[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 146 (2000), Part 12]
[Senate]
[Pages 17460-17461]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]



                    THE PRESIDENT IS BEGGING FOR OIL

  Mr. CRAIG. Mr. President, for a few moments this morning, before we 
get on with the debate on PNTR, I want to deal with an issue happening 
in New York City right now. Our President is up there at the United 
Nations Millennium Summit. Mr. President, there is something going on 
on the side. In a back room, the President of the United States has 
been sitting down with a Saudi Arabian sheik. Here is why: He is 
begging. The President of the United States is begging a Saudi sheik to 
reach over and turn their oil spigot on a little more and increase 
their output of oil by about 700,000 barrels a day. Why? Because in the 
last few days, crude prices have spiked to an all-time high of $35.39 a 
barrel.
  Why has that happened? Because the market has analyzed that there 
isn't enough oil and the demand is ever increasing, and there is no 
strategy in this country to solve it. In May and June of this year, the 
President tried to cover his tracks by sending the Secretary of Energy 
to Saudi Arabia to beg, tin cup in hand. At that time, I think the 
press called it the ``tin cup energy policy'' of this administration. 
Well, today in New York City, behind closed doors, the President of the 
United States--this great and all-powerful country--is begging a small 
country in the Middle East for just a little more oil.
  Here is what the market analysts are saying. They have said that they 
fear that even the 700,000-barrel increase will not be enough to curb 
the jump in prices for crude oil contracts in the futures market. I 
mentioned yesterday they jumped to $35.39 a barrel. That is a 
phenomenal spike. This price is the highest since, of course, the 
battles of the Persian Gulf war of 1990. Why is this happening? Well, 
many of us stood on the floor in May and June and July and discussed 
the energy of our country and our energy needs. We were very frustrated 
at that time because we had 8 years of no energy policy. You know, Al 
Gore has been OPEC's best friend.

[[Page 17461]]

There is no question about that. This administration and Vice President 
Gore, during their tenure in office, have allowed domestic oil 
production to drop by 17 percent and oil imports to go up by at least 
14, and maybe as high as 20 percent. Oil imports averaged about 56 
percent of all of our consumption, and now they are predicted to be 
well over 64 percent in the year 2020.
  Of course, there is a simple reason for that: For 8 long years, this 
administration has had no policy. Let me tell you what Vice President 
Al Gore has said. He says he wants to increase the use of natural gas, 
although it has nearly quadrupled in price. Yet he wants to cancel 
existing leases. Here is his quote:

       I will do everything in my power to make sure there is no 
     new drilling, even in areas already leased by previous 
     administrations.

