[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 154 (2008), Part 11]
[House]
[Pages 15713-15719]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




             AMERICAN ENERGY SOLUTIONS FOR LOWER GAS PRICES

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of 
January 18, 2007, the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Westmoreland) is 
recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the minority leader.
  Mr. WESTMORELAND. Mr. Speaker, again, we come tonight to talk about 
something that is on all Americans' minds tonight, and that is the 
price of energy. We have been here for the last couple of weeks talking 
about the problem that we have with the energy prices and especially 
the price of gasoline in this country. And we are unable to break a 
deadlock, it seems like, in the House, Mr. Speaker, to have the 
representatives vote for a bill that would really increase energy 
production.
  And I have got a few charts that I'm going to put up here now. These 
charts that I put up just represent a little petition that I had made 
up for the Members of this body. I had been contacted, as many of you, 
Mr. Speaker, have heard me say before, that I was contacted by many 
constituents that asked me if I had signed off the Internet petitions 
about drill here, drill now, pay less. There have been several 
petitions about wanting to bring down the price of gas.
  In fact, I was in a local service station. I got my gas. I went in to 
buy some other things. And there was a petition there on the counter. 
It said, ``sign here if you want to lower gas prices.'' And I'm 
assuming the proprietor of that business did that to keep people from 
hollering at him about how much they were paying for their gas. But 
after reading this and learning that over about 1.5 million people had 
signed the petition on the Internet telling Congress, hey, look, we 
want you to drill here, we want you to drill now, I came up with the 
idea, Mr. Speaker, that I would come up with a petition for the Members 
of this body.
  We are hearing from our constituents. And right now, about 73 percent 
of Americans are telling us, drill here. Drill now. We want to lower 
our gas prices. We want to be more dependent on our own natural 
resources than we are on foreign resources and be independent of other 
people to supply us with our energy needs.
  So I came up with a petition. It says ``American energy solutions for 
lower gas prices.'' It includes bringing onshore oil online, bringing 
deep water oil online, and bringing new refineries online. A lot of 
people, Mr. Speaker, do not realize that we have not built a refinery 
in this country since 1978. In order to do that, we have got to do 
something to persuade these refining companies to bring refineries 
online, to do something to streamline the regulation process and the 
permitting process to be able to do this.
  When the Republicans were in the majority, we did do that. We brought 
about a bill that offered an opportunity to streamline and to actually 
put some of these refineries on some of the military bases that were 
going to be closed. I came up with a petition. I had the petition over 
here. It is a House of Representatives energy petition. It says ``I 
will vote to increase U.S. oil production to lower gas prices for 
Americans.''
  Now that is too simple, Mr. Speaker, for a lot of people in this 
body, in that it's one sentence, ``I will vote to increase U.S. oil 
production to lower gas prices for Americans.'' That's pretty simple. 
There's no discharge petition. There's no legislation that goes with 
it, Mr. Speaker. It's just an opportunity for not only the 435 voting 
Members of this body, but also the other seven delegates from U.S. 
territories around the world, to let their constituents know how they 
feel about increasing U.S. production to lower the gas prices. Well, we 
have sent at least two e-mails to everybody's office. We have talked to 
probably 230 or 240, maybe 250 people on this floor. So far, we have 
had 192 Members sign this simple petition. It says, ``I will vote to 
increase U.S. oil production to lower gas prices for Americans.''

[[Page 15714]]

