[Congressional Record Volume 148, Number 77 (Wednesday, June 12, 2002)]
[House]
[Pages H3462-H3471]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




 APPOINTMENT OF CONFEREES ON H.R. 4, SECURING AMERICA'S FUTURE ENERGY 
                              ACT OF 2001

  Mr. BARTON of Texas. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to take 
from the Speaker's table the bill (H.R. 4) to enhance energy 
conservation, research and development and to provide for security and 
diversity in the energy supply for the American people, and for

[[Page H3463]]

other purposes, with a Senate amendment thereto, disagree to the Senate 
amendment, and agree to the conference asked by the Senate.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the 
gentleman from Texas?
  There was no objection.


                Motion To Instruct Offered by Mr. Markey

  Mr. MARKEY. Mr. Speaker, I offer a motion to instruct conferees.
  The Clerk read as follows:
       Mr. Markey of Massachusetts moves that the managers on the 
     part of the House at the conference on the disagreeing votes 
     of the two Houses on the Senate amendment to the bill H.R. 4 
     be instructed, to the extent possible within the scope of 
     conference, to ensure that no provision of the bill will 
     create a deficit in the non-social security portion of the 
     Federal budget during any year of the 10-year budget 
     estimating period unless there are sufficient offsets under 
     the bill so that there is no net deficit during such 10-year 
     period.

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to clause 7(b) of rule XX, the 
gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Markey) and the gentleman from Texas 
(Mr. Barton) each will control 30 minutes.
  The Chair recognizes the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Markey).
  Mr. MARKEY. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 2 minutes.
  The motion which I am offering at this time on behalf of myself, the 
gentleman from Texas (Mr. Stenholm) and many other Members is to ensure 
that as the Members of the House now meet with members of the Senate on 
the energy bill, that the Members from the House be instructed that 
none of the expenditures inside of the bill, as it is finally produced, 
using the number which is now in the House bill, $34 billion worth of 
subsidies, should be paid for out of the Social Security or Medicare 
trust fund.
  The bulk of the subsidies in the bill go to the oil, to the gas, to 
the coal, to the nuclear industries. Some of it goes to the renewable 
industries. That is all fine, but it should not come out of the Social 
Security and Medicare trust funds.
  Senior citizens in our country have worked too long and too hard in 
building those trust funds so they can be there to provide both for the 
income retirement guarantee and for the health care guarantee. 
Otherwise we will see a cutback in the quality of health care which 
senior citizens get and a cutback in the amount of money they will have 
on a daily or weekly basis to pay for the necessities in their life.
  So this is the critical moment where we begin to decide whether or 
not we are going to be tough on the squandering of the trust funds. We 
have already seen over the last several weeks votes that now will 
extend the estate tax benefits to the wealthiest people in our country. 
There are going to be efforts coming up later on this week to do the 
same thing when it comes to the marriage penalty deductions.
  What about the senior citizens? What about the people who built this 
country? What about the greatest generation? My colleagues do not have 
a surplus to do all those other things until they are sure they are not 
taking it out of the Social Security and Medicare trust fund.
  Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.


                         Parliamentary Inquiry

  Mr. BARTON of Texas. Mr. Speaker, I want to ask a parliamentary 
inquiry. We are now debating the motion to instruct conferees; is that 
correct?
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. That is correct.
  Mr. BARTON of Texas. Mr. Speaker, the gentleman from Massachusetts 
(Mr. Markey) has 15 minutes and I have 15 minutes?
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. 
Markey) and the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Barton) each have 30 minutes.
  Mr. BARTON of Texas. Mr. Speaker, I am sure we can do this in less 
than an hour, I would hope.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
  I want to compliment my excellent and good friend from Massachusetts 
for offering this motion to instruct conferees. It is obvious that some 
thought has gone into it. I do not believe anybody on our side of the 
aisle is for deficit financing or deficit spending, and obviously we 
worked very hard, as the gentleman from Massachusetts would, I think, 
acknowledge, to create a bipartisan bill, H.R. 4, that we are sending 
to conference.
  I think after we have a little debate to flush out what exactly it is 
this motion to instruct conferees is attempting to do, I am going to 
recommend that we accept it. I do not see any reason we cannot agree, 
going to conference, to try to make sure the American people know that 
we want an energy policy for this country that is based on a balanced 
approach both on the production side and on the consumption side, and 
in no way are we trying to create through the guise of an energy policy 
a bill that would increase the public debt.
  Having said that, I think we need to make a few points in order so 
that the Members that are in their offices watching this debate on 
television and other interested citizens understand that the energy 
bill that we are sending to conference is an authorization bill. It is 
not a spending bill. It is not an appropriation bill. So in one sense 
it has nothing to do with deficit spending or any other thing like 
that. It is trying to list a series of priorities for this country in 
terms of an energy policy.
  Historically, the United States of America has adopted, as a general 
policy, that our energy policy is going to be based on free markets, 
where we attract private capital. We employ that private capital in the 
most cost-efficient fashion and allow private entrepreneurs to provide 
energy at the least cost of any industrialized society in the world. 
Because of that, the United States has the world's largest gross 
national product. We have the world's largest standard of living for a 
large industrialized nation, and we have tremendous opportunities, as 
we speak, for our children and our grandchildren.
  So if the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Markey) wants to say that 
as we go to work on a bipartisan basis for an energy policy for the 
present and the future that we try to ensure that our House conferees 
work to insist that it is all done in a cost-effective fashion and does 
not increase the national debt, I for one am going to endorse that and 
I would assume that in the absence of Chairman Tauzin, what I say goes 
on this floor unless the Speaker sends me an urgent message to run the 
other way in which I would have to attack my good friend from 
Massachusetts (Mr. Markey) and try to impugn him, and I am not going to 
do that because I know he is a decent fellow at heart and has got the 
national interest.
  So with that, Mr. Speaker, I would simply say that we are going to 
start this conference on a bipartisan fashion and it is going to be my 
recommendation at the appropriate time that we accept this motion to 
instruct conferees.
  Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. MARKEY. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from 
California (Ms. Eshoo).
  Ms. ESHOO. Mr. Speaker, I thank our ranking member for yielding me 
this time.
  Mr. Speaker, today we are going to conference on a bill that gives 
$34 billion in tax breaks to energy companies. Who is going to pay 
these costs? I heard my wonderful friend, the gentleman from Texas (Mr. 
Barton), my colleague on the Committee on Energy and Commerce, make his 
statement, and with all due respect, we see this not only differently 
but very differently. Who is going to pay these costs? It will be the 
Social Security beneficiaries and future generations because that is 
where the cash is.
  In California, and according to official estimates, electricity 
suppliers stuck California with at least $8.9 billion in illegal 
electricity charges between May of 2000 and June of last year. These 
estimates came before we started to learn about some of the unethical 
and possibly criminal trading activities of energy suppliers. Almost 
every day there are news reports about another company that has gamed 
the market in one way or another, and not only in California but in a 
host of States. For months my colleagues and I have been asking for a 
House inquiry into these matters. While others are investigating these 
serious flaws, and the Senate already is, the House has been 
conspicuously absent.
  The House must have a meaningful inquiry before we consider a 
conference report on sweeping energy legislation.

