do so, we could build a refinery in a year. We could start pumping oil very quickly.
But Nancy Pelosi's leadership won't allow us to vote, and it's just absolutely unconscionable to me that we can't vote to supply more oil and stop this dependence upon foreign oil. It is absolutely critical for our national security.
Mr. HELLER of Nevada. In my local newspaper just today, there was an article written by some of the people that you're talking about, some of the more extreme environmentalists saying that this country would be better off today if we had the same gas prices as they have in Holland,
$10 a gallon: $10 a gallon, if we had that, America would be better off. I have a hard time believing that we are better off if we to try to Europeanize ourselves and increase the price per gallon.
I've had town hall meetings. I've had over a hundred thousand people polled of what they thought of a 50 cent per gallon increase. Eighty-
two percent are against it. We have people now calling for doubling the gasoline prices we have today.
Mr. McCARTHY of California. You're all raising very good points, but you're showing what is happening on this floor by not allowing the vote. But there is another way. There is all-of-the-above. If we were able to drill in ANWR, the Federal Reserve Chair said, if you increase production by 1 percent, it goes down 10 percent. ANWR will produce 1 million barrels a day. That automatically would lower the price per gallon by 50 cents.
But think about what's happening today. It's the largest transfer of wealth from our country, America, to countries that disagree with us. If we had an American energy plan that made us independent, what else does it do? It creates American jobs. The $700 billion stays in America.
Mr. WALBERG. If the gentleman would yield, I'd love to hop on that point there.
We talk about those that we pay, and in some cases, even prop up their economy such as Venezuela with Hugo Chavez, who is a dictator who has said that he wants America to be defeated and off the face of the Earth as it were. But we send a check to him of $170 million per day that props up his failing regime, that allows him to continue, and we pay this to an enemy.
I would also submit to you, as I mentioned earlier, as I come from the former motor capital of the world, we have a Volt vehicle that GM is producing that has the ability to run 40 miles, whether standing in traffic, in a traffic jam, or going 40 miles straight on electric power. Most people in their commute would allow them to purchase that Volt vehicle and never have to use the gas portion of the propulsion.
Now, keeping that in mind, we're talking about drilling and we need to drill, but we're also talking about our plan, all-of-the-above, which includes nuclear power, wind power, solar power. I submit to you that, if we have an electric vehicle like that, it won't be any good if we don't do some of the infrastructure.
We need nuclear power to produce that electricity. We need an infrastructure to get it to the box where they have to plug in to recharge. Now, that would allow us the opportunity to expand.
And the gentleman from Nevada, you bring up a good point about those that offer alternatives. We have, at present, the founder of Greenpeace on our side about alternative fuels and the specific nature of nuclear power who says nuclear power is the greenest energy that we can have and we ought to be producing more nuclear power, we ought to be putting nuclear plants up.
So with drilling, with nuclear power, with wind, with solar, with all of the above, natural gas and others, we can make this country independent from any other country on this Earth and put ourselves back in a competitive position that not only allows us to continue our lifestyle and expand it the world around, but also make ourselves secure.
Mr. BROUN of Georgia. These are all great things and they're included in the American energy plan, and that's the reason we need to vote on these. And I think it's absolutely critical--all of us voted to stay here to vote on this bill, and I think it's critical for us to do so.
But a lot of naysayers say, well, even if we voted on this bill, it would take a long time to lower the cost of gas. But I just submit what happened when the President rescinded the Presidential moratorium on offshore drilling. Oil prices immediately fell. Gas prices are coming down. If we would vote on this bill and pass it, I guarantee you almost overnight we'd see much, much lower prices of gas at the pump, and oil prices would come down.
We had this bill about speculation. Well, this is the way to deal with speculation. Let's pass this bill. It will stop the whole problem that we hear from the Democratic side about speculators running up the cost of oil. That's hogwash, too. We need to pass this bill, and I call on the Democratic leadership to bring it to the floor.
Mr. SCALISE. Again, a lot of interesting points are being brought up, great points that you just brought up, and ultimately, this comes down to a supply-and-demand problem. And when you're talking about the price, you are exactly right, because when you talk to economic experts, what they will tell you--and anybody that understands basic market economics, and I think most people in the American country do--
unfortunately, I think the Democratically-controlled leadership of this Congress doesn't understand that you've got an increase in global demand for oil all across this world, not just in the United States, and yet the supply is flat. OPEC's not going to increase their supply because they want a high price.