  Now, if you're sitting at home--Mr. Speaker, if anybody was sitting 
at home watching TV and wanting to find out if their Congressman had 
signed, Mr. Speaker, they would go to house.gov/westmoreland. And, Mr. 
Speaker, on this Web site, we have a list of all those Members who have 
signed. And we have a list of those who have refused to sign. And if 
your Member is not in either one of those lists, then they have not 
signed.
  So everybody in here has had an opportunity to do this. So far, 192 
Members--and as I said, it's very simple, nothing, no piece of 
legislation, it's just a simple comment to the voters at home to let 
you know how the people in this body, because we are the ones, Mr. 
Speaker, that are going to have to take some action to make this 
happen.
  Last week the President recalled or withdrew the Presidential ban on 
offshore drilling. Now, it's up to this House to do the same thing. We 
have to withdraw the congressional ban to explore and to do the 
offshore drilling. But so far, we've refused to do that. In fact, every 
bill that has come to this floor, including the Democrats' energy bill 
of January of 2007, has been either under a closed rule or under 
suspension.
  Now, Mr. Speaker, you know that being under suspension, you have no 
ability to amend the bill, there is 20 minutes of debate normally on 
each side, probably not even a subcommittee or a committee hearing on 
the process. So these bills have come with little input from all the 
Members of this body.
  What we have called for, what the Republicans have called for, is for 
the Democrats to bring a bill to this floor that is an open rule bill. 
That means a bill, Mr. Speaker, that would allow all 435 Members of 
this body to put forth ideas, because the total solution is not 
drilling. The total solution is not conserving. The real solution is 
all of the above, a complete energy plan that would call for drilling 
on our Outer Continental Shelf, that would allow us to drill on Federal 
lands, do coal-to-oil conversion, create oil from the shale in the 
Western States, wind power, solar power, all of the above.
  But so far, the Democratic majority, Mr. Speaker, has refused to 
allow those type of bills to the floor so everybody can have input. 
Now, I see here one of my colleagues, the gentleman from California, 
who just got back from a trip, Mr. Speaker, to some of these regions 
that we're talking about. And so I would like for my colleague, the 
gentleman from California (Mr. McCarthy) to get up and maybe tell us a 
little bit about his trip to some of the area that we believe we have 
some of the largest oil reserves in this country.
  Mr. McCARTHY of California. Well, I thank the gentleman for yielding. 
And I appreciate the work you're doing for the American people.
  Mr. Speaker, this last weekend leaving on Friday was a group of 
Members, one led by Congressman John Boehner. And I applaud the 
gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Boehner) because his is an open-minded 
leadership. He believes that the power of the idea should win at the 
end of the day. So he put together a group of individuals and Members 
from across the country. There were about ten of us. And we traveled 
first to Golden, Colorado. And in Golden, Colorado, I don't know, Mr. 
Speaker, if the American people know, but there is the National 
Renewable Energy Laboratory. And what this laboratory does, it is under 
the Department of Energy, it studies solar, wind and many different 
avenues for renewable energy. When it comes to automobiles, we drove 
from hydrogen to hybrid to electric cars, as well. This is where the 
technology, the patents are being created where we can see the future 
of America, where we can see the future for energy.
  And that is much what the gentleman from Georgia was talking about, 
all of the above. From there after we studied where we can go, but as 
we studied this technology, and as we drive these cars--one car costs 
$1 million and can only go 60 miles--you see that in the future, with 
technology, where we can go and bring the price down where the average 
American could actually afford it.
  And you do that really by thinking about an individual cell phone. 
Think about one of those big old bricks you used to have for a cell 
phone, you would carry them in a suitcase, to where we are today. Many 
of the Members here actually have Blackberries. Do you know that there 
is more technology in a Blackberry than the Apollo had when they landed 
on the moon?
  After our meetings in the renewable energy, we then boarded the plane 
the next day. And we went up to Alaska. We went up to Alaska to look at 
the Alaskan fields. We went into the different ones to actually see 
firsthand, not to sit back and say, no, we will never allow the ability 
to drill, we will never allow it, to understand if we can do it in an 
environmentally friendly way, to see what is happening up there. We 
went to the bay. We went up to the pumping of the first transmission 
line through.
  Do you know what we found when we were there? We saw how even 
technology has changed from when they started in the 1970s to today. 
Before they would take 65 acres to drill. Now we flew over the one 
portion which is out over a little ways. Do you know there are no 
roads? They just put in a landing strip. They only took 6 acres to 
produce the oil out of it. And you would find that you could mitigate 
at the same time while you're producing this. We walked up and saw 
three caribous coming right up to us. So you can actually have an 
environmentally sound way and actually produce more oil and actually 
make America more energy independent.
  Now, the one thing I found most interesting in this, if you went to 
the Trans-Alaska Pipeline, you found in this pipeline it would 
transport oil produced up in northern Alaska all the way down to 
Valdez, and it would be shipped down into the lower 48. But the one 
thing I have found is that in 1989, this pipeline produced 2.2 million 
barrels of oil a day. Think about that for 1 minute, 2.2 million 
barrels a day. Today it only produces 720,000 barrels a day because in 
these fields, as you're bringing it up, every year that nothing 
happens, you lose 15 percent. And what is going to happen is when this 
pipeline gets down to 300,000 barrels a day, it will shut down. It has 
too little to go.
  So, as this Congress continues to debate and as this Congress does 
nothing by not allowing the bills to come forward, we're about ready to 
lose a national treasure. And the American people have to understand, 
Mr. Speaker, that they consume 20 million barrels a day and only 
produce 7 million barrels a day. And as we sat there and looked at the 
wind and the solar and you talked to the individuals, where is the best 
place to put up these windmills? Where the wind blows. Where is the 
best place to put solar? Where the sun shines. Where is the best place 
to be able to explore and produce more oil? Where the oil is at.
  And where the oil happens to be is 75 miles over. Ten billion barrels 
of oil sitting right there in ANWR. The ability to be able to get it 
where you have the transmission line to come in. You won't have to wait 
10 years as we sat and talked to them. And the environmental footprint 
would be much smaller than it has ever been in the past. When they were 
drilling back in the 1970s, they would drill down, and they could not 
expand very far, so you had to have a numerous amount of wells. Today, 
the new technology allows one well to go down and go out 8 miles. So 
you could have fewer wells, fewer roads, mitigate the concerns when it 
comes to the environment, do it in a friendly, safe manner and at the 
same time create an energy policy with all the above, to have wind, to 
have solar, to have hydro, to have nuclear, and also actually produce 
more. Then what happens? This no longer becomes a red State versus a 
blue State. This becomes a red, white and blue American energy policy.
  And when you think for one moment where the economy is at, $700 
billion a year being shipped over to other countries, of whom we're 
funding, instead of creating American jobs, and you sit back and you 
think of this House, Mr. Speaker, you think of this floor. This floor 
should be created on the concept that the power of the idea wins at the 
end of the day. But as my good friend

[[Page 15715]]

from Georgia pointed out, we can't even bring up a bill. We have no 
appropriation bills simply for the fact that the majority party does 
not want to have an individual to bring up an amendment. Why? Because 
it would pass on this floor.
  Mr. WESTMORELAND. Well, if the gentleman would let me reclaim a 
little time, you mentioned the appropriations bills, and as the 
gentleman from California knows, there was an amendment offered by the 
ranking member of Appropriations, Mr. Lewis, and when that was offered, 
that substitute was offered, Mr. Obey just pulled the bill out of 
committee and refused to let it be voted on or to at least have a 
chance of discussion.
  Mr. McCARTHY of California. The gentleman is correct. And what did 
the chairman of Appropriations say? He said there will be no 
Appropriations bills this year. And then when we get up right before 
the weekend, the majority party brings up a bill that doesn't produce 
any more wind, it does not produce any more solar, and it does not 
produce any more oil or explore any more oil, on suspension simply for 
the fact that you can't do an amendment.

