[Congressional Record Volume 151, Number 33 (Thursday, March 17, 2005)]
[House]
[Page H1680]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




             AMERICA'S INCREASING DEPENDENCE ON FOREIGN OIL

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentlewoman from Ohio (Ms. Kaptur) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Ms. KAPTUR. Madam Speaker, if Mr. Greenspan had been doing such a 
good job, the value of the dollar would not be declining every single 
week. Let me just say that the budget that just passed here is a 
national disgrace. It only passed by a couple of votes. If two people 
had changed, we might have gotten a real budget resolution on this 
floor, just by the narrowest of margins.
  Last week, the U.S. Commerce Department announced the largest one-
month budget deficit in U.S. history. Somebody better pay attention. 
Mr. Greenspan ought to pay attention. In fact, now we have the second 
largest trade deficit in history. The ships are lined up outside L.A. 
harbor as far as you can see out into the Pacific and they go back 
empty. What is wrong with these accounts?
  Gas prices, by the way, are up 19 percent. The value of the dollar 
has declined by more than 33 percent, more than a third against the 
Euro in the past 3 years, and our economy is sputtering. The demand for 
oil is just about to increase with summer and vacations on the way. No 
wonder the stock market fell more than 100 points last week, based on 
investors' fears about, you guessed it, rising oil prices.
  The February budget deficit of $114 billion was the first time the 
deficit for any one month exceeded $100 billion. Every day America goes 
more in hock to foreign lenders. They are the ones that are propping us 
up. In fact, if you just look between a year ago, October 2003 and 
November 2004, you can see who we are in hock to. Japan holds most of 
the paper, over $714 billion now. Next comes Europe, over $380 billion. 
China, Hong Kong, but they are going up very fast, $241 billion. We get 
down here to the oil exporting countries. OPEC, over $141 billion. And 
every day we owe them more and more interest as America goes into hock 
to foreign lenders who now own about 40 percent of us.
  Equally troubling is the record trade deficit in January which 
increased to $58.3 billion as imports coming into our country continued 
to swamp exports going out. Even the lower value of the dollar has not 
helped with exports because the fundamentals are bad. Higher deficits 
mean more U.S. jobs get shipped to China, to India, to Latin America, 
jobs everywhere, good jobs. But not here in the United States. U.S. 
light crude flirted with $55 a barrel, near-record levels of last 
October and Ohio's gasoline prices at the pump rose 15 cents, up from 
the last week of February. Currently, Ohioans are paying over $2.10 for 
their gasoline and the upward trend just keeps on going. What is truly 
dangerous and tragic about this trend is America's utter dependence on 
foreign sources of oil.
  Here we have it. We are supposed to be energy independent in this 
country. You go back to 1982, every single year America has become more 
and more dependent on imported petroleum. It means we are strategically 
vulnerable to disruptions, as over half the petroleum we use is 
imported. It is time for a new age of American energy independence.
  But is this Congress or the White House up the street paying any 
attention? The Wall Street Journal reported last week on corn-based 
ethanol and whether the visionary farmers who are leading this effort 
across the Corn Belt would lose their shirts as some of these 
multinational interests would come in and buy up the meager investments 
that they had been able to make out of their own back pockets. This is 
where the Federal Government needs to step in.
  My Biofuels Energy Independence Act of 2005, H.R. 388, does exactly 
this by helping these visionary Americans hedge predatory oil companies 
who lock their product out at every gas pump in this country.

                              {time}  1700

  They need long-term financing, not a comatose President and Congress. 
Imagine an America that was energy independent again and where energy 
independence rose to a national priority and where we put the dollars 
we are paying for imported fuel into the pockets of producers here at 
home.
  The administration is cutting support for advancing biofuels by over 
$84 million this year alone. I ask people who is locking out a new 
energy age for America? Who is locking them out at pumps across this 
country? Who is putting their hand in people's pockets?
  Freedom for America in the 21st century should mean freedom from 
dependence on petroleum. America could create thousands and thousands 
and thousands of new jobs and billions of new dollars back in our own 
pockets if we but understood what is affecting every single user of 
petroleum in this country and why we are falling further and further 
into hock.
  It is time for an age of American energy independence again. Will 
Washington hear the message from the countryside?




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