Floor Statements

Mr. Speaker, it's good to be here tonight, and I wanted to come and talk about something that's concerning Americans all over this country, and that's the price of gas and what we're doing about it here in this body, this decisive body that's supposed to be decisive, that takes action when we find our country in need.

I wanted to talk a little bit about something that happened to me shortly a couple of weeks ago I guess, and I started having people, Mr. Speaker, e-mail me and ask me questions about signing different types of petitions on the Internet, drill here, drill now, lower prices, several other ones on the Internet, so Americans could let their Members of Congress, Mr. Speaker, know how they felt about these skyrocketing gas prices that they had been promised by the new majority that they would get control of.

So I was in a service station down home, and there was another petition laying on the counter. I'm assuming that the proprietor of that service station put that down to give people something to do rather than beat him over the head, but it was a petition: Please sign here if you want to see Congress lower gas prices.

So I came up with an idea, Mr. Speaker. I said, you know, the American people are letting us know, as their representatives, how they feel. We need to let them know how we feel. And so I came up with this petition that's pretty simple. What it says is: American energy solutions for lower gas prices; bring onshore oil on-line; bring deepwater oil on-line; and bring new refineries on-line.

We have not produced in this country, Mr. Speaker, a refinery since the late 1970s. We now import about 7 billion gallons of gas a year. We also import about the same amount of diesel. So we don't even have the refining capacity to refine what we import.

So I did this, and I made a little petition. You can see it over here. It's got spots for 435 people plus the non-voting Delegates to sign. So far I'm pleased to say, Mr. Speaker, we've got 188 people who have signed this. We've got three Democrats, three brave Democrats that have signed it: Neil Abercrombie, Patrick Murphy, and Mr. Speaker, I believe Henry Cuellar was the last one from Texas. And so these are brave people that understand that we have got to do something.

The majority says, well, it will be 10 years before we ever get oil. We've got to start today. If President Clinton in 1995 had not vetoed the drilling in ANWR, we would be producing 1 million gallons of crude oil for this country every day.

So, Mr. Speaker, what this is about--and by the way, this is very simple, because what it says is, I will vote to increase U.S. oil production to lower the price of gas for Americans. And Mr. Speaker, if anybody wanted to know if their Member was on the petition, they could go to house.gov/westmoreland to see if their Member is on there. We've had two Members that did not sign originally, and Mr. Speaker, they were put on the would-not-sign list. They have heard from their constituents and have come back and are now signed onto the petition.

So, Mr. Speaker, it is very important for people to understand where their Members of Congress are at on the energy issue. You're going to hear all kinds of excuses. You're going to hear all kinds of different regulations they want to put in place, all kinds of different taxes they want to put in place. This petition is too simple for most Members of this body to understand because it only says, I will vote to increase oil production in the United States, our own natural resources, to lower gas prices for Americans. That's all it says.

And if somebody wanted to know, Mr. Speaker, they could go to house.gov/westmoreland, and see exactly where their Member of Congress was at because, listen, Mr. Speaker, we hear about change from just about every candidate running, but we are going to have to be forced to change by our constituents. Because as you've seen since the new majority came in in January of 2007, there's been nothing done.

So, Mr. Speaker, I would ask the American people if I could to help us bring about change by notifying your Congressman and say get out of the fetal position and let's be called to action.

Mr. Speaker, I move that the House do now adjourn.

The motion was agreed to; accordingly (at 6 o'clock and 58 minutes p.m.), the House adjourned until tomorrow, Thursday, June 26, 2008, at 10 a.m.

It's good to be here this morning and to be back to work on a good Tuesday morning, Madam Speaker, to let the American people know that we are on the job and that we're here to, hopefully, this week work on the price at the pump. We are here to work on America's independence. As we're coming up on Independence Day, on the Fourth of July, we're working on America's independence from foreign oil.

About 2 weeks ago, I started getting calls from constituents about signing a petition that was on americansolutions.com, and then there were other petitions I was called about--Internet petitions--where Americans were telling Congress this is what we want you to do: Drill here. Drill now. Lower prices.

I was at a gas station in my district, and I went in, and there was a petition there. It said, ``We want to lower gas prices.'' I guess the attendant there was doing that to keep people busy so they wouldn't be hollering at him. So I came up with an idea.

The American people are telling us how they feel. Let's have an opportunity. Let's have our own petition within this House, Madam Speaker, to tell the American people how we feel. So I've come up with a petition. There is no legislation. There is no discharge petition. It's just something that each Member of this body can state to their constituents.