[[Page H3464]]

We should not repeat what happened last year, holding one or two 
hearings and then declaring the problem solved. We should all support 
this motion to ensure that we do not saddle seniors and future 
generations with the costs of these energy company tax breaks. These 
tax breaks at $34 billion should be subjected to the same budget 
treatment as everything else. If you want it, pay for it and declare 
how you are going to do it. That is what is demanded of other parts of 
the Federal budget. That is what we should be doing with this. So I 
urge my colleagues to support this motion. It makes sense and it is 
fair.
  Mr. MARKEY. Mr. Speaker, I yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from West 
Virginia (Mr. Rahall).
  Mr. RAHALL. Mr. Speaker, I thank the distinguished gentleman from 
Massachusetts (Mr. Markey), our friend, for yielding time to me.
  I do rise in support of this motion. Certainly, Mr. Speaker, it is 
time to enact a new national energy policy for the 21st century, but 
not, not, at the price of dipping into Social Security and Medicare to 
finance tax breaks for major oil companies. And that is exactly what 
the Republican-sponsored House energy bill would do through its lavish 
tax and royalty relief provisions for large oil companies.
  This is not just political rhetoric. According to the nonpartisan 
Congressional Research Service, the House version will provide $35 
billion in tax breaks. There is no offset provided and, of course, 
there are no budget surpluses to pay for it. Let me point out that one 
provision in the House bill would let companies that want to drill for 
oil and gas in the Federal waters in the Gulf of Mexico forego paying 
royalties to the American people. Truly a royalty holiday.
  Under the House bill, a company drilling in Federal waters of between 
400 and 800 meters deep can receive, for free, 5 million barrels of oil 
or gas equivalent. The owners of these resources, the American people, 
guess what they get? Zero. Zero. Zilch.

                              {time}  1615

  It gets even sweeter. Nine million barrels of oil or gas equivalent 
for drilling in waters between 800 to 1,600 meters for free. If they 
drill deeper, they get a whopping 12 million barrels of oil or gas 
equivalent for free.
  Oil production in the Gulf of Mexico has soared by 65 percent over 
the last 8 years, with gas production in deep Gulf of Mexico waters 
increasing by 80 percent in the past 2 years alone. At a time when the 
Gulf of Mexico is booming in such a way, I do not feel that we need to 
give more oil and gas away to encourage the industry to drill.
  In conclusion, executives of major oil companies will simply love the 
House energy bill. But a plain folk, a person who pays for gas for 
their vehicle, would have to wonder why they should be gouged twice: at 
the pump and at the U.S. Treasury.
  Mr. Speaker, vote for this motion. Vote for our constituents' 
interest and not the special interests. I commend the gentleman from 
Massachusetts (Mr. Markey) for offering the motion to instruct, and 
urge bipartisan support.
  Mr. BARTON of Texas. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 3 minutes.
  Mr. Speaker, I listened with great interest to the comments of the 
gentleman from West Virginia (Mr. Rahall) about the oil and gas 
industry, and I know they are heartfelt. I would point out that this 
bill has a sizable section on clean coal technology that the gentleman 
is one of the co-authors of. I know the gentleman thinks that is an 
excellent part of the bill, and it is an excellent part of the bill.
  Just as there are things that help his part of the country and his 
industry and his people, some of us think that some of the other parts 
of the bill that might have some impact on deep water drilling and 
keeping marginal wells and stripper wells in, we do not see those as 
efforts to help an industry so much as we see those as efforts to keep 
the working man working and to keep energy prices at stable levels.
  Mr. Speaker, I understand that there can be differences of opinion, 
and I want the gentleman to know that we are going to accept this 
motion to instruct and go to conference in a bipartisan way. As some of 
the issues that the gentleman raised come up, Members will listen; and 
as the gentleman is also a conferee, I am sure the gentleman will 
listen, and we will report back a bill that the American people will 
find good for the country.
  Mr. RAHALL. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. BARTON of Texas. I yield to the gentleman from West Virginia.
  Mr. RAHALL. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding.
  I understand the bipartisan fashion in which he speaks. The clean 
coal language in the bill, while I am not detracting from the use of 
clean coal technology, I do not cosponsor this particular provision. It 
happened to come out of the Committee on Energy and Commerce, not the 
Committee on Resources.
  I might also say to the gentleman, that the coal that happens to come 
from my particular region of southern West Virginia is already clean 
coal. Clean coal technologies are fine, and I do not speak against 
them, but we do not have to apply those technologies to the coal that 
comes out of southern West Virginia and eastern Kentucky, which is some 
of the cleanest burning coal, low sulfur content, high btu.
  Mr. BARTON of Texas. Mr. Speaker, reclaiming my time, we will 
stipulate that the gentleman's coal is clean. We might want to point 
out that coal in general has sizably larger emissions of VOCs than some 
of my dirty natural gas. It is about 95 percent, maybe 96 percent 
cleaner. We are going to work to clean up all energy sources. I would 
also hope that we will help to revitalize the nuclear industry which 
has no emissions.
  Mr. RAHALL. Mr. Speaker, if the gentleman would continue to yield, I 
hope the gentleman does not forget about his lignite coal in his home 
State of Texas.
  Mr. BARTON of Texas. Mr. Speaker, we have some lignite coal, and we 
are proud of it; and some of it was in my old congressional district.
  Mr. MARKEY. Mr. Speaker, I yield such time as he may consume to the 
gentleman from Texas (Mr. Stenholm).
  Mr. STENHOLM. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me this 
time.
  Mr. Speaker, I want to begin by acknowledging that now more than 
ever, America needs a balanced, forward-looking energy policy that will 
infuse our energy sector with both efficiency and competition, 
formulated to protect America against emergencies in the energy market. 
This bill does that.
  I commend the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Barton). I appreciate the 
spirit with which he has accepted this amendment to instruct. This 
amendment is not aimed at the committee. This amendment is aimed at the 
leadership of this House which continues to borrow on our Social 
Security trust funds in order to pay for those things that we need. 
This is a good energy bill. I commend the gentleman from Massachusetts 
(Mr. Markey) for his participation in this, and I see the gentleman 
from Louisiana (Mr. Tauzin) is here. They have worked very well to put 
together a bill which has many good features.
  We no longer can rely on the same old policy, and I am pleased to see 
that we are on the verge of having a national energy policy that will 
achieve many of these goals. There are many provisions in H.R. 4, as 
well as in the legislation passed by the Senate, that I have been a 
long-time supporter of, including access to capital for domestic oil 
and natural gas production; increased research in alternative fuels 
such as nuclear energy; advanced clean coal technology; a sound 
commitment to renewable energy; and improved energy efficiency and 
environmental standards.
  Yet when the House considered H.R. 4, I was disappointed that the tax 
incentives, again that I have supported for many years, were not 
considered within the context of the budget process.
  Last year, the President promised that we could have it all. He 
argued that the projected $5.6 trillion in surpluses within 10 years 
was enough for a large tax cut, a decent Medicare prescription drug 
benefit, increases in education spending, a national energy policy, and 
increases in defense spending.
  This Congress could have taken time to look comprehensively at using 
the Tax Code to accomplish many goals, including some much-needed 
improvement to our energy policy. Regrettably, we made it considerably 
more

[[Page H3465]]

