[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 149 (2003), Part 18]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page 25190]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




   EMERGENCY SUPPLEMENTAL APPROPRIATIONS ACT FOR DEFENSE AND FOR THE 
              RECONSTRUCTION OF IRAQ AND AFGHANISTAN, 2004

                                 ______
                                 

                               speech of

                          HON. LYNN C. WOOLSEY

                             of california

                    in the house of representatives

                       Thursday, October 16, 2003

       The House in Committee of the Whole House on the State of 
     the Union had under consideration the bill (H.R. 3289) making 
     emergency supplemental appropriations for defense and for the 
     reconstruction of Iraq and Afghanistan for the fiscal year 
     ending September 30, 2004, and for other purposes:

  Ms. WOOLSEY. Mr. Chairman, for the past 2 days Members of Congress 
have spoken about sacrifice and responsibility, and about supporting 
our troops. The way to support our troops, many say, is to vote ``yes'' 
on the supplemental spending bill that is currently before the House. 
One part of the supplemental that nobody is talking about is the 
administration's $900 million request for the importation of gasoline 
and other fuel products into Iraq.
  The average wholesale price of gasoline in the Persian Gulf is just 
71 cents a gallon. According to independent oil experts, transporting 
the gasoline the 400 miles from Kuwait to Iraq could reasonably cost an 
additional 10 to 25 cents per gallon. So a logical price per gallon for 
gasoline delivered to Iraq would be about a dollar. But figures from 
the Army Corps of Engineers show that Halliburton is charging the U.S. 
taxpayer between $1.62 and $1.70 per gallon for this gasoline that is 
purchased at much cheaper rates--an outrageous markup of over a dollar 
per gallon that would be considered illegal price-gouging if it 
occurred in the United States. So U.S. taxpayers are now faced with a 
$900,000 bill that pays for cheap gas that is marked up to ridiculously 
not-so-cheap prices.
  It seems that Bechtel and Halliburton aren't as motivated by the 
notions of sacrifice and responsibility as many Members of this House. 
Perhaps this is because the Halliburton Company has never before 
imported gasoline. Or perhaps all those no-bid contracts have gone to 
their heads.
  Let's not forget on March 8, 2003, Halliburton was given a secret, 
sole-source contract for improvements to Iraq's oil infrastructure. 
Halliburton did not have to compete with any other company for this 
contract. And why is Halliburton getting this sweetheart deal? I think 
it has something to do with the fact that the Vice President of the 
United States is the former CEO of this very same company. But his 
connections are not former connections--they still exist to this day. 
Despite what he says to the press about having severed all ties to 
Halliburton, Dick Cheney received almost $400,000 in deferred salary 
from his former company in 2001 and 2002, and he still has 433,333 
unexercised stock options. The facts speak for themselves: Dick Cheney 
is not fully divested of his connections to Halliburton, and yet this 
same company receives U.S. Government contracts worth billions of 
dollars for which they are not required to place a single bid. This is 
unfair to the American people, and this is downright wrong.
  This is not about supporting the troops. This is about supporting 
companies with ties to the Bush-Cheney administration by giving them 
get-rich-quick deals at the expense of U.S. taxpayers. The amendment 
that Congressman Waxman has introduced is a reasonable way to bring 
some sense and some oversight into a bill that is otherwise no more 
than a bailout for President Bush's failed policies. I urge my 
colleagues to vote for the Waxman amendment.