                              {time}  2115

  It is not the masses of the public holding back or the Members having 
a vote on this, it is the leadership. That's why I go back and I 
credit, Mr. Speaker, the Republican leadership to be open-minded about 
all forms of energy and not say no, you are going to pick one winner 
and one loser, it has to be all of the above.
  I yield back my time to my good friend from Georgia, and thank him 
for the work he is doing and letting the American people know the way 
to go is all of the above.
  Mr. WESTMORELAND. I thank the gentleman from California for taking 
time away from his family and actually traveling to ANWR in the Alaska 
area to see not only what it would do for this country in the 
production of U.S. oil, but also to create jobs. This is a job creator 
for Americans, good-paying jobs that they would have and not have to go 
to Saudi Arabia and other parts of this world to get that kind of 
employment. They would be able to have it right here in this country.
  And now I am joined by the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Price).
  Mr. PRICE of Georgia. I thank Mr. Westmoreland from Georgia for his 
leadership on this and so many other issues.
  You have a poster down there that talks about American dollars going 
elsewhere. Have you talked about that poster yet tonight?
  Mr. WESTMORELAND. No, sir, I have not.
  Mr. PRICE of Georgia. Why don't you highlight that poster because 
that talks about the kinds of things that I would like to discuss.
  Mr. WESTMORELAND. Mr. Speaker, this is a poster that we have, and 
this is the poster that really gets my blood kind of hot, and I think 
it does for most other Americans, too.
  When we realize who we are dependent on, when we talk about being 
dependent on foreign oil, exactly who are we talking about? I think 
this poster will give the American people an idea of some of the people 
we are talking about.
  This poster says, America, get out your checkbook. In a recent 
interview on Al Jazeera, Chavez called for developing nations to unite 
against U.S. political and economic policies. What can we do regarding 
the imperialist power of the United States? We have no choice but to 
unite, he said. Venezuela's energy alliances with nations such as Cuba, 
which receives cheap oil, and are an example of how, and this is a 
quote, ``we use oil in our war against neoliberalism.''
  Here is a picture of Fidel Castro and Mr. Chavez. This is the 
interesting quote. Or as he has put it on another occasion, and this is 
Mr. Chavez talking and that was in the Washington Post, ``We have 
invaded the United States but with our oil; not with guns, but with our 
oil.''
  And here is the other part that most Americans do not realize, rather 
than having good-paying American jobs, rather than having the revenue 
from these oil leases come into this country and come into our pot, our 
government, our general account, rather than the royalties coming into 
us and us being able to lower our gas prices for all Americans, we 
write a check every day and this check is from American families and 
businesses to Hugo Chavez for $170,250,000 a day, a day. Not a week, 
not a month, not a year, $170,250,000 a day.
  I yield to the gentleman from Georgia.
  Mr. PRICE of Georgia. I thank the gentleman for pointing that out.
  Now Hugo Chavez is the president of Venezuela, not the president of 
an American oil company, not the president of a friendly nation, he is 
the president of Venezuela, and that's what gets my constituents so 
outraged, and that is instead of taking advantage of the American 
resources that we have to make American energy, what is this leadership 
in the House doing? It is forcing us to continue to give millions upon 
millions upon millions of dollars to folks who don't like us. 
Incredible.
  T. Boone Pickens is doing ads on television right now. He talks about 
a $700 billion transfer of wealth every year, $700 billion from the 
United States offshore. And much of it to folks that don't like us. And 
why? Mr. Speaker, why? Because the leadership, the Democrat leadership 
in the House of Representatives will not even allow a vote on the floor 
of the House to make it so that we can vote on whether or not we ought 
to utilize American energy for Americans.
  And I know that people get frustrated by talking about the processes. 
They say you ought not talk about the process. But in this instance the 
process is policy. The process is policy.
  Here we had a Speaker who came into the majority leadership 18, 19 
months ago. And what did she say, she said this was going to be the 
most open, the most fair, the most equitable Congress in the history of 
the Nation. And what have we had? We have had the most closed Congress 
in the lifetime of us sitting here.
  We talk about what are called open rules which allow amendments or 
debate on a specific bill when it comes to the floor. This has been the 
fewest number of open rules that anybody can remember. It is 
phenomenal, much more so than what we were criticized for when we had 
the majority 2 years ago.
  But what that failure of process means, what that closure of the 
process means is that ideas aren't able to be brought to the floor, 
votes aren't able to be had on bills that the American people care 
about. And in this instance, it is the American people's pocketbook. It 
is their livelihood. It is jobs. It is on American energy for Americans 
that the Speaker of the House will not allow a vote on this floor. It 
is unconscionable. It is unconscionable. I don't know if most Americans 
appreciate this is going on.
  We believe that the process of bringing American energy to Americans 
is complex. It takes into account all sorts of different opportunities 
that we have. Conservation, we all believe in conservation. We are all 
getting greener.
  Alternative fuel, we believe we ought to incentivize the creation of 
alternative fuel and not make it so that the government is picking the 
winner in the area of alternative fuel.
  Mr. WESTMORELAND. If you remember, and Mr. Speaker, I am sure you 
remember this, H.R. 6 in January of 2007, which was the Democrat's 
energy bill, they precluded the American government, our agencies, from 
using the renewable fuels. And so that is an incredible thing. Part of 
the solution is going to be using and making these renewable fuels more 
affordable for all of us. But yet the biggest user of these fuels under 
section 526 of that bill, we are precluded from even using them.
  Mr. PRICE of Georgia. It truly is remarkable because that is not what 
they said. They said we want to be open and we want to do all we can to 
make certain that the American people have appropriate energy. But when 
it comes to voting on the floor of the House, Mr. Speaker, they won't 
allow it. They won't allow it. That's what gets my folks at home upset.

