up hold them in their disappointments and make them patient even amid the unsolved mysteries of life's seasons let such robust confidence in you shine through their lives with such persuasive beauty that it will dispel the darkness of fear and doubt lift their lives from the battle zone of combative were to a caring community where leaders communicate esteem and respect to each other lord help them to trust in your unfailing love and to rejoice at the unfolding of your merciful providence we pray in the name of the prince of peace  form prior to a series of votes center should expect votes be in shortly after eleven eleven ten or thereabouts in relation to the following items condiment on the energy with a sixty vote threshold read amendment on energy with a sixty vote threshold patch  today will have this will be raised to seventy one comments have been made by republican leaders that matter we're just doing the people's business we're only getting done what is important mr president the american people know what is going on it's obstructionism at its zenith at its best and the american people are beginning clearly to see this vision story in newspapers all around the country based on an article by best able to deal with the country's problems democrats by a twenty one point advantage it's obvious why mr president we're trying to do something about the problems facing america today we're trying to do something about the civil war we're now engaged in in iraq we have a situation where we have fifty million people with no health insurance we have the earth's temperature rising every day earth has a fever we need to do something legislatively to try to bring down that fever we have an education system that's in crumbles we want to do something about educating the troops coming back from iraq we believe these troops are just as gallant and her oik as the troops to fight in world war two and when the world war troops came home they had the ability to go to school and were educated and it happened it changed america forever we think american can be changed forever again in the new paradigm we now face with these men and women coming back by the tens of thousands and not being able to afford to go to school we know that the presidential candidate of the republicans senator mccain says it's too generous well this piece of legislation written by jim webb is generous but it should be because these troops returning from iraq deserve our generosity mr president the democratic advantage is going to be pronounced come election time we have tried to work on a cooperate of basis and have been denied time after time after time we know that bush's approval rating in some polls is around seventy percent think about that we have had a number of stories written and just the last ten days that the lowest approval rating of any president history is the president now we're dealing with a person who is a divider not a united the american people see this eighty two percent of the american people feel our country's head in the wrong direction eighty two percent so mr president i would hope that during the next few months we have left in this legislative session and we can stop the increase of this number here and work to try to accomplish things  american people we have so much that needs to be done and we want to work to get this done if we're able to accomplish things there's credit to go around for everyone democrats and republicans but of course the obstructionis which will help lower prices at the pump and create more american jobs last year this congress acted in a bipartisan way that would reduce our demand for oil by increasing fuel economy standards for cars and trucks and by increasing our use of renewable fuels but no matter how hard we try we cannot repeal the law of supply and demand we know that we also need to increase supply in order to lower gas prices and that's what our amendment does in the short term it places a six month moratorium on deposits to their strategic petroleum reserves which will immediately have an impact on domestic supply it also increases production of american energy right here at home about opening up a small portion of the arctic national wildlife refuge or production and allowing coastal states to decide if they want to allow increased production petroleum products that we can produce right here in america and specifically in kentucky my home state with american workers and our members would provide grants and loans to accelerate the development of advanced batteries that can be used to power the next generation of plug in hybrid vehicles here in america these measures coupled with the conservation and biofuels measure we supported last year will increase our energy independence and help to bring down gas prices in the long term now some say opening up new areas for production won't do anything in the short term but remember if president clinton had not vetoed legislation to open and war thirteen years ago more than a million barrels of oil would be flowing to american consumers every single day i believe it makes more sense for us to produce these additional barrels here at home with american jobs rather than begging opec to produce more as some on the other side have advocated i would urge my colleagues to consider our long term energy goals and our need for increased energy independence and vote in favor of this amendment we can't continue to ignore the number one issue facing american families and further delay is not an option that americans can afford now some of our friends on the other side of the aisle believe we need to ask opec to supply more oil that we ought to be sending even more money and jobs to the nations of opec but we take a different approach armament would increase the production right here at home in america while some  amendment which we will vote on shortly and it relates to the cost of gasoline i can't think of another issue that has been in the forefront across america for a longer period of time than the cost of gasoline it goes beyond that obviously to diesel fuel and jet fuel costs and we see it every day you drive down the road and you watch those prices going up at the gas station and people ask senators and congressmen listen you're supposed to be the bigwigs here you're supposed to be so influential why haven't you done something the gas prices are killing us and they are whether it's a family member commuting back and forth to work in downstate illinois trying to get to the state capital whether it's a truck over the road truck or spending almost a thousand dollars to fill up is rigged with these so fuel whether it's a c e o of an air lives who's seen the worst first quarter losses in the history of that airline because of the rise in the cost of jet fuel it's hitting everybody i talked to a chiropractor over the weekend a chiropractor she told me her practice was die because people didn't want to drive twenty miles for her services they said we'll see every other week instead of every week well as you see it's starting to reach into every single area so what response to we have from the republican side the response is predictable and ineffective here's what they say you know what we ought to do we ought to start drilling for oil in arctic national wildlife refuge and we ought to start drilling for oil off the coast of america ok how much oil is there oh there's a lot in the scheme of things it's not a lot all of the oil reserves within the control of the united states of america all of them combined come to three percent  world's total of all reserves three percent each year our nation powerful large economy consumes twenty five percent of all the auto produced in the world we cannot drill our way out of this issue we can't drill our way to lower prices and here's something they failed to mention if we gave approval today which i would think would be a bad idea but we gave approval today to the republican approach it would be years before the oil would start trickling in years of these high prices so what can we do here now two things first we can start dealing with the price gouging consumers these prices are going up dramatically and historically high rates they're not justified by the barrel of oil prices the spread between the cost of a barrel of oil and the cost of refined products keeps growing larger and larger and the oil companies that are re finding the crude oil keep making more and more money products gouging is going on that's the first issue is there any mention of consumer price gouging in the republican approach not one word in the democratic approach we've early price gouging should be part of this secondly accountability