Basically, it says American energy solutions for lower gas prices. Bring onshore oil on line. Bring deepwater oil on line. Bring new refineries on line. The pledge has 435 lines, one for every Member. What it says is ``I will vote to increase U.S. oil production to lower gas prices for Americans.'' It's very simple. ``I will vote to increase U.S. oil production to lower gas prices for Americans.'' That's very simple.

Now, I've heard every excuse in the world from people on this floor, Madam Speaker, about why they didn't want to sign it. Well, if people out there are wanting to know if their Member has signed, they could go to house.gov/westmoreland and see if their Member is on there. They can see if they've signed, and they can see if it says that they will vote to increase U.S. oil production to lower gas prices for Americans.

This is very important. We need to let you know, the American people know, how we feel about the situation that you're in. You're in a situation where you go to the gas pump, and you may have to spend a larger portion of your paycheck than you normally would, but that's only small. We've got winter coming. With natural gas prices as high as they are, you're going to be cold in your home and will not be able to get in your car and drive anywhere to get warm.

So it's not just about the crude oil. It's about the natural gas. We have so much off of our coast, so much natural gas, so much oil in the Outer Continental Shelf. Untie our hands, Madam Speaker. Let our oil go. We want to be self-dependent. We don't want to rely on foreign countries.

I hope that the American people will help us persuade other Members of this body that we need to vote to drill here, to drill now and to lower prices.

Mr. Speaker, I'm glad that I'm able to be here today with my friend, Mr. Shimkus, and I think that he has some travel plans, so I'm going to immediately yield to him. And I can't wait to hear what he's got to say.

That's about as simple as it gets, isn't it?

If I could just interrupt, claim back my time for just 1 minute in the fact that they want us to use alternative fuels. They want to go to alternative fuels and we do to. We think that is something that we need to be developing.

But this, what you're talking about the, the Outer Continental Shelf, the U.S. coal, the shale oil, those are things that we know we have. And the funny part about what they want us to do about using alternative fuels, there was section 526, if you'll remember, in a defense bill that said that the U.S. government could not use alternative fuels. So, you know, which is it? Do they want us to or not?

And so, you know, that's where we're caught, and that's what a lot of people, I think, to my friend in America, don't understand that we're getting a lot of conflicting things from the majority side right now.

A good-paying job.

And to my friend, reclaiming my time for just a moment. That is the reason that I came up with the petition because there were so many people that were signing petitions on the Internet, drill here, drill now, lower prices, other locations, that I knew we will never get to have a straight up or down vote on the drilling, onshore, offshore and adding refineries. And so that's the reason I wanted to come up with the petition.

And I appreciate the gentleman making the point. This is the only way the American people will ever know how their congressman feels is by his or her signing this petition, because they will have no chance to have that simple of a vote.

And what this petition says, I will vote to increase U.S. oil production to lower gas prices for Americans. And you know, some things may be too simple for some of these legislators to understand. They keep wanting to make it complicated. It's not complicated, because to sign that pledge and they know that they're never going to get to vote on it. I think it would at least let their constituents know that they have some feeling for them when those people ride up to the gas pump and feel that pain at the pump.

And can I read one comment?

This was from Greenpeace. They say, Let's end fossil fuel use. For decades, we have relied on oil, coal, and gas to meet our ever- increasing energy needs. And now we are facing the consequences for our actions in global warming.

You know, 85 percent of our energy consumption today is supplied by fossil fuels. This is the base of the majority party, and this is what is driving our energy policy in Congress today. And I think what the gentleman has gone through, especially with the coal and the shale to oil to liquid, just reiterates the Democrats' position almost precisely what Greenpeace stated on their Web site.

Have a safe trip.

Mr. Speaker, thank you for this, and sorry, but he had to take a little trip.

And I want to go back, first of all, and just talk about the petition for a minute and the fact that I had been contacted by several of my constituents, Mr. Speaker, asking me if I had gone on to some of these web pages and signed the petition that said, one said, drill here, drill now, pay less. There were some others. I don't know the particular names. And then I was in a service station/grocery store that had a petition laying on the counter where you paid. It said, Sign this if you want to lower gas prices.

And so what I found is that the American people were doing everything that they could, Mr. Speaker, to let us know, Members of Congress, the people who are sworn to take action to help our constituents, the people were telling us. But there was no way for them to know how we felt about reducing the price of gas because under the new majority, we will never have an opportunity to vote on these things because they know if they brought it to the floor that it would pass and it would hurt their base, the radical environmentalists.

So I tried to come up with something as simple as possible because I believe in simplicity and people can understand the simplicity.

So I came up with my own petition, Mr. Speaker. And this petition was for the 435 Members that have the ability to vote in this House and then the delegates from some of the other territories. And it says, American energy solutions for lower gas prices. Bring onshore oil on line, bring deep water oil on line, and bring new refineries on line.