[[Page 15716]]


  Mr. WESTMORELAND. Reclaiming my time, the petition that I had up 
here, they won't even sign a simple petition that says, ``I will vote 
to increase U.S. oil production to lower gas prices for Americans.''
  Mr. PRICE of Georgia. So all it asks Members of Congress to do is say 
I will sign a petition that says, ``I will vote to increase U.S. oil 
production to lower gas prices for Americans.''
  Mr. WESTMORELAND. Absolutely. You know, there have been 192 people 
who have signed it so far. I think six have been from the other side of 
the aisle, and the rest are Republicans, and there is a list on our 
Website at westmoreland.house.gov.
  To the gentleman from Georgia, let me say, you have talked about 
process. I have talked about process. We have all come to this floor to 
talk about the process, and the fact that it is a broken process. The 
only thing that can come out of a broken process is a flawed product.
  Mr. Speaker, we have to have the people of America get involved to 
help with this. We have to have the people of America engage. They have 
got to be part of the process, and they are going to have to engage and 
call their Congressman or Congresswoman to let them know, get out of 
the fetal position and let's do something.
  Mr. PRICE of Georgia. And time is of the essence. We are here just 
this week and next week. After that, Congress goes on vacation. 
Congress goes on vacation. I have been ranting and raving every time 
when we close this House each week, usually on a Thursday afternoon at 
2:30 or 3, that we are gone for another 3 or 4 days without addressing 
the major one issue of the American people. So in another week or 10 
days, Congress will be gone for a month. And will we have addressed 
this issue? Not unless the American people stand up and hold Congress 
accountable, because I can promise you, what my good friends are saying 
at home is not what they are doing when they come right here.
  Mr. WESTMORELAND. You are exactly right.
  I wanted to read this one quote, Mr. Speaker, that I think will give 
the American people an idea of exactly what is going on because back in 
April of 2006 then minority leader, now Speaker Pelosi made a 
statement, ``Vote for us,'' the Democrats, ``because we have a 
commonsense plan to bring down the skyrocketing price of gas.''
  At the time gas was probably $2.23 a gallon. Right now it is about 
$4.08. This was a statement that was made by Mr. Kanjorski recently 
when he was campaigning. He was talking to one of his local papers. 
Here is what he said, and this was in reference to bringing home the 
troops out of Iraq, but it is just as good a reference to the energy 
crisis that we have. He said, ``We sort of stretched the truth, and the 
people ate it up.'' What a comment to make. ``We sort of stretched the 
truth, and the people ate it up.''
  Well, Mr. Speaker, I think the people have chewed on this enough, at 
least I hope that they have chewed on it enough. Mr. Speaker, if I 
could speak to the American people, which I know I can't, but if I 
could, I would say if you've had enough, let your Congressperson know 
about it, that you are ready to do something. You're ready for this 
body, this duly-elected body to put forth a plan to bring down not just 
the skyrocketing price of gas, but of food. Because as we have made 
efforts to have biofuels and ethanol, the price of corn has gone up. 
The price of all petroleum products have gone up. And what we are faced 
with is a gallon of milk costing more and a loaf of bread costing more, 
and they sort of stretched the truth. Well, I'm saying they stretched 
the truth a pretty good ways if they are talking about a commonsense 
plan to bring down the skyrocketing price of gas.
  I see another one of my good colleagues, the gentleman from Marietta, 
Dr. Gingrey.
  Mr. GINGREY. I thank the gentleman for yielding. I am proud to be 
with my colleagues tonight, and I know a lot of people might wonder, 
Members of this body, why Congressman Westmoreland continues to lead 
these special orders kind of in the evening, sometimes even later than 
this hour.
  Mr. Speaker, as I think most people understand in this body, we in 
the minority have no other forum. We have no other opportunity. Bills 
are brought to this floor under suspension, no amendments can be 
offered. When bills are brought under regular order, we have a closed 
rule and amendments are blocked.
  The gentleman from Georgia, Dr. Price, talked about Congress going on 
vacation for the whole month of August. So we have this week and next 
week to get something done. As he points out, by the time we come back 
after that so-called August recess, we are going to have children, we 
are going to have our school children in our districts across this 
country, in my district, the 11th Congressional District of Georgia, 
walking to school because our school districts are not going to be able 
to afford the gasoline to put in those great yellow buses that are in 
our neighborhoods year in and year out.