difficult to provide for the needed spending in the area of energy as 
well as other top priority issues that are facing this country.
  Instead of figuring out how are we going to stop the tide of red ink 
and stop spending Social Security surplus dollars, the House leadership 
continues to push irresponsible tax cuts.
  Just a few weeks ago, the majority leadership passed the supplemental 
appropriation that also makes room for a $750 billion increase in the 
debt limit. Those of us who said that we ought to sit down and figure 
out how to get our budget back in order before we approve another $750 
billion in debt were ignored.
  This week is no different. We are considering a permanent extension 
of marriage penalty relief. Permanent extension. Again, motherhood and 
the flag, everybody is for it; except our grandchildren should not be 
for it, but they do not have a vote.
  We will also vote in a moment on another great-sounding issue, and 
that is requiring a two-thirds vote in order to raise taxes. But yet my 
friend from Tennessee was denied an opportunity to have an amendment on 
the floor that would suggest that we ought to have a three-fifths vote 
to borrow money. It is easier to borrow money because our grandchildren 
do not have a vote on that issue. It is tough to raise taxes. In fact, 
show me one Member of this body who stands up and says, ``I am going to 
raise taxes,'' and I will show my colleagues a Member that is about to 
get unelected in November.
  But here we are. As a result, we are experiencing trust fund raids 
and deficit for the foreseeable future, instead of large projected 
surpluses, all to pay for this reckless economic plan.
  Mr. Speaker, all we are asking is let us get back on a plan to 
balance the budget without using Social Security. The current estimates 
for this year's unified budget deficit are between $150 billion and 
$250 billion. That is deficits, and not all of it has to do with 
September 11. Not all of it has to do with the economy. As Members read 
in the Wall Street Journal today, Mitch Daniels, director of OMB, is 
finally coming around and beginning to have a moment of honesty: ``At 
this rate, there are not sufficient resources for a decent Medicare 
drug benefit, education spending, or energy policy.''
  I do not understand the philosophy of folks who do not have a problem 
with leaving our children and grandchildren with a large debt just so 
we can have a tax cut or more spending today. I want our children and 
grandchildren to inherit a strong economy and a Federal Government that 
can meet its commitments for Social Security and Medicare. I definitely 
do not want them to inherit a massive national debt and legacy of 
deficit spending.
  The motion to instruct conferees is very straightforward and reflects 
a principle that every Member of this body has solemnly vowed to 
protect. The motion simply states the conferees, to the extent 
possible, within the scope of conference, ensure that no provision of 
bill create a deficit in the non-Social Security portion of the Federal 
budget during the duration of the bill, unless there are sufficient 
offsets under the bill, thereby ensuring that it does not raid Social 
Security surpluses.
  Until we deal with the long-term financial problems facing Social 
Security, we need to be very careful about any tax or spending bills 
that would place a greater burden on the budget in the next decade. If 
Members believe that more tax cuts and increased spending are more 
important than eliminating the national debt and protecting the 
integrity of the Medicare and Social Security trust funds, vote against 
this motion. I am glad nobody is going to vote against it. I believe 
Members should support it.
  Mr. Speaker, I support the spirit of the gentleman from Texas (Mr. 
Barton) for agreeing to this, and I do know that the spirit of the 
conferees will somehow find it in their hearts to talk to the 
leadership and get the leadership to go along with this excellent 
proposal.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Linder). Without objection, the 
gentleman from Louisiana (Mr. Tauzin) will control the balance of the 
time of the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Barton).
  There was no objection.
  Mr. TAUZIN. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
  Mr. Speaker, as we begin the final steps toward enacting a 
comprehensive national energy policy for our country, I want to remind 
the Nation and this House of two important facts. The first was that 
this House passed H.R. 4, the SAFE Act, Securing America's Future 
Energy on or about August 1 of last year.
  We passed it by an overwhelming bipartisan majority. In fact, it 
passed out of the subcommittee by a vote of 29 to 1, and I want to 
thank the chairman of the Subcommittee on Energy and Air Quality, the 
gentleman from Texas (Mr. Barton), for the great work the gentleman did 
in perfecting the core of this bill in subcommittee.
  It passed out of the full committee by a vote of 50 to 5, and I 
particularly want to thank the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Dingell) 
for his extraordinary cooperation and bipartisan support for us to 
produce this energy policy for the House and the Nation. I thank the 
gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Markey) for the work he did, and the 
gentleman knows that we worked out quite a number of important features 
in the bill that he was interested in regarding conservation, 
alternative fuels and other areas.
  The bottom line is we produced this bill for the House on August 1, 
2001, before September 11. We produced this bill for the House when 
after years of sort of benign neglect, we came to a conclusion that 
this Nation needed as a matter of national security a cohesive energy 
policy which was not written in fits and starts, but balanced things 
and brought into play conservation and alternative fuels and new 
technologies and potential new sources of energy for our country.
  We did it out of concern that we were becoming more and more 
dependent upon foreign sources that were not as reliable as they once 
were. At a time when we were facing about 57 percent of imports to 
satisfy this Nation's energy demands, we decided we had better do 
something. We better talk about conservation. We better talk about 
alternative fuels and new technologies and new means by which we could 
move about this country. We better tell the automobile industry that we 
wanted some fuel savings in the SUV fleet, and we wanted to make sure 
that there was in fact new and available sources of energy to power the 
electric grids of this country so the rest of America did not 
experience what California went through.
  We did it on August 1, 2001. Then on September 11, 9-11, we witnessed 
the awful effect of this new age we have entered, this new age where 
this country is at war against terror; and it has dawned on us what we 
did on August 1 has even more relevance after 9-11.
  Here are some numbers. I want Members to think about the fact that we 
are now buying a million barrels of oil a day from Iraq. It costs this 
country $21 billion a year. That $21 billion is money we send to the 
Iraqi Government, to that country. What do they use it for? They use it 
to build weapons of mass destruction after they have thrown the U.N. 
inspectors out. They use it to send money to the families of suicide 
bombers. They use it to build radar sites that lock onto the American 
planes that are patrolling the no-fly zones, and build missiles to try 
to knock down American airmen as we try to live up to and complete the 
terms of that peace agreement following the Persian Gulf War, planes 
that are carrying jet fuel that is made in part from Iraqi oil. How 
crazy is this? How insensible is this?

                              {time}  1630

  We have watched as one of our dearest energy commercial friends, 
Venezuela, has come under a regime that thinks Castro is a pretty nice 
guy. Fidel Castro, if you remember, was a guy that Nikita Khrushchev's 
son wrote about in the memoirs, who acknowledged that Castro asked and 
advised Nikita Khrushchev to launch a full scale preemptive nuclear 
strike against America during the Cuban missile crisis. That is the guy 
Mr. Chavez loves, and we depend upon Venezuela for so much of our 
energy supplies in this country. In fact, we depend upon Venezuela for 
lot of the reformulated gasoline that completes our clean air program 
in America. Think about that. Think about the fact that this country 
depends every day, every one of us that gets in an automobile, every 
one of us

[[Page H3466]]