of the oil companies these oil companies over the last seven years when george bush from all country has been our president have seen their profits quadruple four times the profits they were making just a few years ago the cost of the oil and diesel fuel is going up two and a half times the oil company profits quadrupled these companies are not only making more money than oil companies have ever made in the history of america they're making more money than any businesses ever made in the history of america that's a fact we have a windfall profits tax we say there's a limit to how much these oil companies should be making its profits when it causes so much damage to american families businesses and farmers and truckers in the economy we have a windfall profits tax the republican approach nothing nothing to address the oil company profits that's the reality now senator reid the democratic majority leader came to the floor a few minutes ago and told us what's going on with the republican strategy so far in this session of congress we have two year sessions of congress the republicans have  today they'll hit seventy one you might say somewhat what does that mean in the history of the united states senate over two hundred years that the maximum number of filibusters in a two year period of time was fifty seven the republicans have broken that record what's a filibuster a filibuster is a way to delay a slowdown of void try to turn the page to another issue over and over and over again seventy times the republicans have now set a record for up struction and stopping progress in the united states senate whether it's on issues of energy whether it's on issues of health care helping our schools dealing with the war in iraq over and over and over again republican filibusters today will have a vote we're going to vote a short period of time twelve fifteen probably earlier maybe earlier i'm not sure but in the course of that vote we'll have a choice on whether or not we at least make one small step forward when it comes to dealing with gasoline prices we cannot justify in the current situation continuing to take all off the market where the federal government buys it and stores it it's called the strategic petroleum reserve currently it's about ninety seven percent of capacity we are buying the most expensive  history of the world and storing it taking it off the market further putting an increase in gasoline prices we will offer an alternative to the republican approach which will say that will suspend filling  petroleum reserve it might pass fifty one democratic senators incidentally wrote a letter to the president on march eleventh asking the president to suspend selling of the petroleum reserve because gasoline prices run a control the president refused now we have to pass a law to force the president to do something about these gasoline prices i think suspending shipments to the street that each part of the strategic petroleum reserve is the most sensible way for us to bring these prices down i hope that we can get the cooperation of the republicans beyond that to deal with price gouging of consumers and accountability for oil companies and not face another republican filibuster when it comes to that much to talk about i wanted to just follow my text that i had prepared but i heard the democrat senator discuss this issue that i have to just tell the american people one you know their energy policy is if they are talking about today day that we're not going to buy and put in the reserves seventy thousand and that's for the rest of this year now we use twenty one million barrels a day so let's face up to where that if you don't think that one million barrels a day from the alaskan arctic wilderness which would be american and we could could we could get that coming to america for maybe fifty years if that's not  seventy thousand barrels for seven or eight months to not put in the reserve but leave in the well in the world market i'll leave that to anybody that's listening the price gouging is in there in there a portfolio again and they talk about it last year we gave authority to the federal trade commission they have not yet found any gouging we hope they do now i'd like to go on and talk about what we're trying to do mr president i ask  consent that i be added as a co sponsor to amendment forty seven thirty seven thousand now known as the reid amendment but it's actually senator dorgan this amendment without objection shorter mr president earlier this year i gave a detailed speech on the senate floor about the perils of our nation's growing dependence on foreign oil at that time i noted that the nation was ignoring policies that would increase our energy supply while the stranglehold of foreign oil was tightening i spoke bluntly and warned of dark days ahead for our nation's economy and foreign policy if we continued to send our money abroad to buy oil from unstable and hostile regions around the globe i stated that at current price of oil we are at the pace to send nearly a half a trillion dollars overseas annually to purchase oil a half a trillion when the driving season ends and the price at the pump subsides a bit naturally the volume of constituent letters and phone calls will decrease a bit when the cameras fade in the focus of the day begins to dinner elsewhere we should stop and reflect on the debate that we're having today make no mistake mr president a growing and gathering storm is swirling around this nation i threatening our economic strength our national security our place in the world that storm comes in the form of dependence upon foreign oil and last year congress passed a strong energy bill built on advancing  ethanol and strengthening our fuel efficiency standards we made great steps in adding up policies that will reduce our gasoline consumption however i said at the time and say again today last year's legislation had a glaring weakness which is highlighted today last year's bill failed to include measures for domestic energy production when we tried to open the virginia outer continental shelf to natural gas leasing the other side block that when we tried to improve our nation's refining capacity the other side blocked that and when we tried to advance domestic cold iran iraq a very major way for america to diminish its dependence on foreign foreign oil the other side block that on the conservation and efficiency and pursuit of clean energy this chamber is in wide barters bipartisan agreement but on producing more american oil and gas to to reduce the price of gasoline at the pump it will become clear from today's debate and a vote and a vast majority of the other side oppose action when today's vote is over regardless of the outcome i will continue to return to the senate floor and state on this important speak on this important issue of our growing dependence on foreign oil i continue to speak out against policies that increase the cost of energy on the american people so clearly when one is to provide relief from high gas prices i have listened intently to the increased debate over the past few weeks about the energy challenges and i've heard some of the other side pleaded with opec nations to increase production by one quarter of the amount we provide for here in america with this amendment one quarter of the amount i've heard and wires opponents from a decade ago repeated their claim that  a decade ago that anwar will take a decade to produce i never heard argument this argument when we were supporting the increasing the ickle fuel economy standards that we now take a decade or two to come to fruition we passed a bill that everybody takes credit for it will take ten years for it to have any impact yet we praise ourselves for producing it of course all of us would be assuming the price of oil did not increase over one hundred dollars per barrel during the time that anwar was being blocked if president clinton had been told animal are over twelve years ago we would have this oil from alaska on the market today i've also heard my colleagues argue that seventy thousand barrels of oil per day would make a significant difference in the price of oil that's the sprawl deal while denying access to over a million barrels a day of oil per day from anwar alone it is time to act and what the other side has offered up in this critical moment is talk of energy independence supported by more government investigations empty threats to opec combined with pleas for moral back production if there were not enough if that wasn't enough we are faced with the prospect of a windfall profits tax like the one that passed in april by the administration in venezuela we tried to implement