Date: 2006-05-23
Speaker: WASSERMAN SCHULTZ (democrat)
Chamber: H

I thank the gentleman for yielding. I have been listening to both of you banter back and forth about gas prices. and what I hear in both of your voices is your desire to get to the core of what we obviously are all baffled about which is why. I mean. why over the last 15 to 20 years has there not been an effort. and let us say in the last dozen years. has there not been an effbrt to make a real commitment to fix this. to head this off at the pass. to make sure that our constituents are not consistently having to pay. for the foreseeable future. if not forever. more than $3 a gallon for gas? I guess because I am the newest among. the three of us I have reached the conclusion that obviously the Republicans do not have the joints that they need on the side of their neck because their heads do not appear to go this way. They only go this way. like this bobblehead elephant. Apparently. they only know how to say yes. Mr. Speaker. yes. Mr. President. yes. CEO of oil companies. I am happy to do your bidding in whatever it is that you like. Their necks. unlike ours. dont appear to go horizontal. or side to side. Because if they did. then their voting record would reflect ours and the values of the American people a lot more closely. and they would not have voted in favor of the energy bill they put forward last summer. when they held the vote open for 40 straight minutes to ensure they could twist enough arms to get the bill to pass and give away the subsidies and the oil leasing rights that we own as a United States Government. And instead of collecting the royalties from the oil companies. we gave them away and allowed them to drill essentially for free. or to drastically reduce the rate. That action and the lack of a commitment to funding alternative energy research and the cozy relationship that the Bush administration has with the Saudis and with the OPEC leaders. that is what has caused us to be in the mess that we are in. And you dont see any commitment on the part of the Repub_lican leadership here to make any significant change. The only place you see an effort to make a significant change and take this country in anew direction on oil prices and gas prices is through the Democratic agenda. the innovation agenda. where we pledged. when we rolled out our innovation agenda under Leader PELOSIS leadership. to become energy independent within 10 years. And that is possible through the use of ethanol. I just saw the gentleman who made that presentation to our caucus on CNN the other night for a solid hour. and he literally outlined how it was possible for us to begin to make a commitment in agriculture through corn. which we are already doing in the Midwest. in your area. Mr. RYAN. but also it could be done in my area with sugar cane. in Louisiana and in the mid northwest withsugar beets. I mean. it is possible for us to really make an effort to invest in ethanol. Brazil did it. Brazil is now completely independent of foreign oil. They manufacture vehicles that run on ethanol. They have hybrid and ethanolonly automobiles. That is something that is entirely possible in this country within 10 years. Unfortunately. the heads of the Members on this side of the aisle only go one way.