that gets in an airplane, depends every day on people who are on the 
other side in this war on terror to make fuel available to us and that 
the money we spend to buy fuel from them helps to underwrite the 
terrorists who are attacking this country. And then I think you begin 
to realize how important this conference on energy is going to be and 
how critical it is that the work of this House on H.R. 4 be, as much as 
we can, sustained in the conference with the Senate.
  The Senate has added some important features to the bill we passed. 
They have built a good electricity title that we are going to work on. 
Chairman Barton has done a good job in building a House position. We 
are going to have a chance, with our Democratic colleagues, to 
hopefully add an electricity title to the bill that is going to better 
ensure transmission lines work, that they are there to move energy from 
areas of surplus to areas of demand, that we have enough electricity in 
the grid that nobody has to go through what California went through. We 
are going to continue to work with the Senate on the provisions it has 
added to make sure that we have other blends in the mix, like ethanol 
in the mix of our reformulated gasolines. And we are going to try to 
make sure that when we produce a bill, that it is well balanced, that 
it contains not just conservation and new technologies and alternative 
fuels, but it also contains some incentives to make sure we produce 
here at home gas and oil and fuel and coal and other electric supplies 
that we can depend upon because they are made in America, instead of 
being produced by people that we cannot trust in this world anymore. We 
are going to try to produce a balanced bill.
  I am going to ask all our colleagues to stand with us as we go into 
conference with the Senate to make sure we have that.
  If I could make just a point. That 1 million barrels a day we buy 
from Iraq, that is what we could produce in ANWR if we could include an 
ANWR provision in the conference. We are going to fight for one as we 
go to conference with the Senate.
  So today as we begin this process, as the conferees are named, as we 
begin the process to produce a comprehensive energy policy for America, 
we ought to be reminded every day of that conference of 9/11 and how 
much more critical it is that this House and the Senate succeed in 
putting a bill in front of the President to sign before we leave here 
to go face the voters in November. This may be the most important 
national security work we do. We ought to do it well. We ought to do it 
right.
  Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. MARKEY. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentlewoman from 
Ohio (Ms. Kaptur).
  Ms. KAPTUR. Mr. Speaker, I thank the ranking member for yielding me 
this time and I rise in very strong support of the Markey motion to 
instruct.
  Make no mistake about it, the energy bill provides a world of 
opportunity for wasting taxpayer dollars in pursuit of very bad policy. 
I agree with my dear colleague from Louisiana about the need for 
renewables here at home. The problem is the bill pays very short shrift 
to that while it gives away $34 billion over 10 years and shovels money 
like coal into energy blast furnaces out of the Social Security trust 
fund.
  We are really happy that the motion to instruct apparently has been 
accepted by the other side. But for the life of me, I do not know how 
they are going to make the numbers work, because a week ago the 
Republican majority had borrowed $207 billion from the Social Security 
trust fund and that number this week went up to $212 billion. And now 
this bill adds $34 billion in red ink on top of that. Somebody has to 
keep the ledger balanced at the end of the year.
  What seems to pass for energy policy in this administration includes 
renewal of the Price Anderson Act which exempts nuclear power plants, 
for example, from liability for accidents and potentially streamlining 
the licensing process for companies that are seeking to bring old 
reactors back on-line--like the one in my district which just had a 
hole eaten in its head, and they are trying to figure out what to do 
about it. It has been shut down for months.
  The failure of this administration to provide an intelligent energy 
policy and the failure of Congress to pass tough, no-nonsense campaign 
finance reform creates a climate for vast giveaways of taxpayer 
dollars. If you look at the nuclear industry alone, which the Vice 
President loves a great deal, they gave more than $13.8 million to 
Federal candidates in the 2000 election cycle. Most of our citizens do 
not have that kind of election clout.
  So I would just say it is important to pass this motion to instruct 
conferees to protect the Social Security trust fund being tapped as the 
only place to get the money for the kind of corporate giveaways that 
are included in this bill. Unfortunately, the surpluses that had begun 
to build as of January 2001 have now plummeted into deficits in every 
single account in this government. The promise that was made with seven 
votes that we took here on this floor ``not to break the lockbox'' has 
been broken seven times. We are now in the red already this year, as of 
yesterday $212 billion. This bill worsens that problem.
  I urge my colleagues to vote for the Markey motion to instruct and 
stop the raid on Social Security trust funds being cashed out to the 
corporate energy giants.
  Mr. TAUZIN. Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to yield 5 minutes to the 
gentleman from North Carolina (Mr. Burr), the vice chairman of the 
Committee on Energy and Commerce.
  Mr. BURR of North Carolina. Mr. Speaker, my only regret is that we 
had not had this debate and this level of cooperation about the 
economic stimulus package, because had we started it sooner, it would 
have been bigger. The fact is the economy would go faster and we would 
not have the challenges that we do about programs that the American 
people want.
  I find it ironic that we have a debate about robbing money from 
Medicare in the same month that we hope to pass a $300-billion-plus 
Medicare prescription drug benefit for seniors who desperately need it 
across this country. We will in this House, once again as we did 2 
years ago, pass it, but in all likelihood we will not do it with a 
unanimous vote.
  Mr. Speaker, H.R. 4 does a tremendous amount, and I think we are in 
agreement on the highlights of this bill. It is the SAFE Act. It is 
about securing America's future energy needs. It is about making energy 
policy and energy availability predictable and, most importantly, 
affordable. The House passed a comprehensive national energy bill which 
builds on the President's national energy policy and that was to 
promote economic development and domestic energy supplies and encourage 
increased efficiency and conservation.
  This motion to instruct will be accepted, and we should, because 
nobody wants to rob Social Security and Medicare. But the fact is that 
many of the areas that have been pointed out as tax breaks are, in 
fact, issues that were lobbied for by all Members, because they deal 
with conservation.
  Let me just point out a few. We give a tax credit for residential 
solar energy because we know that we need to diversify the sources that 
we get our energy from. We give tax credits for fuel cells, the 
possible best breakthrough in the future, for less of a reliance on the 
fuels that we currently import. We give modifications and extensions 
for provisions relating to electric vehicles, clean fuel vehicles, 
clean fuel vehicles' refueling property. We give tax credits for 
energy-efficient appliances. We give credits for energy-efficient 
improvements to existing homes. We give allowance and deductions for 
energy efficiency for commercial properties. We give investment and 
production tax credits for clean coal technology.
  As a member of the North Carolina delegation where we just passed 
smokestack legislation which cleans up our State, it is challenging, 
but we cannot do it without the Federal Government's investment in 
clean coal technology.
  By the way, Mr. Speaker, in addition, we in this bill increase the 
LIHEAP authorization levels. That is the needs of low-income Americans 
for heat in the winter, and I am sure that is probably calculated in 
these predictions of what we steal from Medicare and Medicaid.
  The fact is that, Mr. Speaker, we are challenged with many more 
things than just energy policy this year. This one bill makes 
predictable not only the

[[Page H3467]]

supply but the cost. We as a Congress will be challenged with 
additional needs of supplemental appropriations to fight a war on 
terrorism. We will be challenged to find the money for the Medicare 
prescription needs of our seniors. But since we have taken care of some 
of it in budget resolutions, we may be challenged as money runs short. 
We can find the areas we get it from. We have before. We will again. We 
will live up to the fiduciary responsibility that the American people 
have entrusted in us.
  I hope that all of our colleagues will join us in supporting the 
motion to instruct conferees, protecting the bank that we are in charge 
of but, more importantly, in passing an energy policy that is so 
overneeded in this country, making sure that our future is, in fact, 
secure.
  Mr. MARKEY. Mr. Speaker, I yield such time as he may consume to the 
gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Frank).
  Mr. FRANK. Mr. Speaker, I thank my friend from Massachusetts who has 
been such a leader on energy and environmental issues for so long in 
this Congress.
  I am glad to note some points of agreement.
  First of all, as the previous speaker made it clear, the important 
issue of energy policy is one where there has to be a strong Federal 
Government role. Sometimes there is rhetoric in this Chamber that 
assumes that the Federal Government is simply a problem. Indeed, Ronald 
Reagan in his first inaugural said, ``The government is not the answer 
to our problems. The government is the problem.'' I am glad to join the 
gentleman from North Carolina in repudiating that simplistic and 
inaccurate misstatement. As the gentleman said, without a Federal 
Government investment, we cannot have a good energy policy. Obviously 
if you think the Federal Government is just a problem, you do not want 
it to go around investing, presumably spreading problems.
  He is right. The free market has a role to play, but the government 
has an indispensable role. Those who would denigrate government and 
those who would think that you could somehow do away with it are 
reminded here, and I am glad to see that we have this agreement, this 
is a bill to expand the role of the Federal Government in dealing with 
our energy problem. I welcome that area of agreement. We may have 
disagreements about how to do it.
  We have one other disagreement, though, and let me just say, there 
are some areas where I wish the gentleman from Louisiana had gone even 
further. He mentioned some of the unattractive regimes with whom we 
must deal to get oil. I would have added Saudi Arabia. Indeed, when I 
look at the list of things we find wrong with most of these countries 
that have been criticized, I find Saudi Arabia right up there. It seems 
to me we are a little inconsistent. Things that we find indefensible in 
some regimes, they appear to be almost virtues when the Saudis do them. 
But I agree we should be across the board.
  As to conservation, I wish we would go further. I wish the President 
of the United States had not backed off his predecessor's proposals 
regarding air conditioning. When we are talking about the need for 
energy at that peak period in the summer when air conditioning is such 
a drain, under the previous administration, the presidency of President 
Clinton, we had very good energy-saving proposals. The President has 
cut back, and here is the common theme. The President cut back because, 
well, we would have had to pay for that a little bit in air 
conditioning. The gentleman from North Carolina said, why are we 
objecting? We are giving a tax cut here and a tax break here. There a 
tax break, here a tax break, everywhere a tax break.
  I am for many of those; not for all of them. The problem is the 
attitude that says to the American people, here are some freebies. The 
one word that people never mention is ``sacrifice.'' We are not talking 
about going around in sackcloth and ashes, whatever those look like. I 
do not know myself, but I have heard that often enough. What we are 
saying, however, is you cannot have it all. You cannot have more 
spending on these programs and more tax cuts for those programs, and 
then more tax cuts in general, and then still make everything work. 
There is a failure here to tell people the truth.
  We vote here, but not under oath. Maybe we ought to vote under oath 
sometimes and not just testify under oath. Everybody is going to vote 
for this, they tell us, but I do not think it is going to be carried 
out. It has a particular relevance to Social Security and Medicare. It 
is not the case that money spent here will in and of itself reduce 
Social Security benefits.