                              {time}  2130

  We are going to be putting our children at risk. We have already 
talked about the price of groceries, and this is killing our economy. 
There is no question about it. This is absolutely killing our economy.
  My colleague, his petition, a simple petition that he just said, you 
know, how many are willing? How many Members of this body, Republicans 
and Democrats, are willing to sign this petition saying that we will 
support increasing domestic supply so we are not dependent on people 
like Hugo Chavez and other people in the Middle East, Iran, or 
Ahmadinejad, these people that absolutely hate us, that hate our way of 
life, hate our success, and want to bring us down. If we don't do 
something about it, they are going to bring us down.
  So I think Mr. Westmoreland mentioned earlier the number of Members 
that had signed the petition; I believe he said 192. I think he said 
that most of those were Republicans; I think there were a number of 
Democrats. How many Democrats, Mr. Westmoreland?
  Mr. WESTMORELAND. Six as of now.
  Mr. GINGREY. Six. Correct me if I am wrong, but I believe the 
Democratic majority enjoys a membership of 237, something like that, 
237. Out of 237, six of them have signed this petition. Now, I don't 
know what percentage that is, my math is not that quick, it's pretty 
low, and you have got 186 Republicans out of about 198. That's a pretty 
darn high percentage of Republicans. It doesn't really make a lot of 
sense.
  I am going to close my time, and I appreciate the gentleman yielding. 
Tonight I did one of these tele-town hall meetings where we call into 
our district. Both of us have done on both sides of the aisle, very 
popular, a great way to communicate with our constituents. I talked to 
people in three of my nine counties in northwest Georgia, Carroll, 
Haralson and Polk, great counties. In fact, Mr. Westmoreland and I 
share Carroll County.
  Most of the questions were about energy and why in the world Congress 
was not doing anything. So why are you all not doing anything?
  The final question, the lady said, I don't understand, with the poll 
numbers across the country, and people wanting us to drill now or drill 
here, and bring down that price of oil to give us some relief, why is 
Congress refusing to act?
  I said to her, you know, from the political perspective, if somebody 
on the other side is trying to commit political suicide, well, you 
know, we stand back and let them do it. But in this instance, we can't 
afford to let them commit political suicide, because the people are 
suffering. The people are suffering. Republicans, Democrats and 
independents, and we need to come together in a bipartisan way and get 
this done.
  As Mr. Price said earlier, we have very limited time. I am so 
thankful to Mr. Westmoreland for doing this, for bringing it to the 
attention of our colleagues. If anybody else happens to be

[[Page 15717]]

