Gas Prices
Floor Speech
GAS PRICES -- (Senate - July 24, 2008)
BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT
ENERGY
Mrs. MURRAY. Mr. President, I come to the floor this morning to talk about the fact that the Senate is going to have an opportunity to vote on cloture to move us to an important bill that will address the issue most of my constituents in the State of Washington, as well as all those in the country, are facing, and that is the high price of gasoline today--$4.45 is what I paid last weekend when I went home to Washington State. This is having an impact on our families, on our communities, and on all of our businesses--on everyone.
It is important that we address this issue. The bill that is being offered, which we hope to get past cloture and filibuster from the other side, is not a silver bullet, but it is an attempt to get at what we believe is a fundamental part of the solution, and that is the manipulation of the oil marketers by a few greedy traders, thereby increasing the cost you and I pay at the pump. We are not asking for a large energy bill, but we are saying it is important that we address this issue in a way that will produce relief as quickly as possible in some way for our consumers as we head out a week from now for our August break.
I have been listening to this debate, and I have to say I am fairly surprised by all of those who come to the floor and say: Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. Unless we get to offer amendment after amendment after amendment on drilling more, and drilling more, and drilling more, then we are not going to allow the Senate to deal with the issue of speculation, which Members on both sides agree is critical that we address. I think it is important that we step back for a minute and go back in history and talk about energy and this Senate's history over the last 8 years and this White House's history over the last 8 years.
Democrats understand there are short-term solutions for the crisis facing us, but we also need long-term solutions because we believe, at the end of the day, that we have to decrease our dependence on oil. We have to decrease our dependence on oil, otherwise this Senate body, 10 years from now, will again be debating whether to open up more drilling. Meanwhile, we are all supposed to ride our bikes until we have more oil out there again, and then the next generation gets to debate oil again. We want to break this cycle. We want to get to long-term energy independence. We want to create new alternatives for people. We want that new technology to be invested in so that consumers 10 years from now, and the next generation of Senators who are here and consumers out across the country, don't have to listen to this debate again. We can get there, but it is not easy.
Eight years ago, this country elected two oilmen to the White House. No surprise: Every energy debate since then has focused on how we can drill more for oil. Here we are today, a week before we leave for the August recess, and those on the other side want to take us right back to drilling again. Let me remind our colleagues what Senators on this side of the aisle have been doing for some time. When we got the majority a year and a half ago, we said: Okay, with the majority, we want to begin making inroads on focusing on energy independence which, by the way, will reduce the cost to everybody as the consumption decreases. We looked at CAFE standards. We were successful, not in doing it quickly, but at least beginning to make progress on setting CAFE standards so our cars will be using less fuel. That is part of reducing the price of gas in the long term and our dependence on oil.
We also looked at an energy tax package. In fact, we brought an energy tax package to the floor of the Senate that would create incentives for alternative energy. It costs a lot to develop new technology for energy. We said it is time for the Government to put its backing there and provide tax credits for these companies so they can do the research that is necessary to get that alternative technology out there. What did the other side do? Filibustered. Blocked it. And today, those investors are not out there investing in new technology. Democrats said we need to move this bill. It is part of our plan in the long run to reduce the price of oil to create those alternatives. We were blocked on the other side from doing that.
A few months ago, Democrats said: It is important to look at how we can stop this increasing, spiraling cost as soon as possible. We put together an energy package, and one of the key components was focusing on the oil companies, who were reporting record profits at the time--and by the way, still are today--and we tried to repeal some of the oil companies' tax breaks they currently get so that those costs would go back to consumers and reduce our prices. What happened? We brought the bill up, and it was blocked by the other side. Why? Because they wanted to focus on drilling more oil.
We have tried many ways on this side to focus on the larger picture of energy and how we can reduce consumption, how we can get to energy independence, how we can focus on making sure those high gas prices that my constituents and others pay today--and by the way, when this administration took office 8 years ago, gas was $1.46 a gallon, but because of the energy bills that have been pushed by the other side that focus on drilling, it is now $4.45 a gallon in my home State. Yet here we are today, as we try to focus on speculation in the markets, and what does the other side say? Oh no, we need to drill for more for oil. Well, that hasn't worked in the past. We have already, several years ago, added an additional--and I see my colleague from Illinois here on the floor--I believe it was an additional 8 million acres to be leased in this country. We added that. Did it reduce the price of gas at the pump?
Mr. DURBIN. Will the Senator, through the Chair, yield for a question?
Mrs. MURRAY. I would be happy to yield to the Senator from Illinois.
Mr. DURBIN. Is it not only true that we have 68 million acres of land we have leased to the oil companies, which they are paying us money to lease in order to find oil and gas, but they are not doing anything with it--some 34 million offshore, on the Outer Continental Shelf and some 33 million onshore that they are now leasing?