such attacks in the eighty's and it did not work then and it will not work now we can't produce more energy by taxing on oil companies or taxing anyone according to the congressional research service the imposition of windfall profits tax could have several adverse economic effects and as such attacks could be expected to reduce domestic oil production increase the level of the oil imports the architect of this tax during the carter admin astray should recently called the windfall profits tax quote a terrible idea today today we consider real solutions to our national problem on may first i entered the american energy production act of two thousand and eight obviously if we had democratic support and help we could make it even better but we had to do this with the republicans to lay before the american people the fact that there are ways to produce more american oil and natural gas without doing any harm any real harm to the american environment  pleased to have twenty one co sponsors on that trail and i'm pleased as senator mcconnell has offered this legislation as an amendment to the bill currently before us unfortunately the other side has not allowed us to consider this proposal to address record high gas prices speaking of filibusters on our bill they have been sisted that there be sixty votes that's the equivalent of the filibuster so you can chalk one up for us to filibustering the only energy bill that we've seen in a while that would produce energy for america i support the bipartisan amendment on the fiji petroleum reserve and i've already indicated to you that i do and it needs no further explanation i'm confident that if enacted the american energy production act the one we're talking about will strengthen our nation's security for decades to come in this legislation we open up two thousand of the nineteen million acres of the arctic national wildlife refuge and i defy anyone with common sense to seriously contend that two thousand acres out of two million will harm that wilderness it can be done with a small footprint and everyone knows that we just chosen up sides regardless of the real facts and therefore i assume the democrats will defeat it again taken together these policies enable the production of twenty four billion barrels of american oil which would increase our domestic production by nearly forty percent over the next three decades opening anwar alone would create a thousand of thousands of american jobs provide three billion in revenues in the next ten years to the federal treasury and bringing online over one million barrels of oil per day this amendment also spurs the commercialization of coal derived fuels and oil shale resources dance man and these policies will be spoken of in more detail by other senators but clearly they are things to look at the american people are that know about them they are sources huge sources of energy that can be made in america by americans poor americans with emerging economies around the world increasing their thrust their thirst for oil we face a new energy challenge in america the world demand demand for oil continues to grow and america's production of oil is fallen to its lowest levels in sixty years that's because we haven't done anything new or significant to add to what we have produced for years if we do not start producing more of our own energy resources and we will continue to rely on unstable corn or oil and continue to pay a high price that is what is at stake today in today's vote we probably will not win but we feel very comfortable giving that the other side an opportunity to vote no again for the production of oil and gas for him that is american by americans for america with that i yield the floor mr president senator from massachusetts i yield to myself five minutes mr president we're going to be voting on some extremely important energy issues and i've expressed my views on those  before so i wanted to take an opportunity to talk about another matter which will be voting on later this morning early this afternoon and then will be the subject matter that will be before the senate for the next to the next few days an extremely important matter deals with our national security primarily homeland security it deals with the challenges that our first responders are faced with i'm talking about our police offices we're talking about our firefighters we're talking about the first responders they are the ones that are on the cutting edge of our domestic national security we're focusing and seeing massive reorganizations of our of our various institutions that have a dealt with homeland security we've seen additional resources of focused on homeland says security and the legislation that senator gregg and i offer will strengthen our national security by including those individuals that are on the front line into the decision making about what is helpful and useful in terms of the security of our communities small cities large cities all across this nation and it will give them a voice in making a judgments and decisions so decisions are not going to be only baby made by policy makers and bureaucrats but by men and women that are on the ground and what we know mr president it is called our public safety employer employee cooperation act it is bipartisan in nature in nature and it could make a t extraordinary difference we had the opportunity last evening to go over the essential elements of the legislation sort of the do's and don'ts there are those that have misconstrued this legislation and have misrepresented the legislation and we have seen that sort of a technique around here in the united states as the senate when a members differ with the legislation and then distorted to misrepresent and then differ with it it's a it's an old technique that is a use around here but we will have the chance in the safa noon and tomorrow and this is a notice that we will welcome sen gregg and i will we will welcome the amendments we want to this legislation has in one form of another have been a before the senate previously it had extraordinary bipartisan support in the house of representatives i believe ninety five republicans as support of the legislation which is an indication of the breath support that that it has so mr president we will look forward and we're going to urge our colleagues  o help us move this legislation which is of such great importance in consequence do the security of our people ask them to help with move it forward this week mr president some three hundred thousand police offices a hundred sixty or so three hundred thousand police offices in twenty four states are they are in strong support of the legislation  senator from texas was president i rise today to talk about the bill that we are going to vote on starting at eleven o'clock we have an amendment filed by the distinguished republican leader  senator from new mexico is the prime foster of this amendment and i commend senator domenici for his continuing leadership in the energy arena in january of two thousand and seven when control of congress changed hands the price of gasoline was two dollars and thirty three cents a gallon today it is three dollars and sixty one cents a gallon at the fifty five percent increase and it is going in that direction even further mr president the reason for the record high price is simple economics the global demand for energy has soared especially in fast rising countries like china and india meanwhile the supply of energy has remained largely stagnant there is a simple classic economic principle a law of supply and demand when the demand goes up the supplies stays the same the price goes up knowing that the best way for congress to reduce the price of energy is to increase the supply of energy we need more american oil more american natural gas more american clean coal and we need more american nuclear power that is why i joined the ranking member of the energy committee to introduce the bill today that would do exactly that first this strategic petroleum reserve mr president two weeks ago i wrote a letter to the president signed by thirteen republican senators i know to that it was announced by the minority leader that the majority leader excuse what we are asking the president to do is temporarily halt deposits of oil into the spro to day the spro holds one hundred and eighteen days almost four months of reserve for an emergency in this country mr president i'd like to stop now and ask for unanimous consent that i be added as opposed bonsor of the dorgan amendment number forty seven thirty seven without objection sort because what the amendment does and what is also included in our bill is to add or a temporary