Providing for Consideration of H.R. 6899, Comprehensive American Energy Security and Consumer Protection Act
Floor Speech
PROVIDING FOR CONSIDERATION OF H.R. 6899, COMPREHENSIVE AMERICAN ENERGY SECURITY AND CONSUMER PROTECTION ACT -- (House of Representatives - September 16, 2008)
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Mr. MARKEY. I thank the gentlewoman.
Ladies and gentlemen, this is a very simple debate. The Republicans are very upset that the Democrats are going to take the oil companies and make them pay taxes to the American people when they drill on the land owned by the American people, and the Democrats then want to move the money over to wind and solar and plug-in hybrids for tax breaks. So the Democrats are saying that America needs an oil change. So, as Mr. Green just said, we open up vast new areas where the oil industry can drill, drill, drill; drill, baby, drill.
But what we put into the bill is something else as well. We put in change, baby, change. Because we only have 3 percent of the oil in the world, we have 4 percent of the population, and we consume 25 percent of the oil in the world on a daily basis. That is not a long-term recipe.
So we need an oil change. And what we need to do and what we are going to do is allow them to drill in thousands and thousands of additional acres, to go for the oil, to go drill, baby, drill, but then say we need back some of those tax breaks that you don't need at $100 a barrel, $140 a barrel, $4 a gallon at the pump. We don't need to subsidize you anymore.
The taxpayer doesn't need to be tipped upside down and have money shaken out of their pockets as taxpayers to hand over to the oil companies, because they have already been tipped upside down and had money taken out of their pockets as consumers by the oil companies.
So we just take back those tax breaks, put a little bit of a tax on where they don't pay any taxes at all, and where do we shift it over to? Ladies and gentlemen, we shift it over to wind and solar and green buildings and plug-in hybrids. We shift it over to the future. We unleash a technological revolution that will break our dependence upon imported oil.
It is change, baby, change. It is innovate, baby, innovate. These guys are a one-note organization. They have been since two oilmen went to the White House 8 years ago.
Drill, baby, drill is not a long-term strategy.
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