watching out in the country, God bless them, because you need to call 
your Members of Congress and let them know how you feel.
  I yield back to my colleague.
  Mr. WESTMORELAND. I thank the gentleman. I too did a tele-town hall 
tonight and talked to about five of my counties.
  The last person on the line was a gentleman by the name of Ken. Ken 
asked me, he said, why can't you all come up with a solution together? 
Why can't you do that?
  I said, Ken, that's a great question, and I tried to answer Ken the 
best I could, but it was hard to answer it without getting into floor 
procedures and the parliamentary procedure. Basically what I tried to 
tell Ken and the other 500 or so people that were on the call is that, 
listen, when you have 218 votes in this body, you can do anything you 
want to do. You can have a good idea. You can have a great idea. You 
can be 100 percent right in your idea and your thoughts.
  But if you don't have 218 votes, you don't have anything. You can't 
even get it to the floor.
  That's what's happened here, even though 73 percent of the American 
people polled said, look, let's drill here, let's bring down our price 
of gas, let's become more dependent on our own natural resources rather 
than giving $170 million in American jobs to Hugo Chavez, let's invest 
in our own futures, let's invest in the future of our children and 
grandchildren.
  That's what they are saying. When somebody like Ken asked me that on 
a call, why can't you get along, we can't even get our point out. As 
Mr. Gingrey from Georgia said, this is the only way we have got to do 
it is come to the special orders on the floor of the House and try to 
convince the American people to get involved.
  You know, we are a government of, for and by the people, but if the 
people aren't engaged in it, then it's not going to work. Seventy-three 
percent of the American people have answered polls and said, look, 
let's drill. But, yet, the majority party, who represents probably a 
little over half of the American people, have said November. But the 
Republicans, the minority, who represent the other half of the American 
people, have not had an ability to put their ideas on floor.
  We have discharge petitions, and a discharge petition is something if 
you can come up with 218 signatures, supposedly, it would get to be on 
the floor. We had one the week of June 9 that said No More Excuses 
Energy Act of 2007. Reduce the price of gasoline by opening up new 
American oil refineries, investing in clean energy resources such as 
wind, nuclear and capture carbon dioxide and making available more 
home-grown energy through environmentally sensitive exploration or the 
Arctic energy slope in America's deep-sea energy resources.
  Then on the week of June 16 we had another discharge petition, which 
is over here every day for Members to come sign that says, Expanding 
American Refining Capabilities on Closed Military Installations, 
reduces the price of gasoline by streamlining the refinery application 
process and by requiring the President to open at least three closed 
military installations for the purpose of siting new and reliable 
American refineries. We even had that in a motion to recommit that was 
voted down. But this is over here readily available to be signed every 
day.
  Week of June 23, the repeal of the ban on requiring alternative 
fuels, as I mentioned before, we have a ban on alternative fuels for 
our government agencies. It reduces the price of gasoline by allowing 
the Federal Government to procure advanced alternative fuels derived 
from diverse sources such as oil shale, tar sands and coal-to-liquid 
technology.
  The week of July 7, the Coal-to-Liquid Act, reduces the price of 
gasoline by encouraging the use of clean coal-to-liquid technology, 
authorizing the Secretary of Energy to enter into loan agreements with 
coal-to-liquids projects that produce innovative transportation fuel. 
Take the burden off of aviation fuel, off of our military.
  You know what? This creates American jobs. This puts people to work.
  The week of July 14, the Fuel Mandate Reduction Act of 2007, reduces 
the price of gasoline by removing fuel blend requirements and onerous 
governmental mandates if they contribute to unaffordable gas prices. 
It's right over here every day for people to sign.
  This week, American Energy Independence and Price Reduction Act, 
reduces the price of gasoline by opening the Arctic energy slope to 
environmentally sensitive American energy exploration. The development 
footprint would be limited to one one-hundredth of 1 percent of the 
refuge. Revenue received from the new leases would be invested in a 
long-term alternative energy trust fund.
  Those are opportunities that each Member of this body and each 
delegate of the U.S. territories across this world have an opportunity 
to sign, yet we don't even have the 218 yet. So these are 
opportunities.
  When people go home on these resources, and as my gentleman, my 
friend from Georgia said, we get out on a Thursday about 2:30 while 
other people are hard working trying to earn enough money to buy their 
gas, but let us hear from you. If I could speak to the people, I would 
tell them, we need your help to move this.
  I see the gentlelady from North Carolina, my good friend and 
classmate that came in at the same time I did, Ms. Foxx.
  Ms. FOXX. Thank you, Congressman Westmoreland, it's a treat to be 
here with these Georgians tonight, I guess we will call it southern 
night. We certainly do understand each other when we are speaking.
  I was pleased to hear Congressman Gingrey saying, quoting his 
constituents, saying, why won't you all do something about this? Well, 
I hear that kind of question all the time too. It takes a real 
practiced tongue to say it the right way too.
  But I think it's important, as you are pointing out, that we 
distinguish who is in charge here. We see a lot of polls being done, 
and we know that many Americans don't realize that the Democrats are 
completely in charge of the Congress. Now they want to put the blame 
for this problem on the President and Vice President, but we know the 
President and Vice President can't pass laws. It's only the Congress 
that can do this, and the Democrats are in charge of the Congress.
  I was over here several nights last week making that point. I think 
it is very, very much up to us to point out to the American people that 
it's the Democrats who are in charge.
  They are the ones who can help solve this situation, but they seem 
totally out of touch. They don't understand, I think, what is going on 
at the polls. When you have people in Congress who have been in 
Congress for over 50 years, and some of their chairmen have been here 
over 50 years, many of them have been here 40 years, many of them 30 
years, I think they are totally out of touch with the American people.
  They are not used to buying their own gas, they don't go home on 
weekends, they don't hear from their constituents in the same way that 
we do. We know that they are the ones in charge, and they can do 
something about this. They, again, want to deflect the problem, but we 
have the statistics on our side, and I think we have to keep reminding 
the people about that.
  When people ask me why, why won't the Congress do something, you 
know, I don't really have a good answer for them. I am wondering if 
it's because they are so out of touch, and they don't know how the 
American people are suffering as a result of the high gas prices. I am 
not usually a person who thinks in nefarious ways, but I wonder if 
sometimes they don't want the people to be as miserable as possible, 
because they think they can blame the President, and they can blame the 
vice president for what's happening.
  That's the only answer I can come up with. I can't really understand 
why the Democrats, who claim to represent average people, want the 
average people to suffer the way that they do.
  I didn't get a chance to hear all of the comments that my colleague 
from California, Mr. McCarthy said, when he was on the floor earlier, 
but I do

[[Page 15718]]

want to put in a plug for our drilling in Alaska, for our drilling 
wherever we need to.
  The Democrats keep saying we can't drill our way out of this. We 
can't drill our way out of this.
  But I do believe, like my Republican colleagues, that it's important 
that we take advantage of the great gifts that the good Lord has given 
us in this country to use on our behalf. We have the mechanisms to be 
energy independent with American-made energy.
  I want to point out, again, that even the newspapers are calling on 
the Congress, but not all of them are pointing out that it's the 
Democrats, some do. The Las Vegas Review Journal says, ``The ball is 
with Congress, will Democrats continue to block the development of 
energy resources?''
  That is such an important question to ask, and it's important again 
that every newspaper in this country point out that it is the Democrats 
that are blocking the development of resources. The Lafayette Daily 
Advertiser in Louisiana, ``Congress should back drilling.'' Now, the 
Republicans do back drilling. The Democrats do not.
  The Daily Inter Lake in Montana. ``Drilling, will Congress ever 
act?'' We need to point out again that they should be saying, Will the 
democratically-controlled Congress ever act?
  Newspaper after newspaper is coming out and saying that we, Congress, 
need to act on this. It is not the Republicans who are in charge. The 
President and the Vice President can't do anything about this. As my 
colleague from Georgia said earlier, drilling and creating our own 
energy will create millions of jobs in this country.
  Again, the Democrats claim to be the party that wants to create jobs, 
that wants to help average Americans, but they are standing in the way 
of doing all of that.
  You know, I have jokingly said here that they think they are so 
powerful that they can repeal the law of supply and demand. Now, that's 
what they think. They think that just through conservation efforts and 
just by talking, you know, it's sort of like the Wizard of Oz. There is 
nothing really behind that screen. They promised us a commonsense plan 
to bring down the price of gasoline.