The Republican side of the aisle has become a one-trick pony--keep drilling, keep drilling, keep drilling. We know if we decided today to drill on any acreage here, it would be 8 to 14 years before we would see any oil coming from it. So this notion not only flies in the face of the 68 million acres they currently have, but it doesn't solve the problem.
As the Senator from Washington said, it makes the problem worse because we don't face the realities of what we need to do to have a national energy policy.
Mrs. MURRAY. The Senator from Illinois is absolutely correct. Every time we have come out here to try to broaden the energy debate and to bring down the price of gasoline and get to energy independence, we have heard from the other side: Oh, no, there is only one answer, and that is drill more.
We have given them that. In fact, yes, the oil companies have 68 million acres of land today that can be drilled, but they are choosing not to. Why? Because if they increase the supply, the price is going to drop. So what good does it do for us to give them even more of our Federal lands, because their benefit is keeping the price high.
Mr. DURBIN. If the Senator from Washington will yield for another observation, she noted that when we elected President Bush and Vice President Cheney we brought two people in from the oil industry, and coincidentally, during this two-term administration, profits of the oil companies in America have reached historic high levels at the expense of our economy and families. The Republicans, the President's party, want to end this administration by giving them the biggest farewell gift anyone could ever wish for in the oil industry--millions and millions more acres so that they can, at their pace and in their time, decide to drill on.
It would seem to me, if you are honest about the oil companies and what they have done to this economy, this is the last thing we should be doing. We should be holding them accountable for the prices they charge, the profits they are reporting, and what they have done to the American economy. So I ask the Senator from Washington: The alternatives we have talked about over the years--fuel efficiency for cars, more efficiency in the appliances we use, the buildings we build, all of this is part of the big energy picture, is it not? It isn't just about keeping oil companies happy.
Mrs. MURRAY. Well, I say to the Senator from Illinois, he is absolutely correct. In fact, in the past few days, a headline from Reuters read: ``ConocoPhillips' Earnings Rise With Record Oil Prices.''
The oil companies are making a lot of money, so what is the other side's answer to every energy debate we have? Give them more money.
I say to my colleague from Illinois, I know he goes to the President's State of the Union Addresses every January, as I do, and we sit in the House Chamber and listen to what the President is presenting to us. I wonder if the Senator from Illinois remembers 2 1/2 years ago, the President's third State of the Union, I believe it was--and I rose with excitement when I heard the President say this to us:
Keeping America competitive requires affordable energy. And here we have a serious problem:
Now, this is the President of the United States in his State of the Union speech.
America is addicted to oil, which is often imported from unstable parts of the world. The best way to break an addiction is through technology.
These are not my words, but those of the President of the United States. Yet every time we have tried to bring a bill to the floor to break our addiction to oil, we are stopped because the other side wants to drill more oil.
So I say to my colleague from Illinois, does it feel to him as though we are trying to break our addiction to oil here?
Mr. DURBIN. I would respond to the Senator from Washington, through the Chair, and say that I think America understands this. Sure, we are going to be drilling oil in America--we need to, for exploration and for production--but we know we only have 3 percent of the world's supply of oil--3 percent--and we use 25 percent of the oil. So we can't drill our way out of this.
Whether it is T. Boone Pickens or some friend of mine in central Illinois, it is obvious: You have to look for other solutions, and those solutions mean the oil companies are not going to be the answer to every question. Unfortunately, the Republican side of the aisle, time and time and time again, all they have to suggest is drill more oil and make more money for the oil companies.
That isn't the answer to America's energy problem. If it were the answer, we would have seen, as the Senator said, gasoline prices coming down as we made more acreage available for drilling over the last several years. It has not happened. They have gone up dramatically.
Mrs. MURRAY. The Senator from Illinois is absolutely correct. I have listened to this debate, and it is not just the debate today on speculation, about whether we should do that. It is whether we should bring energy tax credits, whether we should repeal oil company tax breaks and whether we can invest in alternative energy.
Every time, the only answer we get from the other side is, no, we are not going to do that. We want to drill more.
I would say to my colleague that drilling for oil is a false promise to the
American people that it will bring down their prices substantially as we head off to our August break. Even their own Presidential candidate has said drilling oil only brings psychological benefit. We don't need any mental health care. We need real reductions at the pump. Even President Bush's own energy experts say drilling more oil will not produce a significant decrease in the price at the pump.
As I truly believe and I think most people understand in this country, until we invest in long-term energy independence, all we are going to do is see the oil companies get more profits and our prices go up. The bill we are offering today and hope to move to will begin to deal with that and that addresses the issue of speculation. I hope we move to that.
I yield the floor.
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