halt on any more oil going into this pro halting the daily deposit seventy six thousand dollars barrels a day into this pro would allow sri million additional gallons of gasoline to be available on the market if we halted the thirteen million barrels of oil the department of energy has sought contracts  or to go into spro it would be more than the total of the february two thousand and eight imports from libya syria q weight united arab emirates egypt as your version and china combine amendment offered today would halt additional contributions to this pro for one hundred eighty days and ensure that these resources could be utilized immediately in the marketplace in addition we would open the grassy plains of anwar which is unavailable for drilling today and the u s geological survey estimates that there could be as much as in billion barrels of oil and water this would be almost enough oil to replace what we import from saudi arabia every day what would be drilled in and war isn't near a forest or stream it is a grassy plain it is two thousand acres about the size of national airport in an area and war which is the size of the state of south carolina so drilling in this grassy playing would be environmentally safe and it would make america much more independent much more reliant on ourselves and our resources for our energy needs a place we need to go another area the outer continental shelf that is more than venezuela's proven reserves of eighty billion barrels we need more refineries capacity this is meant to encourage as refinery expansion to alleviate the bike concerns with refine petroleum which is gasoline mr president this amendment that we're voting on today would not do much to bring down the demand because in fact we can't control what china and india are demanding in oil and natural gas resources but it can affect supply and that's what congress has turned a blind eye to doing all they talk about is a windfall profits tax on oil companies we tried that once before and what happened jobs went overseas we had to import more from overseas so we became more dependent on foreign sources in we lost jobs in our country the price would not go down it would just come from foreign sources instead of ours so let's don't talk about things that will not help let's talk about supplies which we can help by working together to increase our utilization of our own natural resources mr president this year we will spend five hundred billion dollars to import oil all of those dollars could stay here in america creating good jobs in america and making us self reliant if there's anything that america stands for it is the spirit of self reliance of knowing that if we are running into a crisis if our economy is down that we would be dependent on ourselves because we have the resources to meet this demand we have the resources now we need the willpower and we need the good old american spirit to say we can prevail we can reduce prices we can help the american family get over the hump we can do something by relying on ourselves mr president and that's what the amendment we're voting on will do i hope the american people will look at these laws do they want political rhetoric windfall profits taxes that soon jobs overseas or do they want real solutions short term by not putting any oil in spro right now and putting it on the market there start bringing that price down and to let those who are hedging on commodities know that america is going to act and the very thing we could do for america to show those hedgers that we're going to act is to say we're going to take the long term steps to we're going to drill in our own areas that we control we're going to put ogden america we're going to help the states get their royalties if they want to drill offshore and we're going to stand up and say this is america and we'll take care of ourselves with our own natural resources that's the vote today mr president thank you from north dakota mr president i'm not going to speak so much about what divides us i want to talk about what would unify us with respect to the two plans we're going to vote on an amendment that is a bill i offered back in february of this year that would stop putting oil underground now some say well that doesn't mean very much that one accomplish very much but we know we have testimony before the senate democrat the senate energy committee i should say by  economist and energy expert mr berger who said that what's coming off the gulf of mexico a sweet light crude the most valuable subset of oil and despite the fact that it is a small percentage of the oil usage it could have as much as a ten percent impact on the price of sweet light crude so i don't think we should diminish what this proposal is at a time when oil prices are bouncing up their record highs oil prices one hundred twenty hundred twenty four hundred twenty six dollars a barrel we have speculators playing their fiddle and the oil prices dance up here in the stratosphere the economy's damaged the consumers get injured we've got industries going belly up and so at a time when we're doing that the question is what what unites us here what can we agree on today will i tell you one thing we can agree on i believe there are but eighty u s senators have expressed themselves including all three presidential candidates saying at least let's stop putting oil underground we have something called the strategic petroleum reserve a reasonable thing to do set of oil aside underground let me show you what it is this is what it looks like instead of coil going into the pipeline and so that you can convert gasoline to your ninety seven percent filled now the question is this with oil at one hundred twenty six dollars a barrel and gasoline around four dollars or headed towards four dollars and above with the american consumer being burned at the stake why should its government be carrying the wood why on earth should we be putting oil underground at a time of record high prices who thinks it's smart to go out into the marketplace and take oil that is that valuable and stick it underground which has the impact of putting upward pressure on oil prices i mean that makes no sense at all as i said all three presidential candidates have said we have to stop eighty senators and said we ought to stop somehow president cheney and president bush are insistent you've got to continue to do this now look there are a lot of other things that are happening number one production i was one of four senators that introduced the legislation with senator domenici that led to opening least one eighty one in the gulf of mexico that's additional production i'm proud we did that it should have been broader should have been expanded but it got narrowed i've got a bill in to expand it i mean yes we need some additional production we need conservation we need  need renewables we need all of those things and we've made some progress and some of them we finally passed cafe ten mpg in ten years that's a historic achievement after twenty seven long years here in this congress we've set us on a course towards renewables so there are some short term intermediate term long term solutions now john maynard keynes says in the long run we're all dead so what do we do in the short run well how about today the day i know where there's seventy thousand arrows of sweet light crude can go into the pumps at the gas station to be put in cars and put downward pressure on gas prices i know where that is and so to most of my colleagues at least today we can agree on that please and let me make another point there is unbelievable speculation  commodities market you know it's interesting let me give you a couple of charts that show senior vice president exxon mobil last month the price of oil should be about fifty or fifty five dollars per barrel know marathon oil one hundred dollars oil isn't justified by the physical demand in the marketplace a man who testified before the senate energy committee mr gates thirty five years a senior member of oppenheimer's energy area there's absolutely no shortage of oil i'm quoting him i'm absolutely convinced that oil prices shouldn't be a dime above fifty five dollars a barrel i call it the world's largest gambling hall it's open twenty four seven unfortunately it's totally unregulated this is like a highway with no cops no speed limit everybody going one hundred twenty miles an hour and the fact is we've got speculators hedge funds investment banks that have never before been in these futures markets and they are in neck deep driving up the prices in the future markets in my judgment having very little to do with the fundamentals of supply and demand should we