                              {time}  2145

  The chart that my colleague showed a little while ago, the price of 
gasoline has almost doubled since the Democrats were in office. I don't 
know what the American people would have gotten had they made some 
other kinds of promises, but promising to bring down the price and then 
doubling the price--you know, I go back to the quote that was used by 
Mr. Kanjorski: ``We sort of stretched the truth and people ate it up.'' 
Well, that is what they are doing now, too, about the leases. They are 
saying, oh, we don't need to drill. The oil companies have all these 
leases that they are not using. But I think it is important that we 
debunk that. We had the Truth Squad last year. We have got to bring the 
Truth Squad out again.
  The oil companies do have some land that has been leased, but the oil 
companies report to their shareholders they are not going to waste good 
money drilling where there is no oil or no potential for getting oil. 
Even the Democrats voted against this ridiculous ``Use It Or Lose It'' 
bill that they brought up for the second time last week.
  Again, I think we have to remind the American people, we could 
produce enough energy in this country to become totally energy 
independent. We need to start now, but we need to remind them, the 
Democrats are in charge. Call your Democratic Member of Congress if you 
are represented by a Democrat, and tell them, you want them to drill 
now. You want them to do all the alternatives.
  We Republicans support conservation. We support all of the above. But 
we can do it. We have always done it. And I now yield back my time to 
my colleague from Georgia.
  Mr. WESTMORELAND. I want to thank the gentlelady from North Carolina.
  I want to thank the Speaker, too. I didn't realize who the Speaker 
was until just now. But I want to thank the Speaker for what we did a 
couple of weeks ago in a 2-hour Special Order where we had bipartisan 
participation. And I think the American people, Mr. Speaker, enjoyed 
it. I know that you said you enjoyed it. I enjoyed it, and hopefully we 
can do that again.
  I want to comment, the gentlelady from North Carolina made a comment 
about the Democratic majority calling on the President to do something. 
Well, he did do something. He removed the executive ban on drilling in 
the Outer Continental Shelf, and he called on Congress to do the same 
thing. We have yet to do that.
  But just the mention, just the mention of that, oil went down $10 a 
barrel. Then just the mention, the discussion, even though it was more 
snake oil than anything else, that the majority had last week on a bill 
that they called DRILL for some reason, oil went down again.
  And so I think that, and if you look at the spike in oil prices, and 
I don't have the chart up here with me tonight. I do have the chart 
that shows the 12 years of the Republican Congress of gas going from 
$1.44 to $2.10. In the 18 months that the Democrats have been in charge 
of Congress it has gone from $2.10 to $4.11.
  Let me give you just a little bit of background about that, because 
if you look at a chart in May of 2007, the speculation in the oil 
prices just shot up, and for good reason.
  We had an amendment on this floor that Mr.--I believe that was the 
gentleman from Colorado that said, no more drilling for shale oil. Two 
trillion barrels. And I believe, Mr. Speaker, that is more than Saudi 
Arabia has in crude oil that we have got in our western States in shale 
oil, and this Congress, by a very narrow vote, said nope, we are not 
going to take that out. We are going to leave that two trillion barrels 
of oil in there.
  It was at that time that we saw the spike because what people 
realized is, hey, look, they are not going to take care of their own 
resources. They are not going to increase their production. They are 
going to be dependent on other countries to supply it.
  And then, on the reverse, just the mention of drilling dropped the 
price of oil.
  I would like to yield some time to the gentleman from Georgia.
  Mr. PRICE of Georgia. I thank my colleague for yielding because the 
issue of oil shale is, I think, the untold story that is truly one of 
the secrets to making, allowing America to be energy self-sufficient or 
even energy-independent.
  As you say, the vote was held here on the floor of the House to make 
it so that America couldn't use its resources.
  Some of my friends are fond of saying that America, under this 
Democrat leadership, is the only nation on the face of the earth that 
views its natural resources as an environmental hazard instead of a 
national asset. It is truly phenomenal.
  You mention that the oil shale resources that we have here, in the 
United States, in the lower 48, would possibly provide two trillion 
barrels of oil.
  Now, we throw around big numbers here in Washington; we are fond of 
doing that. But what does that mean, two trillion barrels of oil?
  It is not only more than the oil that is present in the Middle East. 
Mr. Speaker, it is more than twice as much as the entire earth has used 
in the last 150 years. It is more fossil fuel than the earth has used 
since it began, since man began using fossil fuel for energy. It is an 
absolute phenomenal amount of natural resource. And the thing that has 
made it accessible is that we now have technology that is available to 
utilize it and mine it in a way that is environmentally sensitive and 
environmentally sound.
  But what does this leadership say? What does the Speaker say? Oh, no. 
Oh, no, we wouldn't want to do that because, as my friend from North 
Carolina says, we believe that we can actually repeal the law of supply 
and demand.
  Well, I will tell you, Mr. Speaker, what my friends and my 
constituents at home say. They want to be able to