                              {time}  1645

  That is not the argument. It is not the case that it will reduce in 
and of itself the money in Medicare. But here is what is happening. 
People make projections, and they look at the cost of Medicare and 
Social Security as currently structured 20 years from now and they say 
we will not have enough money to pay for it.
  But what they then do by increasing spending and reducing taxes is to 
exacerbate that very problem. This is a self-created problem. We say 
there will not be enough money at the Federal level to meet the 
commitments of Social Security and Medicare. So how do we respond to 
that? Let us reduce the revenues that would otherwise be available for 
it.
  That is why people are being frightened with the need to privatize 
Social Security, although we have heard less of that these days. We 
could all look forward, of course, to the average working person 
retiring and being told he or she now has a private Social Security 
account and, of course, his or her friendly analyst would be glad to 
give that person a wholly objective impression of what stocks to buy 
and which accounting firms had been involved in manipulation there.
  But that is the problem here. What you do is you tell people you can 
have it all, we can have the standard of living we have already had, we 
can conserve, and we can cut taxes, and we can continue everything 
else, except when we get to Medicare and Social Security, people are 
going to be told we have to cut back.
  One of the previous speakers mentioned the prescription drug program. 
The prescription drug program that was passed 2 years ago was 
inadequate. It did not give middle income older Americans a fair deal, 
and neither will the one that will be coming forward. Indeed, it has 
been held up because the first impulse on the majority side was to cut 
Medicare to pay for it. Well, the Members were not ready to vote for 
that now, so we are going to get a still inadequate prescription drug 
program.
  But the consequence of this bill and every other bill, and we are not 
objecting at this point to doing some of these things, we are objecting 
to pretending you can do them with no choices being made, and that is 
probably even a better word than ``sacrifice.''
  What the majority wants to do is simply avoid choices, to tell 
everybody they can have everything. What this will result in is, on the 
one hand, people will spend and cut taxes and raise the debt limit and 
increase the deficit and reduce the revenues that are coming into the 
Federal Government and turn a surplus into deficit, and then they will 
say in an entirely other context, hoping nobody remembers, oh, and by 
the way, we are going to run out of money, and, therefore, we have to 
reduce Social Security benefits. Therefore, we have to restructure 
Medicare. Therefore, we have to cut back. Therefore, we cannot afford 
an adequate prescription drug benefit program.
  I am pleased that my friend from Massachusetts has offered this. I do 
note one other thing that I meant to mention. I did hear the chairman 
of the subcommittee who began the debate say, ``Why are we so upset? 
This is, after all, not an appropriations bill, it is just an 
authorization bill. That is, this simply says we can spend the money. 
It does not spend the money.''
  Note the apparent assumption that just because we say something does 
not mean we mean it. When you say do not worry, this is just an 
authorization bill calling for the expenditure of these billions, but 
it does not actually spend them, I am reminded of the couplet from Tom 
Lera that I cannot quite remember, but it did involve Wernher Von 
Braun, the former German rocket scientist who became a part of the 
American science movement, and I remember the rhyme which was basically

[[Page H3468]]

he was in this song disclaiming responsibility for the damage his 
creations had done in England, because, the words went, in effect, I am 
not responsible. I am only in charge of when they went up. I am not 
responsible for where they came down, said Wernher Von Braun.
  Well, you are responsible when you authorize and write into law for 
the expenditures that come. So what the gentleman from Massachusetts 
said is absolutely accurate: Do not pretend that we can continue to cut 
taxes, incur deficits, spend in other areas, and not have that have a 
negative impact on our ability to continue to fund Social Security and 
Medicare. So I am glad that people are going to vote with us. I just 
wish they meant it.
  Mr. TAUZIN. Mr. Speaker, I am honored to yield 4 minutes to the 
gentleman from Iowa (Mr. Nussle), the distinguished chairman of the 
House Committee on the Budget.
  Mr. NUSSLE. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding.
  Mr. Speaker, what is probably most humorous about the last statement 
on the floor is that the Democrats do not want to take credit when it 
is going up or when it is coming down. In fact, this year the Democrats 
presented no plan, no budget, no ideas, no answers, no solutions, 
nothing. Not on energy, not on Medicare, not on agriculture, not on 
Social Security, not on anything that is addressing the needs of this 
Nation. Not on homeland security, not on defense, not on intelligence. 
None of those things were presented in a budget this year.
  Let us just review the bidding of how we got here. Last year, not 
this year, last year the Republicans, together with the President, 
introduced a budget that said energy needs to be a priority. When you 
are 60 percent dependent on foreign fossil fuels for the energy of your 
nation, you have got a problem.
  People come to my town meetings and they wonder sometimes a little 
bit about why we are entangled in the Middle East. Wake up, America. 
There is your reason. We have not had a long-term energy strategy. We 
have allowed it to deplete over time. The last 8 years have certainly 
been no friend to energy. And so, yes, of course, we find ourselves 
with that as a necessary priority. It has impacted our economy, it has 
impacted the creation of jobs. So last year we put into the budget to 
have an energy strategy, and last year in August we passed this bill in 
order to address it within the, fit within budget, fit within surpluses 
as far as the eye could see, and we managed the problem.
  Now today Democrats are running to the floor saying, ``My God, what 
happened? Where is the surplus? Where did it go? Why are we in 
deficits?''
  Well, there is a little incident that occurred September 11, you may 
have remembered that, I realize you discount it now, but pretty 
significant, in which in a bipartisan way, thankfully, Republicans and 
Democrats reached into that surplus, and they took out money for the 
emergency, they took out money for homeland security, we took out money 
to fund the war, and we took out money to stimulate an economy that was 
already in doldrums, that went into the doldrums even further as a 
result of that attack, and we did that in a bipartisan way. And now, 7 
months later, you wander to the floor and say where is the surplus? We 
spent it, folks. We spent it, appropriately so, on the needs of this 
country.
  So we had an energy bill that fit within the budget, and we 
appropriately spent the surplus and did whatever it took in order to 
address what happened in September.
  Now you wander to the floor and say where is the surplus? Why are we 
in deficit? Well, addressing that deficit, we passed yet another budget 
plan this year and we said we can get back out of deficits if we 
control spending. We can have an energy plan, we can address the needs 
of homeland security, we can win the war, we can stimulate the economy. 
Yes, we will be in deficit, but it will be periodic and we are able to 
get back out of it if we can control spending.
  So the gentleman from Massachusetts comes to the floor here and he 
says, where are the choices? Where is the sacrifice?
  We have a plan that shows you where the choices are. Where is your 
plan? You do not have one. The very distinguished gentleman from Texas 
presented a plan. His plan was our plan, with a trigger. We do not 
agree with the trigger. We will agree to disagree.
  But the interesting thing is the only plan you presented was our 
plan. The Senate, excuse me, the other body, cannot even pass a budget. 
And you wander in here and you say where are the choices?
  Mr. Speaker, wake up. We are going to accept this motion to instruct 
conferees. But how did we get here? Remember back to what happened in 
September. Do not demagogue Social Security. Obviously for political 
purposes you can go ahead and do that, but we need this energy strategy 
to get our economy going, to become less dependent and less entangled 
in the Middle East. It fits within the budget. It responsibly allows us 
to win the war and get the economy going. We need to pass this bill and 
get it through conference.
  Mr. MARKEY. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Texas 
(Mr. Stenholm).
  Mr. STENHOLM. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me 
time.
  I appreciate my friend, the chairman of the Committee on the Budget, 
for acknowledging at the last part of his comments that there was an 
attempt to offer a second amendment or budget this year, but we were 
denied.
  The gentleman is entirely correct; it was your budget on spending, 
but it was not your budget on borrowing money from the Social Security 
trust fund. We wanted a trigger. We wanted to avoid discussions like we 
are having today.
  I also want to remind my chairman, the chairman of the Committee on 
the Budget, that we did present, the Democratic party, did present an 
alternative budget last year, the Blue Dog Democrats led and were 
followed by the overwhelming majority of Democrats on this side, that 
said we should not allocate all of the $5.6 trillion projected surplus 
into spending and tax bills because they might not happen and there 
might be an emergency. We lost. We were in the minority.
  I am used to losing when I am in the minority. What we are not used 
to doing is having the majority win and not assume the responsibility 
for your actions. The debt ceiling is going to have to be increased, 
and yet you want to duck that.
  But the gentleman is absolutely correct, and I appreciate his 
kindness and his remarks.
  Mr. TAUZIN. Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to yield 5 minutes to the 
gentleman from Texas (Mr. Barton), the chairman of the Subcommittee on 
Energy and Air Quality of the Committee on Energy and Commerce.
  (Mr. BARTON of Texas asked and was given permission to revise and 
extend his remarks.)
  Mr. BARTON of Texas. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding 
me time.
  Mr. Speaker, I want to point out the obvious before I get into a 
little of the substance. We are technically debating a motion to 
instruct conferees, and we are going to accept it. Some are trying to 
pick a fight, and the Republicans are in a good mood today. We do not 
want to fight. We want to go to conference and work on a bipartisan 
basis for an energy policy.
  The Committee on Energy and Commerce, the distinguished gentleman 
from Louisiana is the distinguished chairman of it, passed this bill 50 
to 5, with the good help of the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Dingell) 
and the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Boucher) and others. My 
subcommittee passed it 29 to 1. We are the ``happy face'' committee. We 
want to go to conference with the other body and work in a bipartisan 
basis.
  So we are very willing to say we do not want an energy policy that 
increases the national deficit. Let us think about that a little bit. 
This country for over 150 years has had an energy policy that is based 
on private markets, where we allocate capital through the free 
enterprise system to create energy sources at the lowest possible cost 
possible. Because of that, we have the world's greatest economy.
  Now, if we were really having a debate today, I would posit the 
question, if you have an energy policy that is balanced and tries to 
have a production component and an environmental component and a 
consumption component

