[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 155 (2009), Part 13]
[House]
[Page 17701]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                        THE NATIONAL ENERGY TAX

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Shimkus) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. SHIMKUS. Madam Speaker, I appreciate the time to come down to the 
floor and talk about the bill which recently passed the House, the cap-
and-trade, cap-and-tax national energy tax bill, which has a basic 
premise. The basic premise says that there is too much carbon dioxide 
in the atmosphere. The solution is to make sure that the emission of 
carbon dioxide is charged more, and that charge will decrease our 
reliance on that by forcing people not to use fossil fuels.
  It sounds simple. It is not that simple. Fossil fuels is the basic 
foundational fuel for a thriving economy. And in this economy that we 
have today, the last thing we want to do is slow that engine by raising 
costs.
  Energy is a component in the cost of everything we do. Here in this 
Chamber, we appreciate the lights being on. That currently is possible 
by fossil fuels. Whether that is coal or natural gas, fossil fuels help 
create that electricity. As we drive back and forth to our districts, 
the gasoline is a fossil fuel. If we are flying back to our districts, 
the jet fuel is a fossil fuel. If we add a cost on the use of fossil 
fuels, the cost for everything increases from the clothes that you wear 
to the food that you consume and to the houses that you build.
  The last time we went through environmental legislation that dealt 
with the Clean Air Act, there was great devastation of jobs throughout 
the Midwest. An example is this poster that I bring to the floor 
numerous times of United Mine Worker members from Peabody No. 10 in 
Kincaid, Illinois. When the last Clean Air Act amendments were adopted, 
1,200 mine workers in this mine alone lost their jobs. There is an 
effect by the legislation that we pass here on the floor of this House.

                              {time}  1800

  And not only did it affect these individual miners, but it affected 
all the communities from which they have come from because that was the 
major job creator in this county was those who operated this mine. They 
not only lost their jobs, but in southern Illinois, 14,000 other mine 
workers lost their jobs. This is very similar to what happened 
throughout the rest of the Midwestern States.
  The one that really is poignant because the head of the Ohio Coal 
Association, the Ohio Mining Association came before our committee and 
said, after the 1990 Clean Air Act amendments, 35,000 coal mine workers 
lost their jobs. And so that's why those of us from coal-producing 
areas and those of us who want low-cost fuel have come to the floor and 
we fought so diligently in opposition to the national energy tax.
  Now, if we want to move on the national energy tax and if we want to 
limit the amount of carbon dioxide because the atmosphere has too much, 
wouldn't it be important to ensure that the rest of the countries that 
are developing would also comply? But the bill that passed the House 
had no provision, had no trigger to ensure that the number one emitter 
of carbon dioxide would have to comply in a regime, and that's China. 
Another major emitter of carbon dioxide is India. They're not involved 
and responsible for moving to limit their emissions. So, for the United 
States to go into and disarm ourselves by raising our energy costs 
against countries that compete with us because they can pay their 
employees more, they don't comply with environmental standards, now we 
are going to allow them to have cheaper energy, it is just a foolish 
proposition.
  So what have Republicans done? We've come to the floor to talk about 
what really are the energy demands that we have in this country. We 
need to decrease our reliance on imported crude oil. The cap-and-tax 
bill does nothing to decrease our reliance on imported crude oil.
  What we have proposed is making sure that we take access of the Outer 
Continental Shelf, the oil and gas reserves there. The royalties then 
are used not to continue to bring additional taxes on the American 
people. The royalties are used to expand wind and solar power that is 
now developing throughout this country, which we support because we 
want a diversified energy portfolio. We want to make sure we use our 
most efficient, cheapest source that we have, which is coal. We want to 
use it for electricity generation, driving down electricity prices. We 
also want to use that to produce liquid fuel, so we have a competitor. 
That is where we decrease our reliance on imported crude oil.

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