American Energy Solutions for Lower Gas Prices

AMERICAN ENERGY SOLUTIONS FOR LOWER GAS PRICES -- (House of Representatives - July 22, 2008)

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Ms. FOXX. Thank you, Congressman Westmoreland, it's a treat to be here with these Georgians tonight, I guess we will call it southern night. We certainly do understand each other when we are speaking.

I was pleased to hear Congressman Gingrey saying, quoting his constituents, saying, why won't you all do something about this? Well, I hear that kind of question all the time too. It takes a real practiced tongue to say it the right way too.

But I think it's important, as you are pointing out, that we distinguish who is in charge here. We see a lot of polls being done, and we know that many Americans don't realize that the Democrats are completely in charge of the Congress. Now they want to put the blame for this problem on the President and Vice President, but we know the President and Vice President can't pass laws. It's only the Congress that can do this, and the Democrats are in charge of the Congress.

I was over here several nights last week making that point. I think it is very, very much up to us to point out to the American people that it's the Democrats who are in charge.

They are the ones who can help solve this situation, but they seem totally out of touch. They don't understand, I think, what is going on at the polls. When you have people in Congress who have been in Congress for over 50 years, and some of their chairmen have been here over 50 years, many of them have been here 40 years, many of them 30 years, I think they are totally out of touch with the American people.

They are not used to buying their own gas, they don't go home on weekends, they don't hear from their constituents in the same way that we do. We know that they are the ones in charge, and they can do something about this. They, again, want to deflect the problem, but we have the statistics on our side, and I think we have to keep reminding the people about that.

When people ask me why, why won't the Congress do something, you know, I don't really have a good answer for them. I am wondering if it's because they are so out of touch, and they don't know how the American people are suffering as a result of the high gas prices. I am not usually a person who thinks in nefarious ways, but I wonder if sometimes they don't want the people to be as miserable as possible, because they think they can blame the President, and they can blame the vice president for what's happening.

That's the only answer I can come up with. I can't really understand why the Democrats, who claim to represent average people, want the average people to suffer the way that they do.

I didn't get a chance to hear all of the comments that my colleague from California, Mr. McCarthy said, when he was on the floor earlier, but I do want to put in a plug for our drilling in Alaska, for our drilling wherever we need to.

The Democrats keep saying we can't drill our way out of this. We can't drill our way out of this.

But I do believe, like my Republican colleagues, that it's important that we take advantage of the great gifts that the good Lord has given us in this country to use on our behalf. We have the mechanisms to be energy independent with American-made energy.

I want to point out, again, that even the newspapers are calling on the Congress, but not all of them are pointing out that it's the Democrats, some do. The Las Vegas Review Journal says, ``The ball is with Congress, will Democrats continue to block the development of energy resources?''

That is such an important question to ask, and it's important again that every newspaper in this country point out that it is the Democrats that are blocking the development of resources. The Lafayette Daily Advertiser in Louisiana, ``Congress should back drilling.'' Now, the Republicans do back drilling. The Democrats do not.

The Daily Inter Lake in Montana. ``Drilling, will Congress ever act?'' We need to point out again that they should be saying, Will the democratically-controlled Congress ever act?

Newspaper after newspaper is coming out and saying that we, Congress, need to act on this. It is not the Republicans who are in charge. The President and the Vice President can't do anything about this. As my colleague from Georgia said earlier, drilling and creating our own energy will create millions of jobs in this country.

Again, the Democrats claim to be the party that wants to create jobs, that wants to help average Americans, but they are standing in the way of doing all of that.

You know, I have jokingly said here that they think they are so powerful that they can repeal the law of supply and demand. Now, that's what they think. They think that just through conservation efforts and just by talking, you know, it's sort of like the Wizard of Oz. There is nothing really behind that screen. They promised us a commonsense plan to bring down the price of gasoline.

The chart that my colleague showed a little while ago, the price of gasoline has almost doubled since the Democrats were in office. I don't know what the American people would have gotten had they made some other kinds of promises, but promising to bring down the price and then doubling the price--you know, I go back to the quote that was used by Mr. Kanjorski: ``We sort of stretched the truth and people ate it up.'' Well, that is what they are doing now, too, about the leases. They are saying, oh, we don't need to drill. The oil companies have all these leases that they are not using. But I think it is important that we debunk that. We had the Truth Squad last year. We have got to bring the Truth Squad out again.

The oil companies do have some land that has been leased, but the oil companies report to their shareholders they are not going to waste good money drilling where there is no oil or no potential for getting oil. Even the Democrats voted against this ridiculous ``Use It Or Lose It'' bill that they brought up for the second time last week.

Again, I think we have to remind the American people, we could produce enough energy in this country to become totally energy independent. We need to start now, but we need to remind them, the Democrats are in charge. Call your Democratic Member of Congress if you are represented by a Democrat, and tell them, you want them to drill now. You want them to do all the alternatives.

We Republicans support conservation. We support all of the above. But we can do it. We have always done it. And I now yield back my time to my colleague from Georgia.

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