[[Page H3469]]

that results in lower prices, is that going to increase or decrease the 
national deficit? Or if you have an energy policy that tries to be 
anti-energy that results in higher energy prices, is that going to add 
to or subtract from the deficit?
  I would say an energy policy that is balanced and that has the net 
result of a balanced approach, that has lower energy prices, is going 
to result in either lower deficits or, probably, surpluses.
  To put this in personal terms, if you go to the gas pump and pay 
$1.25 a gallon, or if you go and pay $2.25 a gallon, which helps your 
economy the most? Obviously, if you only pay $1.25.
  If you get your electricity bill and you pay 7 cents a kilowatt, is 
that better than getting an electricity bill that you pay 17 cents a 
kilowatt? Obviously, if you pay less, you have more money to do other 
things for your family.
  Well, the energy bill before us actually is a balanced bipartisan 
approach to try to create an energy policy for the 21st century that 
results in moderately priced energy, in large quantities, so we can 
continue to have the kind of free market economy that we have had.
  Now, let us look at some of the specifics in the bill. Let us see 
whether we think these are good things or bad things. These are in the 
bill. These are not debating points, they are in the bill.
  We require that Federal buildings reduce their energy consumption by 
35 percent. We require that we put more money into the Low Income 
Heating and Cooling Program, the LIHEAP program. That was an amendment 
adopted in my subcommittee that was offered by the gentlewoman from 
California (Mrs. Bono).
  We have increased funding for the DOE weatherization program. We have 
a requirement that the gentleman from Louisiana (Mr. Tauzin) and the 
gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Dingell) worked out on a bipartisan basis 
that our trucks and cars need to reduce the amount of gasoline that 
they consume by 5 billion gallons over 5 years.
  We have increased research grants for alternative fuels like hydrogen 
and things of that sort. We have a very good program for advanced clean 
coal technology. We have increased funding requests for fusion energy, 
hydrogen energy, bioenergy, renewable energy and solar energy. We have 
a program to try to do some research for ultra-deep water, oil and gas 
drilling in the Gulf of Mexico, which I think is a good thing.

                              {time}  1700

  I could go on and on. But the bottom line is, this is a balanced 
bill, it is a bipartisan bill; it is a comprehensive bill. We need to 
accept this motion to instruct, go to conference, and work with the 
other body to bring back a conference report that results in lower 
energy prices for the American people for the next 20, 30, 40, 50 
years. And with the leadership of the gentleman from Louisiana (Mr. 
Tauzin), who is going to chair the conference, I am very confident that 
we are going to do that.
  Mr. MARKEY. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from 
Texas (Mr. Doggett).
  Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, I would just add that this bill was 
considered in at least two committees; and in the Committee on Ways and 
Means, there was anything but a bipartisan, balanced bill. Indeed, what 
we did have was a letter from the gentleman from Iowa (Mr. Nussle) 
assuring our committee that this bill could be passed without taking 
any money from Social Security and Medicare; and as indicated by his 
remarks on the floor this afternoon, it is pretty clear that has 
changed completely.
  Indeed, much has changed since September 11. This bill was passed 
before them, before the collapse of Enron, and before the Bush budget 
sprang a leak of red ink that began with a trickle and has now become a 
flood. Many things have changed, but one thing that has not is the 
commitment of some here to a bill that is not so much an energy policy 
as a collection of unjustified tax breaks, loopholes, and special 
provisions to aid traditional energy industries.
  I like the idea of balance in an energy bill, but what we have is 
some sweet words about the environment, a little sugar coating for new 
environmental technologies, and most all of the tax benefits going to 
the same old polluting industries.
  For the gentleman from Louisiana (Mr. Tauzin) to suggest that this 
has something to do with taking a million barrels of oil a day from 
Iraq, I think, is really misleading.
  If this bill passes in today's form, it would not reduce that amount 
by one barrel; indeed, I would say not one pint. What this bill does is 
to give more tax breaks to the companies that are bringing in the 
million barrels of oil a day from Iraq. It does not change or limit 
their ability to do that.
  And the suggestion that we would replace that oil by exploiting the 
Alaskan National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) would be a serious mistake that 
would jeopardize an irreplaceable environment for little real energy 
benefit.
  Mr. TAUZIN. Mr. Speaker, I yield 30 seconds to the gentleman from 
Iowa (Mr. Nussle).
  Mr. NUSSLE. Mr. Speaker, I just have to report to the Congress what I 
just got. I just found out that the next motion to instruct, which is 
going to be on the supplemental offered by the Democrats, is going to 
be to accept the higher spending level between the House and the 
Senate.
  Mr. TAUZIN. Come on.
  Mr. NUSSLE. Now, where is that money going to come from, I ask my 
colleagues. Not $27 billion; they want the other body's version of $31 
billion. Where is that coming from? Is it coming from Social Security? 
Why are you not down here demagoguing that?
  Mr. FRANK. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield? I will answer him. 
Will the gentleman yield for an answer.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Linder). The gentleman will suspend.
  Mr. FRANK. Mr. Speaker, would the gentleman yield?
  Mr. NUSSLE. I do not have any time.
  Mr. FRANK. Or any knowledge of the rules either, apparently.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Who yields time?
  Mr. MARKEY. Mr. Speaker, I yield 30 seconds to the gentleman from 
Massachusetts (Mr. Frank).
  Mr. FRANK. Mr. Speaker, I would just say to the gentleman from Iowa, 
because he wanted to know where the money could come from, I had 
several places. I am personally prepared to say that incomes over 
$300,000 do not need a tax reduction which is scheduled to go into 
effect as urgently as we need energy and security. So to the extent 
that we have outstanding tax reductions that have not gone into effect 
for incomes over $300,000, reducing the rate on that, there are tens of 
billions to be gained by that; that would be one place. And personally, 
I would look at some of the money in the agriculture bill also.
  Mr. MARKEY. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentlewoman 
from Texas (Ms. Jackson-Lee).
  (Ms. JACKSON-LEE of Texas asked and was given permission to revise 
and extend her remarks.)
  Ms. JACKSON-LEE of Texas. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for 
yielding me this time.
  For a minute I thought the chairman from Louisiana was calling for 
church by saying ``Come on'', but let me hope that he can do the same 
for me. We are familiar with that terminology, ``come on,'' but let me 
explain to the American people my support for this particular motion to 
instruct. I am delighted that my good friends, including the gentleman 
from Texas, is willing to accept it. But let me put a face on the value 
of the motion of the gentleman from Massachusetts.
  Last year at this time, or last year in the summer, we were 
vigorously discussing the energy bill. At that time we had a $5.6 
trillion in surplus. We now are a year later and the tragedy of 
September 11 has occurred, and we are now at a mere $400 billion. We do 
not have a prescription drug benefit.
  The chairman knows that I come from oil country and clearly have 
worked collaboratively, and I thank him for the amendments that were 
passed, the $5 million on bioengineering and the one dealing with 
assessing the amount of resources in the Gulf. We come from that area. 
So this is not a condemnation as much as it is a reality check on 
facing the fact that we have no money. This is an important amendment.
  Mr. Speaker, might I also say, coming from the community where Enron 
has collapsed and we have people who are unemployed and who are still