just ignore that should we say that's ok mr president let me i think i've consumed five minutes let me ask unsent for two additional minutes without objection should we just ignore that and say well that's ok let's just talk about other subjects i don't think so you want to control stock in the stock market by buying on margin then you have to put up fifty percent of the money you want to control of oil in the in the markets that are now the subject speculation if you want to control one hundred thousand dollars worth of oil then all you need is five to seven thousand dollars as a margin seems to me that margin requirement ought to be increased to the point of wringing speculators out of that system yes we need a futures market for legitimate hedging we need it for liquidity but there are times when speculative bubbles develop in this case this speculative bubble driving up the price of oil and gasoline at the gas pumps it's injuring this country's economy it's damaging in our economy it's hurting a lot of industries truckers airlines it's hurting a lot of american families and we can and should do something about it but what we can do that's that's part of the plan that we had offered it's you know we've got a couple different plans but let's take the one common part of both plans which is the amendment that i offered as a bill in february and pass that today because that will make a difference is that a giant step no not at all but is it a step finally at long last in the right direction it is so instead of getting the worst of each let's try to get the best of both here the best of what both have to offer in this chamber is to say this agree on this we can do and my hope would be that  at the end of today at least this congress would have said to this president vice president stop doing what you're doing the last thing in the world we ought to do is put upward pressure on gas and oil prices what we ought to do is do something to put some downward pressure and we can do that today with one single reserve and must have it and we shouldn't grow accustomed to thinking this pretty cheap petroleum reserve is going to solve our energy supply problem senator dorgan has never said that and it won't i'm going to answer some of the remaining questions when i wrap  with my last five minutes i know you mr president center for me last weekend i was traveling around wyoming and it was clear that high energy prices are what's on everyone's mind it's a trend i've noticed each and every summer for the past several years each year our constituents ask us to do something to address energy prices and while we talk and talk about what we're doing rarely do we take any meaningful action it's a little different this year because americans are really seeing record prices at the pump those saying get to work on this problem are more numerous they're louder willie anguished calls for help make it through the thick and thus far shut doors of congress americans are caught in a tight spot s asking how can i put food on the table when i can't afford the gas it takes me to get to work on top of that the food is more expensive because of the fuel it takes to produce and ship it no one in this chamber has all the answers no but we can do something we can act we can help the question for me and my colleagues in the senate here is will we we have the opportunity to do so today we have the opportunity to vote for an amendment that provides some short term relief at the same time it helps address the long term issues that got us in this situation i'm a co sponsor of the mcconnell domenici amendment also known as the american energy production act of two thousand and eight because it's a responsible way to address the need to produce more domestic energy and to reduce energy prices the energy situation we're in has been a long time in the may king and we're not going to fix it overnight we don't have enough domestic energy to meet our nation's energy demand but the american energy production act would help change that it opens an important sliver of the arctic national wildlife refuge anwar to environmentally conscious leasing and allows for more production from the outer continental shelf with consent of the states doing so will help the united states produce more of its own energy instead of sitting at the trough of foreign oil barons with our hands out begging americans will produce more american energy later today xpect see support for the dorgan amendment to suspend the filling of the strategic petroleum reserve if you're worried about roughly seventy thousand barrels a day staying off the market for this reserve fill then you should be outraged that one million barrels a day from the anwar is kept off the market because it was vetoed by president clinton more than ten years ago that's a million barrels that we would not need to purchase from south american dictators or a million barrels from countries who are friendly to those who wish to destroy the united states what will americans say about this vote ten years from now will they say better late than never because we passed the american energy production actually say you had just didn't get it and now look at us suffer for it the american energy production act recognizes also that coal is our nation's most abundant energy source it recognizes american ingenuity it recognizes that coal has been turned into diesel fuel for half a century and it encourages the building of coal to diesel facilities in the united states the united states is the saudi arabia of coal and my home state of wyoming is the leading coal producer in the united states it makes sense that we use america's most abundant energy source at a time we all agree that we are too dependent on foreign energy sources the amendment also includes a number important provisions will help wyoming and the nation the amendment repealed the minerals the theft that's been included in the fiscal year two thousand and eight of us appropriations bill it allows the development of oil shale to move forward i support the idea of developing more alternative energy i support the use of wind energy and the development of better solar energy technologies as my constituents can tell you why only as an especially good state for wind and we have high solar potential as well we need to develop these technologies for the long term we need all the energy we can get today we need more domestically produced oil we need more wind energy we need more domestic natural gas we need more solar energy we need more nuclear and we definitely will need more clean coal energy our nation's energy policy is haphazard it's broken and it threatens to break our country we need to make meaningful changes to that policy and voting in favor of the american energy production act is the first step in the right direction i hope my colleagues will recognize the need to take this step and support the this president center for next which president let me take up to five minutes at this point to chairman will advise me when my five minutes has been used up we do have two votes coming up related to energy the first is on the mcconnell amendment which is a compilation of various provisions that do relate to energy but i would argue do not hold out much promise for affecting the price of oil or the price of gas following that we have the vote on the proposal that is and put forward by the majority leader sen need with regard to suspending the filling of the strategic petroleum reserve for the balance of this year i will be voting against the first amendment and voting for the second  and i hope my colleagues will will do so as well let me give the reasons why i think we should vote against the republican leader's amendment first the republican leader's amendment does not do anything to deal with the issue of speculation in oil markets we've had testimony repeatedly before our senate energy committee that speculation in these markets is a significant factor contributing to the hundred twenty six dollars per barrel price of oil that we're seeing today so if someone is concerned as all of us are about energy consumers and the burden that's being placed upon those consumers th dampening speculation in these markets should be high on our list of things to try to do it's not in the republican leader's amendment course the amendment that he proposes also does not do anything with regard to the to the weakening of the u s dollar anything with our fiscal policies and yesterday i went into a discussion about how that is contributing to the increase in the price of oil and i think most economists would agree with that the second reason that i would oppose the republican