The Gasoline Price Reduction Act of 2004
THE GASOLINE PRICE REDUCTION ACT OF 2004 -- (House of Representatives - June 15, 2004)
Mr. BARTON of Texas. Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and pass the bill (H.R. 4545) to amend the Clean Air Act to reduce the proliferation of boutique fuels, and for other purposes.
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Mr. MARKEY. Madam Speaker, if we had a rule prohibiting false or misleading short titles on legislation, I would offer a point of order that the Gasoline Price Reduction Act being brought before the body today is a blatant violation of honesty and presentation of legislation because the bill does absolutely nothing to deal with the real causes of the increase in the price of gasoline at the pump.
With this bill the Republicans have identified a problem. Gas prices are too high. The consumers are paying an arm for regular. They are paying a leg for plus, and for their first born they get premium.
We need to do something, says the Republicans. The Democrats agree, but the Republicans have offered up a false solution. They say, let us waive the Clean Air Act. We have 24 million Americans with asthma. We have 8 million children in America with asthma. Is the solution to high gasoline prices waiving the Clean Air Act?
We have a dramatic rise in breast cancer, in prostate cancer in America, much of it environmentally related, what we breathe in the air, but what is the Republican solution to that? They say, well, let us regulate softly and carry a big inhaler. That is the message to the children of our country.
So what is the problem? Well, the Saudi Arabians, of course, took about 1 million barrels of oil off the market a year ago, and we heard just a little whisper from this White House that the Saudi Arabians were playing games with the oil prices in our country. The GAO actually did a study a year ago that indicated that all the oil company mergers in the 1990s led to a dramatic increase in gasoline prices.
Are they investigating all these oil company mergers in America? Are they investigating what the Saudi Arabians are doing? Have we seen those hearings? No. Their answer is that it is the clean air that children are breathing in the United States that is the problem.
We hear the complaints from the Republican Party, the air is too clean, the water in America is getting too clean; that is the problem, not what is going on in OPEC, not what is going on with the oil companies. What is their solution? Their solution is whenever there is a significant fuel supply disruption that the Environmental Protection Agency and the Bush administration, every polluter's ally EPA, is able to waive the Clean Air Act requirements to protect the children's air in America. That is what this bill is, the Gasoline Price Reduction Act. The Increase in Pollution Children Breathe Act is what it really is.
Now, we say to the Republicans, we say to the White House, will you please deploy the Strategic Petroleum Reserve of 600 million gallons that the American people have purchased as a weapon against price gouging by the oil companies and by OPEC? They say, oh, no, that would be a disruption in the free market if we actually use the oil in the Strategic Petroleum Reserve to drive down prices.
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Their answer is to increase pollution in the air that the children breathe, that the seniors breathe in our country. That is what this bill is all about.
And how long will the EPA have to keep this reduction in clean air protections on the books? Forever, indefinite. So we could have the worst possible supply disruption, and this administration says it will never deploy the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, but will immediately take the Clean Air Act off the books.
So the language is actually whenever the EPA, in consultation with the Secretary of Energy, deems necessary by reason of such fuel supply disruption. So GOP, it used to stand for Grand Old Party, now it stands for Gas and Oil Party, now it stands for Gang of Polluters. Their solution to high gasoline prices is to pollute, not to go to OPEC, not to go to the oil companies. It is to pollute.
This bill is absolutely atrocious. I beg Members, please do not be misled. This bill is nothing more than something that will result in more and more children in our country needing inhalers. Members should not vote for it. There is a direct correlation between the amount of pollution that goes in the air and the amount of disease we see in our country. We do not have to find this false solution to deal with the problem when it is so obvious what is going wrong in the oil markets, our OPEC allies.
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