[[Page H3470]]

struggling, I would hope that as this bill goes to conference that some 
conversation can be raised on the issues dealings with the Enron 
collapse and how it has impacted the energy industry and, in 
particular, how we have been able to deal with the employees, the ex-
Enron employees who found themselves standing in the back of the line 
with no money, no resources in a bankrupt company.
  So what we are suggesting is that this is an important motion to 
instruct, because we do not have the money we had last year. I hope 
this motion will be accepted, but I also hope we recognize the concerns 
we have, Mr. Speaker, and I hope together we can ``come on'' with this 
message and face the fact that we need not go into Social Security and 
Medicare.
  Mr. TAUZIN. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of the time.
  Let me say again to the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Markey) we 
will certainly accept his motion to instruct and we will ask Members to 
vote for it. More importantly, I will ask the gentleman and the other 
members of the conference committee in the House to join with us in a 
cooperative spirit to make sure we finish the job that we started here 
on August 1 in this House, and that we complete a good package for the 
President to sign before we leave here.
  I want to correct the record. It was not just two committees which 
produced this bill. It was the Committee on Ways and Means, the 
Committee on Energy and Commerce, the Committee on Science, the 
Committee on Financial Services, and the Committee on Natural 
Resources. This was a collaborative effort of not just Democrats and 
Republicans, but of many committees of this House; and this represented 
the best of this House's ability to come together and do something good 
for this country in a time of need. Little did we know on August 1 just 
how much we would need this bill, but we know today.
  This is not about the surpluses and the deficit issues that the 
country faces; we will get into those great debates when we get to 
them, and there will be time for that. This is truly about whether we 
can now close this deal with the Senate, the other body, to make sure 
that we pass an energy bill that really protects this country into the 
years ahead with predictable, affordable sources of energy to keep this 
economy strong and to keep our Nation secure so that we do not have to 
depend upon people we cannot depend upon. That is going to be a good 
debate with the other body, but it is a debate worth winning.
  Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleagues from both sides of the aisle who 
joined with us in an overwhelming vote of support for H.R. 4 when it 
left the House, and I ask them to join us in another big vote when we 
return from the conference committee with a successful product.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.
  Mr. MARKEY. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of the time.
  Mr. Speaker, the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Stenholm) and I and the 
gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Frank), the gentlewoman from Texas 
(Ms. Jackson-Lee), the gentleman from West Virginia (Mr. Rahall), the 
gentleman from Texas (Mr. Doggett), all of us want an energy bill. All 
of us know that we need a new energy plan for our country. That is not 
what this debate is over. This debate is over who is going to pay for 
the energy bill.
  Now, last summer, August 1, we raised this issue. The Republicans 
contended that they could vote for a $1.7 trillion tax cut, and the 
President said, do not worry, there is plenty of money left over for 
Social Security, plenty of money left over for Medicare. And the 
Republicans on the House floor said, what is your problem? There is a 
surplus. There is plenty of money. Let us pass this energy bill now. 
Now, we hear the chairman of the Committee on the Budget out here on 
the floor saying, the surplus is gone, all gone. Now, the Democrats 
said that last August 1, but it is kind of like the dog ate my 
homework. Al Qaeda ate the surplus. Now, we were saying this on August 
1. It is gone.
  Now, what are we told? Do not worry. Who cares if we have deficits? 
Who cares? Grandma cares. Grandpa cares. Because there is only one 
other place to go: the Medicare and Social Security trust funds.
  What this energy bill does is set up an oil rig on top of the Social 
Security and Medicare trust funds, and it begins to drill into those 
trust funds. That is why they care, because grandma and grandpa were 
told last summer, do not worry; there is plenty of money. Instead, a 
pipeline is being constructed into their pockets. They are being tipped 
upside down and the money from their trust funds is going to be shaken 
out onto this House floor and transferred over to the oil, to the gas, 
to the nuclear, to the coal industries.
  Now, we can all debate on whether or not they deserve subsidies, but 
I think we should all agree, it should not come out of the Medicare and 
Social Security trust funds for the greatest generation. That is not an 
energy plan that comports with the crisis that we are in. It is 
patriotic to fight al Qaeda. It is patriotic to fight terrorists. It is 
not patriotic to take the money out of the Social Security and Medicare 
trust funds. We must find that money from some other place in our 
country, and the majority and the President have a responsibility to 
promote that plan. They have yet to do so.
  Vote for the Markey-Stenholm resolution rejecting the plundering of 
the Medicare and Social Security trust funds.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Isakson). Without objection, the 
previous question is ordered on the motion.
  There was no objection.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The question is on the motion to instruct 
offered by the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Markey).
  The question was taken; and the Speaker pro tempore announced that 
the ayes appeared to have it.
  Mr. FRANK. Mr. Speaker, I object to the vote on the ground that a 
quorum is not present and make the point of order that a quorum is not 
present.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Evidently a quorum is not present.
  The Sergeant at Arms will notify absent Members.
  Pursuant to clause 8 of rule XX, this will be a 15-minute vote on the 
motion to instruct, followed by a 5-minute vote on the motion to 
instruct offered by the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Obey). After 
these votes, the Chair will appoint conferees on both sides.
  The vote was taken by electronic device, and there were--yeas 412, 
nays 1, answered ``present'' 2, not voting 19, as follows:

                             [Roll No. 223]