leaders amendment is that it i believe misses the boat on how to promote more supply i mean the argument being used is the assumption within the amendment is the way to promote more supply is we need to open up more areas for drilling and particularly we need to open up the east coast of the united states for drilling off the coast off shore in the out of town no shelf and we need to open up the west coast offshore and the outer continental shelf and we need to open up a portion of anwar the arctic national wildlife refuge frankly i  think the as i say i think it misses the the key issue here in that we are opening additional areas for drilling at a pretty rapid rate in the in the in the onshore areas of the united states where only gas production occurs and in the offshore areas but additional leases by themselves are not going to make a difference to consumers either in the near term or in the medium term what we need to be focused on is how we can promote more diligent development nearly three quarters of what we have leased the mess to clean on shore is not now being produced nearly three quarters a little over three quarters of what we have leased offshore is not being produced and that's what we should be concentrating on is how do we build incentives in for actual production on that area that we have in fact lease finally worth respect a future lease sales or republicans lee leaders amendment leaves out the most promising area and that is the area in the gulf coast particularly the area that we have still not opened up in the original lease sale one eighty one area of the gulf coast this is something that we clearly should should be addressing here as well as i say the second vote is going to be on the proposal to suspend the selling of the  reserve that is in the republican leaders amendment as well as a version of that is in the republican leader's amendment as well as as being proposed by senator reid i hope will get a very strong bipartisan vote for provision and i do think that the prudent thing is to turn down this this compilation of various energy related provisions that have been put forward by the republican leader with of the mcconnell domenici and then because it does do a number of things that we need to do to address this real crisis in our country crippling energy prices rising energy prices that hit the pocketbook of every louisiana family i represent every american family that cause grave concern about our economic future is present i'm afraid what we heard from the distinguished senator from new mexico just now is sort of more of the same excuses with heard for a couple of years now why we can't do this and can't do that and can't act in general but what does that inaction that paralysis those excuses what does it all lead to i'll tell you what it's led to it's led to soaring energy prices back in january two thousand and seven when this democratic congress took office average price of a gallon of gas was to thirty three at the pump today it's three sixty one at fifty five percent increase that's what those excuses that's what that inaction has led to mispresent we need to do a number of things and we need to do a number of things across the board on the demand side on the supply side this domenici mcconnell amendment includes a lot of those things those include every one of them no no single proposal is ever going to include every good idea out there that we probably need to act on that or includes a lot that we need to act on i want to focus on one part of the amendment in particular which i'm very supportive of and that is opening up more of our outer continental shelf to exploration and production was present i believe one of the most important things an energy policy that we have done since in the short time i've been in the senate is to open up new parts of the gulf of mexico with revenue sharing and this provision in the net domenici mcconnell amendment would expand on that proce it would say that we can open up areas of the atlantic and the pacific but with two very important caviar spose of which are great policy first of all mr president the host stay the state off which the activity would occur has to walk the activity has to agree to it the governor has to say yes we want this activity off of our waters and secondly mr president that host states in return would get significant revenue sharing exactly the same revenue sharing we passed a few years ago thirty seven and a half percent to go to the host state to meet its environmental or education or  highway or other needs that's sound policy we passed that for a new areas of the gulf that we're opening up we need to expand on that policy to dramatically increase our domestic energy production and we can do that safely environmentally friendly way there are many other things the mcconnell domenici amendment does that are needed as well but i wanted to highlight that because i think it's  absolutely crucial and important it builds on good policy we set a few years ago it expands on that process event and i believe expanding on that process and can significantly increase our domestic energy resources in this country that we need to do other things absolutely do we need to act on the demand side further absolutely you know this isn't brain surgery economics one  one tells you that price asked to do with two lines on a graph the demand line and the supply line we need to mitigate bring down demand and we need to increase supply for any reasonable policy that does those two things on the demand side conservation greater efficiency new sources and forms of energy absolutely and i'm going to agree with senator dorgan and vote for his amendment regarding the strategic petroleum reserve like senator domenici i've trained my mind on that because the increases in the price at the pump have gotten so dramatic and so outrageous that can mitigate demand increases as well but as we do all of those things on the demand side and we need to do more we can't constantly ignore the supply us a lot particularly the domestic time the republicans have t majority of sixty minutes eighteen seconds are seven minutes remaining of the minority texas stand that your side is only going to have one speaker use your time i'm trying to find a senator from texas he wanted to speak but let me take a couple minutes and if somebody will get in he will speak and i will give you a little russian as he arrives mr president mexico first of all i want to say that my good friend fellow senator from the mexico spoke about speculation in this oil market there may be some we've heard evidence testimony there may be but so everybody knows i don't there's nothing before the senate that the democrats propose regarding speculation so we they just have a one shot deal here and it's it's pretty good but it isn't a manager policy we're going to probably most of us vote for that's what senator dorgan proposed and i as i indicated i changed my mind if people are wondering about that i'm i was reading a body economic history and i read where john  the great the cannot economists dumb saslow why did you change your mind and he said when the facts change i change my mind that's what happened here with reference to spreading the facts changed and i changed my mind  senator from new mexico my colleague also said that we have a big problem with the weakening of the dollar i hope he doesn't intend to imply by god that when when we find that we can strengthen the dollar then we can and we can  d will solve the energy problem i don't know that we know how to do that one any any quicker than we do the energy crisis so i don't think that would accomplish anything we have we have a lot going on in the would send such a big signal to the world if we decided to move with that and that alone would have an impact positive one in addition the bill that we have before a before the united states senate and does a lot of things in a number of areas that have not been talked very much about it would cause the world to take another look and they say america is serious they're really going to do something about their mr mr president i'm required by our leadership to jab jack because they want to get the vote off by the time pre determined i apologize for that but that is what i'm required to do this president directions are four minutes this president i think one thing has been accomplished by up the debate leading up to this morning's vote and that is congress finally finally has acknowledged the existence of the law of supply and demand if you look at these two two votes that we're going to have this morning first is the mcconnell mcconnell's domenici bill i'm proud to be a co