[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 154 (2008), Part 5]
[House]
[Page 7285]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                               GAS PRICES

  (Mr. COURTNEY asked and was given permission to address the House for 
1 minute.)
  Mr. COURTNEY. Mr. Speaker, last night, gas prices in New London, 
Connecticut reached $3.77 a gallon. When George Bush took office, they 
were $1.52 a gallon. Those prices are 72 cents higher than last year in 
New London County, 42 cents higher than just last month. Commercial 
fishermen on Long Island Sound have seen their fuel costs double, truck 
drivers have seen their diesel prices more than double in the last 
year.
  Dozens of Members of Congress have written to President Bush asking 
him, with one stroke of the pen, to change the delivery schedule for 
the Strategic Petroleum Oil Reserve, which is a tried and true practice 
that he himself exercised in 2005 after Hurricane Katrina which brought 
down the price of gas by 40 cents at a time when the price per barrel 
was $75. Today, at $120 per barrel, it is time for President Bush to 
listen to the people of this country, Members of Congress, who are 
asking him to exercise his power to bring down the price of gas. And 
our Congress, the Democratic-led Congress, is going to keep the 
pressure on the President until he listens to the people of this 
country and avoids smothering our attempts to bring this country out of 
recession with the economic stimulus package.

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