  Here is a man asking to be President of the United States; yet he is 
out in the field today campaigning and saying: I guarantee you there 
will be no more increased production in this country, while his 
President, behind closed doors in New York, is begging a foreign nation 
to open its valves and increase production. Does it make any sense for 
this great Nation to be on its knees begging Arab sheiks of the OPEC 
nations to increase production while we go around saying we are going 
to decrease production?
  During the Clinton-Gore administration, there has been no energy 
policy, no domestic oil or gas exploration or production--in 8 long 
years. No new oil refineries. In fact, because of a lack of policy and 
compliance with the Clean Air Act in this country, in the last 8 years, 
we have closed 36 oil refineries. That is a staggering amount. We have 
closed 36 oil refineries in the past 8 years. There is no new use of 
coal. EPA has tried to shut down coal fired plants and are now suing 
some in the East because they don't think they are in compliance with 
certain standards. There is no new nuclear power. In fact, quite the 
opposite has happened. We have tried here to solve the gridlock over 
the production of energy and electricity by nuclear power, only to have 
items vetoed time and again by the President.
  Now, yesterday, the President said oil prices are too high. Gee whiz, 
Bill, where have you been all summer? You're darn right they are too 
high. You have done nothing about it nor has your Vice President, 
except to say we will shut down production. He even went on to say that 
it will impact not just America but it could result in a world impact, 
and it could result in the specter of a recession here or abroad if 
oil-producing countries do not raise production to bring down soaring 
crude prices.
  Well, what about production in our country? What are you doing here, 
Vice President Gore? I will tell you what you are doing here. You are 
saying: I am not going to allow new drilling; I am going to shut off 
the areas where you can drill. I don't want to see more production in 
this country.
  That doesn't make a lot of sense.
  Here is Gore's new energy plan:
  Don't develop proven domestic energy;
  Give $75 billion in new subsidies for new renewables and new 
technology.
  OK. Homeowner in the Northeast: You are just about to see your costs 
for heat this winter go up 35, or 40, or 50 percent. The message to 
you, homeowner, in the Northeast is: Vice President Gore is going to 
invest $75 billion in subsidies and in new renewables, and in 10 or 15 
years you can put a solar cell up or we can put a wind machine out on 
the Adirondacks, and somehow we will generate this new abundance of 
energy.
  That is the answer for the problem today. That is the answer you are 
being given. That will not work tomorrow. It will not work a week from 
now.
  I support renewables. We ought to clearly drive ourselves in that 
direction as best we can. But my guess is when what is going on today 
translates into the price of gas at the pump, and when the oil truck 
backs up to your home in New York or Connecticut this winter and sticks 
the hose in the oil barrel and starts cranking in the fuel oil that 
will heat your home, and it is going to double or triple your fuel oil 
costs, if it is available, who are you going to blame? Who are you 
going to blame because of this dramatic increase?
  My suggestion is that fingers deserve to be pointed to an 
administration that has had no energy policy, has worked to shut down 
all increased production, and, in fact, in a rather swaggering way has 
suggested we will not drill anymore. We will not produce anymore. It is 
somehow environmentally wrong to produce oil and energy in this 
country. That is a fundamentally critical thing with which we have to 
deal.
  We have attempted to deal with it in the Senate. We have dealt with 
these issues on a regular basis. We have introduced legislation to 
bring about that increased production. We have suggested that these 
great oil reserves we still have remaining in our country be allowed to 
be drilled, and in an environmentally safe and sound way, that we bring 
our production back on line.
  In the nonlarge oil producing segment of our country, a segment 
called stripper wells, oftentimes owned by farmers and ranchers through 
the Southeast, the South, and the upper Midwest--if we, by tax 
incentives alone, would guarantee them a margin, we could see a million 
barrels a day come back on line--our oil; money that stays in our 
country and doesn't go to Saudi Arabia to buy the limousines or the G-4 
jet airplanes of the OPEC sheiks.
  What is wrong with that policy, Mr. President? What is wrong with 
that policy, Mr. Gore? Is it wrong to support domestic production at 
home? I think not.
  This is an issue we will spend a good deal more time with in the 
coming days. But I thought with this press release coming out of New 
York today, and we know the President has been talking with the Arab 
sheiks yesterday, Mr. President, Mr. Bill Clinton, quit begging. Don't 
beg these nations to produce. Turn our producers loose. Let us produce. 
Let us become the great producing country again. Let us be the masters 
of our own destiny. Don't apologize. And don't suggest to somebody this 
winter when their heating bill goes up that it is some Arab sheik's 
problem, that they shut the oil off. No. In the last 8 years, you have 
shut the oil off, Mr. Gore. You have shut the oil off, Mr. Clinton, 
because your policies have denied production and brought production 
down at a time when we were increasing consumption and were the 
beneficiaries of that consumption by an ever increased standard of 
living in our country.
  I am not ashamed, nor will I apologize for the citizens of my State 
because they want to be consumers. But I will be angry about a 
government that denies the kind of production that keeps the strong 
economy. And that is exactly what is going on. In our great country 
today, the only energy policy that exists in the Clinton/Gore 
administration is a policy of begging, begging the producing nations of 
this world to please turn on the valves and give us a few more barrels 
of oil in hopes that it will drive the price down. The analysts say it 
won't.
  This winter, as we grow increasingly cold, I am very fearful the 
citizens of the Northeast and in other cold areas, especially those who 
still use heating oil for their space heat, will find the price tag 
getting even higher, and my colleagues will be on the floor asking that 
we offset that with Federal tax dollars. I will not blame them for 
asking that.
  But once again I will ask: Where was Mr. Gore? Where was Mr. Clinton 
for these 8 long years when they knew the day would come that there 
would be no oil to burn and we would have to beg to get oil?
  I yield the floor. I see the principals are on the floor to continue 
the debate on PNTR with China. I hope we can move that expeditiously 
today. Thank you.

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