sponsor of that bill which would produce if implemented potentially up to three million additional variables of oil a day from the united states of america three million making us less dependent on imported oil from some of our nations  these countries like iran and venezuela who are part of opec the organization of petroleum exporting countries alternatively our friends on the other side of the aisle have proposed and i'll vote for a temporary suspension of putting oil into the strategic petroleum reserve but how much does that represent it represent seventy thousand barrels of oil that would be taken out of the strategic petroleum reserve or release would not be put there and would be available on the open market so additional supply of oil which is then available to be refined into gasoline and i suspect that will have some modest impact on the price of gasoline at the pump maybe three to five cents a gallon but if you think seventy thousand barrels of additional oil into the open market would be beneficial in terms of bringing down the price of gasoline how much more beneficial would it be to have three million additional barrels of oil produced from our country out in the open market available for refining into gasoline to help bring down the price of gas at the pump so i'm pleased that our colleagues have recognized of the importance of the law of supply and demand and that congress something congress has been turned a blind eye to for lo these many years as we have put so much of america's natural resources out of bounds when it comes to developing those resources and of course we know what the consequences of that has been with three dollars and seventy one cent average price for gasoline in america today the price of oil on the spot market up bouncing up around one hundred twenty five dollars a barrel now i don't know whether this amendment that i'm a proud to be a co sponsor of that could produce ultimately three million new barrels of american oil each day i don't know whether it will get the requisite sixty votes or not mr president if it does not when gasoline is three dollars and seventy one cents a gallon and oil is one hundred twenty five dollars a barrel i wonder if the same boat if we have it again when gasoline is four dollars a gallon and oil is one hundred fifty dollars a barrel or when gasoline is four dollars and fifty cents a gallon and the price of oil is even higher at what point the united states congress the united states it is going to listen to the american people and say we need some help we need some relief now that congress has acknowledged the importance of additional supply in terms of bringing down the price at the pump ultimately it's my hope that our colleagues will vote at least sixty of us for the domenici mcconnell amendment i think the american how much time remains senator merkley to six minutes mr president let me let me conclude with a couple of thoughts first about my colleague from new mexico described the  issue of speculation just a bit we do in fact in our larger proposal that we announced last week have a provision dealing with that speculation and it's important that we do that because speculation is a part of what is driving these price i just showed the comments by executives from some of the largest oil companies in this country that said there is no justification for the current price given supply and demand they said the price of oil shouldn't be much above fifty sixty seventy dollars a barrel so what is happening well let me come to that in a moment let me say first of all my hope is that today here on the floor of the senate we will decide to do some good things now how do you do good things you try to find areas of common interest and legislate moving ahead where you can that's what senator reid has suggested the underlying amendment that we will vote on here dealing with stopping and halting the putting of oil underground in the strategic reserve is something that i introduced in the senate back in february now as i said before when when the american consumer is being burned at the stake by high gas prices it's government ought not be caring that would make just that simple we can do something about this now seventy thousand barrels a day seventy thousand barrels a day every single day of sweet light crude the most valuable subset of oil mr burglar who testified before our committee  was was a an economist and energy analyst and he said that although it it is only three tenths of a percent of usage he said because it is sweet light crude a different subset of oil the most valuable it could have up to as much as ten percent effect on the price of oil so it seems to me that what we do here is do what republicans and democrats have now generally come together to say we should do say to the president look you can't be putting seventy thousand barrels of oil under underground every day you can't do that the strategic petroleum reserve is ninety seven percent filled ninety seven percent now oil's one hundred twenty hundred twenty six dollars a barrel gas is going to four dollars a gallon let me describe the circumstance we all understand what we face in this planet of ours we stick straws in the planet and suck oil out we suck out eighty four eighty five million barrels a day every day we are required to use one fourth of that in this little spot of geography on the planet called the united states of america we say that again we take eighty five million barrels a day and we need one fourth of it to be used in the united states now sixty percent of that which we use comes from outside of our country that holds us hostage to others and seventy percent of the oil that we use in this country is used through vehicles so vehicles are an important part of this i'm proud to say this congress with this majority and so minority help we passed for the first time in twenty seven years an increase of ten mpg in the next ten years of cafe standards automobile efficiency better gas mileage we've made some progress we made some progress in other areas we've made progress in opening up production and least one hundred one in the gulf of mexico where there are substantial reserves we've made progress in the biofuels ethanol standards renewable fuel standards we've made some progress in all of those issues but that we've got people coming to the fore today to say well gas is four dollars a gallon let's let's open anwar so that means we get all in ten years i mean zero in the long run we're all dead as mayor john mccain said in the short run what can we do what in the short run at least today on tuesday we can at least do what we both believe that is minority and majority believe is appropriate and that is stop putting oil underground and put some downward pressure on gas prices and oil prices give the consumer an opportunity here to see some some decent prices this is these this speculation in the futures market is speculation is driving up prices we want to do something about that as well but at least today we have one comm and that is we can increase supply by seventy thousand barrels a day of sweet light crude instead of going into the supply that comes to the pump into the cars and there but there by puts downward pressure on gasoline it is now going underground underground the strategic reserve makes no sense at all so i'm just saying let's stop doing bad things or start doing good things we can start by taking the first step to do that today and this present how much time remains minute twenty seconds that let me make one one additional point if i might because it doesn't relate directly to this amendment but this issue of the markets the free market there's no free market here you have an opec cartel behind closed doors you've got oil companies that are bigger through mergers and you've got a futures market that is now rife with speculation there's no free market here and so the american people deserve it seems to me the a congress that will stand up and take some obvious steps to put some downward pressure on gasoline prices this step that we can take today is a step that is not a giant step but it is a step in the right direction that will put downward pressure on gas prices it will help this country and my hope is that the following this vote will see what both parties can contribute to something we agree on something and i think this will be a good day to put downward pressure on gas prices mr president on behalf of the majority leader i call up a member number four seven three seven present just want to say whoever's interested in what's going on here today should know that to the democrats speak of doing other things to bring to bring