[[Page 15719]]

use American energy for Americans. So we have got to conserve. We have 
got to find that alternative fuel. But in the meantime, in the short-
term, in the near term we simply must increase supply, onshore 
drilling, exploration, offshore deep sea exploration, utilizing oil 
shale, clean coal technology, making certain that we have enough 
refineries, more refineries to be able to refine the product that we 
have, all of those things go into the mix to making it so that America 
can be energy self-sufficient so that we can bring down that spike in 
the cost of gasoline at the pumps, and in the cost of home heating oil 
which is, although it is hot right now, it will be cool relatively 
soon. And our friends in the Northeast, who are so fond, apparently of 
this current Democrat majority, with this Speaker and this Democrat 
majority, they will find out what this leadership has brought them, and 
it has brought them incredibly skyrocketing prices in the area of home 
heating fuel.
  So I hope that people are paying attention to that as they look at 
their newspapers and as they look at their ballots, Mr. Speaker, as 
they evaluate who they believe ought to be leading this Nation.
  I will tell you, Mr. Speaker, that I believe that the commonsense 
agenda is an agenda that embraces all technologies, embraces all 
technologies in a way to increase American supply of energy for 
Americans. We would hope that we would be able to do that in a 
bipartisan way. Our friends on the other side though, in terms of the 
leadership, haven't allowed that to happen. But we look forward to the 
day when we are able to lead and lead with both Republicans and 
Democrats to bring together, American energy for Americans and bring 
down the cost of gasoline for our constituents all across this land.
  I want to commend once again my friend from Georgia for his 
leadership on this and so many issues. I look forward to being with you 
again.
  Mr. WESTMORELAND. I want to thank my good friend from Georgia for 
those comments. And we have all said here tonight, and as Ken asked me, 
Mr. Speaker, on that teleconference call, why can't you work together?
  And Americans all over this country are wondering why, when 73 
percent of them say drill here, lower our gas prices, they want to know 
why. And I want to give just a little insight into why.
  I want to read you some quotes, and this quote is from the Sierra 
Club, and you can go to probably their Web site or at least the FEC 
reports and see which Members have gotten money from this group. But 
this is the Sierra Club. ``The Sierra Club opposes any general program 
to lease Federal oil shale reserves for production purposes. The Sierra 
Club opposes development of the oil resources on the Outer Continental 
Shelf.''
  The U.S. has an equivalent of 1.8 trillion, two trillion barrels of 
oil in the oil reserves.
  Greenpeace said this: ``Let's end fossil fuel use. For decades we 
have relied on oil, coal and gas to meet our ever increasing energy 
needs, and now we are facing the consequences of our actions in global 
warming.''
  Now, keep in mind, when they say let's end fossil fuel use, 85 
percent, Mr. Speaker, of U.S. energy consumption is supplied by fossil 
fuels.
  League of Conservation Voters: ``Drilling in protected areas offshore 
won't solve our energy needs in the short-term and in the long-term 
will increase the threat of global warming.''
  Natural Resources Defense Council: ``Oil and gas production is a 
dirty process. Drilling in the Arctic refuge would ruin one of 
America's last wild places. The Arctic refuge is simply too precious to 
destroy.''
  Mr. Speaker, I don't know if a lot of Americans have ever seen that 
Arctic refuge, but it is a frozen tundra. I have never seen a tree on 
it.
  Friends of the Earth: ``Even if the burning of coal was not a major 
greenhouse gas contributor, the coal industry is a disaster when it 
comes to environmental stewardship and human health.''
  Center for Biological Diversity: ``Oil and gas exploration directly 
disturbs wildlife, destroys precious habitat, and can result in 
catastrophic oil spills, as well as dangerous blowouts that kill 
people, ignite fires and contaminate surface drinking water.''
  Mr. Speaker, I want to ask the American people, how many of you have 
heard lately of a catastrophic oil spill? Even with our oil wells with 
Katrina and Rita, how many of you have heard of dangerous blowouts that 
kill people? How many of you have heard of these fires being ignited? 
How many of you heard of the contaminated drinking water from our oil 
platforms? None.
  Mr. Speaker, this is the reason we can't get anything from the 
Democratic majority, because, Mr. Speaker, these environmental groups 
are controlling the agenda on this House floor when it comes to the 
U.S. production of oil. And Mr. Speaker, I am afraid that there is 
nothing the minority can do about it except stand here and beg the 
American people to become involved.
  H.R. 6, which was the Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007, 
that was passed by the Democratic majority, this is the one, the 
commonsense energy plan to bring down skyrocketing gas prices. And as 
you saw on my other chart, they have almost doubled.
  Here are the words in that 316 page bill. Crude oil was mentioned 
five times, gasoline 12, exploratory drilling, two, offshore drilling, 
none, Domestic drilling, none, domestic oil, none, domestic gas, none, 
domestic fuel, none, domestic petroleum, none, gas price or gas prices, 
none, common sense, none, light bulb, 350 times.
  Mr. Speaker, we called it a no energy plan, and this is a quote from 
Mr. DeFazio about the comments the Republicans made about H.R. 6, the 
Common Sense Energy Bill. ``It is sad to see the Republicans come to 
this. Now they will laughably say this will lead to higher gas 
prices.''
  That was January 18, 2007, when gas was about $2.10 a gallon. It is 
now $4.07.
  Mr. Speaker, I beg, I implore the American people to become involved. 
Go to house.gov/westmoreland; find out where your congressman is at. 
See if they won't have the will to sign that petition to let you know, 
Mr. Speaker, the constituents of the people elected to this body, that 
they believe in lowering gas prices for all Americans.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

                          ____________________