                               YEAS--412

     Abercrombie
     Ackerman
     Aderholt
     Akin
     Allen
     Andrews
     Armey
     Baca
     Bachus
     Baird
     Baker
     Baldacci
     Baldwin
     Ballenger
     Barcia
     Barr
     Barrett
     Bartlett
     Barton
     Bass
     Becerra
     Bentsen
     Bereuter
     Berkley
     Berman
     Berry
     Biggert
     Bilirakis
     Bishop
     Blumenauer
     Blunt
     Boehlert
     Boehner
     Bonilla
     Bonior
     Boozman
     Borski
     Boswell
     Boucher
     Boyd
     Brady (PA)
     Brady (TX)
     Brown (FL)
     Brown (OH)
     Brown (SC)
     Bryant
     Burr
     Burton
     Buyer
     Callahan
     Calvert
     Camp
     Cannon
     Cantor
     Capito
     Capps
     Capuano
     Cardin
     Carson (IN)
     Carson (OK)
     Castle
     Chabot
     Chambliss
     Clay
     Clement
     Clyburn
     Coble
     Collins
     Condit
     Cooksey
     Costello
     Cox
     Coyne
     Cramer
     Crane
     Crenshaw
     Crowley
     Cubin
     Culberson
     Cummings
     Cunningham
     Davis (CA)
     Davis (FL)
     Davis (IL)
     Davis, Jo Ann
     Davis, Tom
     Deal
     DeFazio
     DeGette
     Delahunt
     DeLauro
     DeLay
     DeMint
     Deutsch
     Diaz-Balart
     Dicks
     Dingell
     Doggett
     Dooley
     Doolittle
     Doyle
     Dreier
     Duncan
     Dunn
     Edwards
     Ehlers
     Ehrlich
     Emerson
     Engel
     English
     Eshoo
     Etheridge
     Evans
     Everett
     Farr
     Fattah
     Ferguson
     Filner
     Flake
     Fletcher
     Foley
     Forbes
     Ford
     Fossella
     Frank
     Frelinghuysen
     Frost
     Gallegly
     Ganske
     Gekas
     Gephardt
     Gibbons
     Gilchrest
     Gillmor
     Gilman
     Gonzalez
     Goode
     Goodlatte
     Gordon
     Graham
     Granger
     Graves
     Green (TX)
     Green (WI)
     Greenwood
     Grucci
     Gutierrez
     Gutknecht
     Hall (TX)
     Hansen
     Harman
     Hart
     Hastings (FL)
     Hastings (WA)
     Hayes
     Hayworth
     Hefley
     Herger
     Hill
     Hilleary
     Hilliard
     Hinchey
     Hinojosa
     Hobson
     Hoeffel
     Hoekstra
     Holden
     Holt
     Honda
     Hooley
     Horn
     Hostettler
     Hoyer
     Hulshof
     Hyde
     Inslee
     Isakson
     Israel
     Issa
     Istook
     Jackson (IL)
     Jackson-Lee (TX)

[[Page H3471]]


     Jefferson
     Jenkins
     John
     Johnson (CT)
     Johnson (IL)
     Johnson, E. B.
     Johnson, Sam
     Jones (NC)
     Jones (OH)
     Kanjorski
     Kaptur
     Keller
     Kelly
     Kennedy (MN)
     Kennedy (RI)
     Kerns
     Kildee
     Kilpatrick
     Kind (WI)
     King (NY)
     Kingston
     Kirk
     Kleczka
     Knollenberg
     Kolbe
     Kucinich
     LaFalce
     LaHood
     Lampson
     Langevin
     Lantos
     Larsen (WA)
     Larson (CT)
     Latham
     LaTourette
     Leach
     Lee
     Levin
     Lewis (CA)
     Lewis (GA)
     Lewis (KY)
     Linder
     Lipinski
     LoBiondo
     Lofgren
     Lowey
     Lucas (KY)
     Lucas (OK)
     Luther
     Maloney (CT)
     Manzullo
     Markey
     Mascara
     Matheson
     Matsui
     McCarthy (MO)
     McCarthy (NY)
     McCollum
     McDermott
     McGovern
     McHugh
     McInnis
     McIntyre
     McKeon
     McKinney
     McNulty
     Meehan
     Meek (FL)
     Meeks (NY)
     Mica
     Millender-McDonald
     Miller, Dan
     Miller, Gary
     Miller, George
     Miller, Jeff
     Mink
     Mollohan
     Moore
     Moran (KS)
     Moran (VA)
     Morella
     Murtha
     Myrick
     Nadler
     Napolitano
     Neal
     Nethercutt
     Ney
     Northup
     Norwood
     Nussle
     Oberstar
     Obey
     Olver
     Ortiz
     Osborne
     Ose
     Otter
     Oxley
     Pallone
     Pascrell
     Pastor
     Paul
     Pence
     Peterson (PA)
     Petri
     Phelps
     Pickering
     Pitts
     Platts
     Pombo
     Pomeroy
     Portman
     Price (NC)
     Pryce (OH)
     Putnam
     Radanovich
     Rahall
     Ramstad
     Rangel
     Regula
     Rehberg
     Reyes
     Reynolds
     Riley
     Rivers
     Rodriguez
     Roemer
     Rogers (KY)
     Rogers (MI)
     Rohrabacher
     Ros-Lehtinen
     Ross
     Rothman
     Roukema
     Roybal-Allard
     Royce
     Rush
     Ryan (WI)
     Ryun (KS)
     Sanchez
     Sanders
     Sandlin
     Sawyer
     Saxton
     Schaffer
     Schakowsky
     Schiff
     Schrock
     Scott
     Sensenbrenner
     Serrano
     Sessions
     Shadegg
     Shaw
     Shays
     Sherman
     Sherwood
     Shimkus
     Shows
     Shuster
     Simmons
     Simpson
     Skeen
     Skelton
     Slaughter
     Smith (MI)
     Smith (NJ)
     Smith (WA)
     Snyder
     Solis
     Souder
     Spratt
     Stark
     Stearns
     Stenholm
     Strickland
     Stump
     Stupak
     Sullivan
     Sununu
     Sweeney
     Tancredo
     Tanner
     Tauscher
     Tauzin
     Taylor (MS)
     Taylor (NC)
     Terry
     Thompson (CA)
     Thompson (MS)
     Thornberry
     Thune
     Thurman
     Tiahrt
     Tiberi
     Tierney
     Toomey
     Towns
     Turner
     Udall (CO)
     Udall (NM)
     Upton
     Velazquez
     Visclosky
     Vitter
     Walden
     Walsh
     Wamp
     Waters
     Watkins (OK)
     Watson (CA)
     Watt (NC)
     Watts (OK)
     Waxman
     Weiner
     Weldon (FL)
     Weldon (PA)
     Weller
     Wexler
     Whitfield
     Wicker
     Wilson (NM)
     Wilson (SC)
     Wolf
     Woolsey
     Wu
     Wynn
     Young (AK)
     Young (FL)

                                NAYS--1

       
     Sabo
       

                        ANSWERED ``PRESENT''--2

     McCrery
     Thomas
       

                             NOT VOTING--19

     Blagojevich
     Bono
     Clayton
     Combest
     Conyers
     Goss
     Hall (OH)
     Houghton
     Hunter
     Lynch
     Maloney (NY)
     Menendez
     Owens
     Payne
     Pelosi
     Peterson (MN)
     Quinn
     Smith (TX)
     Traficant

                              {time}  1736

  Messrs. NORWOOD, POMBO, and FOLEY and Mr. PRICE of North Carolina 
changed their vote from ``nay'' to ``yea.''
  Mr. THOMAS changed his vote from ``yea'' to ``present.''
  So the motion to instruct was agreed to.
  The result of the vote was announced as above recorded.
  A motion to reconsider was laid on the table.

                          ____________________