the price down but the only thing that we're really doing is they amendment of the senator from north dakota on sproat we all agree that that's a temporary seven month deferral of purchases clearly that is going to if it does anything it will be extremely temporary all the other things that are spoken about are not in none of them are in this bill whether it has to do with fraud speculation or whatever on our side we have that the said let's start coal to liquid a great american resource that start off shore around america let's start on anwar let's start moving on oil shale and let's accelerate battery research which will move us towards automobiles that can plug in which will be a big american boom so there's a lot of pluses there's a lot of the rhetoric and there's one reason times that i democrats offer that we agree upon i believe those people are interested in production should vote for the dementia amendment and tell the american people the truth we can produce compilation of various proposals the main thrust of it is to try to lease more federal land and particularly people should understand that we have been leasing a great deal of federal land on shore that's this pie chart on the left offshore  and the outer continental shelf that's the pie chart on the right we currently have thirty one million acres of land that is least and is not producing what we need to do is to get diligent development of of these areas that are already lease offshore the same thing in the outer continental shelf thirty three million acres they are not producing so this amendment this compilation of energy related provisions that are put into the mcco senators voting in the affirmative alexander bennett krag demand insulin hutchison kyle lugar and sessions senators voting in the negative by being a man conrad bitter bitter i mr bird mr bird kno smith mr smith no this is boxer mrs boxer no i mr live lieberman mr lieberman no mr nelson of nebraska no mr biden mr biden no mr martinez mr martinez no no every senator voted does any center wish to change his or her vote on this vote the yeas are forty two and the naser fifty six under the previous order requiring sixty votes for the adoption of this amendment the amendment is withdrawn are now two minutes equally divided prior to the next vote on the the strategic petroleum reserve is ninety seven percent filled with oil and gas prices going through the rough in this country we are putting seventy thousand barrels of oil underground every day it is a subset of the most valuable kind of oil sweet light crude coming off the gulf of mexico we've had testimony before the energy committee that even though it's a small part of our oil usage this subset of oil the seventy thousand barrels a day put underground could have an impact of up to ten percent of the price of oil i'm not suggesting that this does everything it's a step in the right direction as i said earlier when the american consumers being burned at the stake by energy prices the government ought not be carrying the wood sticking all underground is wrong at this point in time and this amendment simply says stop it halt its present centers senator to mexico mr president i want the republicans to that i have changed my mind over the past three or four weeks and it's simply because the price of oil is now up one hundred twenty five dollars a barrel perhaps real dollars one hundred  ten and i think for seven months to stop killing sprawl would you could have a chance of reducing the price a small amount i make no bones about it now this is no big energy policy this is one little thing we can do and i think we ought to go ahead and do it i know that there are some who will take the fact that we need a big reserve seriously and they think we ought to continue to philip even more than we are and i respect those views but it is with reference to this amendment by senator dorgan i think that we ought to support it and at least do one positive thing it was in our bail incidentally as a  number of positive things we would do including a alaska which is complaint so much it would produce a million barrels permanently more or less this kind of and a thousand barrels one time just so we understand i yield the floor mr bond mrs boxer mr brown mr brownback mr bunting mr  mr carden mr carper mr casey mr chambliss mrs clinton mr called burn mr cochran mr coleman ms collins mr hatch mr levin mr lieberman mrs lincoln mr lug mr pryor mr salazar mr sanders mr schumer mr sessions mr white house mr wicker mr wyden mr smith mr smith has every member voted does any member wish to change his or her vote on this vote the a's are ninety seven the nays are one of the previous order crying sixty votes for the adoption of the suburban the members agreed to as a result of that vote to the senate now when we just concluded i know ask consent that the senate proceed to a bill at the desk which encompasses the text of this  we could have this out here today house could take care of it either tonight or tomorrow will be on the president's desk on wednesday i've been told by my distinguished friend sent to manage he that there's going to be injection on the other side i think it's really unfortunate that's one reason a peep all our little concern about our conduct here we just passed something by almost one hundred votes and someone now is objecting to taking this up as a bill i think that doesn't make a lot of sense and i'm terribly disappointed that we have more of the stalling and obstructionism that has gone on this entire congress this spring deserves action and i did object present i now ask consent that the previous order with respect s two two eight four be further modified to provide that following third reading of us to to wait for the banking committee be discharged from furthe objection reserving the right to object i shall not object of course but i observe that i understood the objection to the previous damask said requests my hope would be that in the coming hours to day we might have some discussions between the leadership of the minority mr obama mr warner mr this is boxer mr lieberman thi the a's being ninety two and the nays are being six the bill as amended is a passed initiated the public safety employer employee cooperation act signed by seventeen senators by unanimous consent the mandatory quorum call is waive the question is is it the sense of the senate that debate on the motion to proceed to h r nine eighty public safety conversations take out in the hall please to the chamber come to order the senator from massachusetts mr president this is the legislation to provide a voice for our public safety offices we spend a great deal of time here in the united states says senate on homeland security but to the key to an effective homeland security are having affective firefighters police officials and first responders they are the individuals that are really protecting our homeland and they are the ones that should have a voice in decisions affecting the security of our country this legislation provides them with that kind of a voice it will ensure greater safety and security for all americans i hope that the senate will support th mr president the senate from wyoming with the chamber come to order please mr president when the chamber come to order please take your conversations out into the hallway senator from wyoming mr president once again we have one of those bills never been to committee i guess we're afraid to take labor issues to the labor committee we ought to be able to review these things look at a few amendments and work on him as we do on other kinds of build that's not happening on the labor issues instead i think we're going to play gotcha politics and so we have a bill here and that will take longer than a minute it'll take longer than an hour it'll take longer than a day to cover some of the flaws that are in this bill some of the things that are shown up in a substitute bill that never got introduced on this one so that we can see how it doesn't work this will affect all fifty states this is an opportunity for you to impose the will of the federal government on your state i don't think you really want to do that but we need to have a little bit more than a minute to discuss that so i think that leadership is asking for people to vote for this amendment we've already agreed that we go to it right after lunch so this isn't a matter of stalling out in the senate it's a matter of trying to get the right decision made and so i ask that you take a little better look at these things that ought to go to the labor committee first so that reasonable suggestions can i made i yield the floor  mr cochran mr cochran no