But we here in our country have the ability to increase some of those moratoriums that were arbitrarily placed by Congress. And you talked about the President lifting the ban on Outer Continental Shelf drilling. You saw a $10 drop in the price of a barrel of oil in just 1 day because of an executive ban, even though still now and I think most in people in the country now see that the only thing standing in the way of opening up that Outer Continental Shelf to drilling is the congressional ban that's in place, and that's the ban that's part of the all-of-the-above strategy, and we're asking Speaker Pelosi to just give us a vote on that.
If she wants to disagree with it, if these radical environmental groups don't want to do that, that's their prerogative, but let's have a straight up-or-down vote. I think that a lot of Democrats would vote for that, too, as well as Republicans because ultimately you would see a real solution being placed on the table.
But in fact, what we're left with is this do-nothing approach and the leadership in Congress saying let's adjourn for 5 weeks rather than address this problem because they're afraid of the realization, and I think they realize that if we had a vote on this, we opened it up to all amendments so that we could actually talk about a full, comprehensive energy plan which our country doesn't have--the fact that if we did that, you would see an immediate drop, even bigger than that
$10 a barrel drop you saw that one day. You would see a dramatic drop, as my friend from California talked about, at least a 20 percent drop, which our people, our constituents all across this country would realize very quickly in a lower price of gas at the pump, and that's ultimately what we should be trying to achieve.
Mr. DAVID DAVIS of Tennessee. We're here tonight to ask the Democrat majority to let us take a vote on all-the-above, no more excuses.
You know, the interesting thing is we actually took a vote on the floor today. You know, we're here taking votes, 435 Members. We took a vote today to go home. So leadership's letting us take votes but just not on energy bills. I think that's a point that ought to be taken to the American people. They need to understand that we're taking votes. We're just not taking votes to increase the supply of energy. All of the above, wind, solar, coal, oil, drilling, natural gas, we're taking votes but not to increase energy. We're taking votes to go home for 5 weeks. That means for 5 weeks gasoline prices are going to be high back in northeast Tennessee. That's not what the American people look for.
Mr. BROUN of Georgia. I ask any Member here, what's the Democratic leadership afraid of? Do y'all know? I think they're afraid it will pass. I think that's the problem. I think they're afraid that this will pass and they won't have the environmental wackos and radical environmentalists that they can pander to anymore.
Mr. DAVID DAVIS of Tennessee. I think I have an answer to that because I do believe there are some commonsense Democrats on this floor. This is not a Republican issue. This is not a Democrat issue. This is an American issue. The only thing standing between us and the vote is Nancy Pelosi's Democrat leadership. I would call on the Democrat leadership to let us vote. Let Republicans vote. Let Democrats vote. Let them vote their conscience. Let them vote their district.
And I would, without a doubt, believe that we could go home on August 1, 48 hours from now, with an energy plan that would bring down prices at the pump because there's going to be some commonsense Democrats that will vote to make sure that moms and dads have some relief at the pump; young families have some relief at the pump; senior adults have some relief at the pump; small businesses have some relief at the pump. We need some relief at the pump.
Mr. McCARTHY of California. Reclaiming my time, because as we begin to end here, one, I want to thank all my colleagues for coming down, for talking to the American people about the quarterly report, telling them what actually goes on in this building.
When we think for one moment that, as this House adjourns--not because anybody on this floor right now voted to adjourn. We said let's stay here and let's create a plan that creates an energy program that has all the above, from wind, to solar, to hydrogen, to nuclear, to exploration, takes us into the new frontier.
Because when you think of the floor that we're on, they built this Dome in the Civil War. You think of the challenges that this country has faced. And time and time again, we have met that challenge. But how did we meet that challenge? By not being afraid of debate, by not being afraid of the idea coming forward, not being afraid of one side of the aisle or the other, not saying the country's red or blue. This country is red, white and blue.
And that's the American energy plan we have. It makes us American independent of foreign countries. It stops sending the greatest amount of wealth out of this country to somebody else by creating American jobs right here.
But the only way we're ever going to be able to do it is that this Democratic-controlled Congress has got to change. It's got to allow the idea to come forth and not be afraid of the vote.
So, today, when you go home and when you see your Member out maybe in a parade, maybe on a street corner, maybe they're having a town hall meeting, ask that Member if they voted to adjourn. Did they vote to stay? Did they vote to make America energy independent? Or did they vote no, let's go home, let's let that price go up higher?
Well, I want to thank the Members for being a part of this tonight, and thank you for coming down and telling the American people where the report stands, where we're going forward and being willing to lead, going to Golden, Colorado, to see the renewable energy, and going to ANWR.
____________________