A lot of people might not realize with the refinery part of it that we haven't built a refinery in this country since 1978, 30 years since we built a refinery. A lot of people would be amazed to know that we import from Canada, Great Britain, Norway, a number of other OPEC nations, 6.9 billion gallons of refined gasoline into this country every year, about the same amount of diesel fuel because we cannot even refine what crude oil that we've got.

So I have made these boards up. I have had them up now, today is Friday, and we have had them up 4 days this week and 1 day last week. And it is so simple that it is confusing a lot of people on this floor. It says, House of Representatives energy petition. I will vote to increase U.S. oil production to lower gas prices for Americans.

Mr. Speaker, I know that you understand that. I understand that. But some people must not understand it because we've only had 170 people sign it. And so if this bill comes to the floor, which I don't think-- and by the way, the Speaker said today that she's bringing four energy bills next week, and I'm going to talk about them in a minute and give you some kind of idea how they're going to help.

But this is real simple, it just says that whoever is representing you will vote to increase our U.S. oil production. Because see, we shouldn't be in a position--because to me, we're the greatest Nation in the world. And Mr. Speaker, we shouldn't put the leader of the free world, the President of this country, in a position to where Mr. Schumer from the Senate or Ms. Pelosi, the Speaker of the House, is asking him to go hat-in-hand to countries that are basically our enemies and asking them to increase their oil production to use their natural resources for our benefit.

Now, somebody is not thinking clearly. We don't need to put our President in that position. We don't need to be asking anybody anything when in this country in shale oil in the western States we have 1.5 trillion barrels. That's more than Saudi Arabia has. And so why in the world do we want to be in this position?

So I came up with a petition. Right now we have 170 people that have signed the petition. Mr. Speaker, I wanted to give the American people an opportunity, and I know I can't talk to them, but if I could talk to them, if I could address them, I would tell them for real energy solutions that they would want to go to www.house.gov/westmoreland and see if their Congressman has signed this petition.

And when you call them, you might get some dancing, some shuffling around. There is no dancing, there is no shuffling. It's one sentence. One sentence: I will vote to increase U.S. oil production and lower gas prices for Americans. I will be quiet about the petition for a minute. Here is the address.

I will say one thing about one individual that signed this. And his name is Neil Abercrombie, and he's from the great State of Hawaii. Neil is the only Democrat that has signed the petition. He's the only Democrat that has signed the petition. And he knows that at some point in time, we have got to start. And he knows that the party line that, you know, there's 68 million acres out there that's been leased, and that's true, but there's 2.5 trillion acres that could be leased, Mr. Speaker. But this Congress has passed bans that says you can't. The President has said he's willing to take off the executive order if Congress would move to take off our order. We're not going to move on that.

So I want to congratulate Neil and all of the people that he represents for him having the courage. And he's given some of the greatest speeches on the floor of this House that I've heard in my 16 years of legislative experience, not just in here but in the State of Georgia. So Neil, my hat's off to you and you should be congratulated.

I want to talk about for just a couple of minutes, I know I have got several of my colleagues here to join me, but I wanted to talk for a minute about what the Democrats have done so far in the 110th Congress. Because see, back in April, and if you will remember the gentleman, Mr. Shimkus, had a thing up about when the Democrats took over this Congress in 2006, that oil was about $56 a barrel. What happened was when they were running for office, Speaker Pelosi said back in April of 2006, Democrats have a commonsense plan for lowering the skyrocketing price of gasoline.

Now, keep in mind that the skyrocketing price at the time was about $2.26 a gallon. Man. Did you ever think you would long for the days when gas was $2.26 a gallon?

Anyway, we have yet to see that secret plan. They have brought out some plans, but I don't think they've really brought out the secret plan yet.

I want to quote a little bit here from the Democrats. They passed a price gouging prevention, and you can see right here. Here is the Democrats' philosophy on lowering the gas prices: Sue OPEC. That's gone a long ways. Launch the seventh investigation into price gougers. The seventh investigation. Mr. Speaker, I think the American people want us to get out of the committee hearing, the investigation mode, and get into the action mode. We're in the fetal position mode right now.

Launch the fourth investigation into speculators, $20 billion in new taxes on oil producers. Mr. Speaker, that took an economic genius to figure out that raising taxes $20 billion on a producer or a manufacturer is going to lower the price to the consumer.

Halt oil shipments to the Strategic Petroleum Reserve would save a nickel a gallon. So their price, it brings it down from $4.08 to $4.03.

But I want to read you some of the quotes.

This was the Federal Price Gouging Prevention Act, H.R. 1252, that the Democrats in this body passed on May 23, 2007. May 23, 2007, was when this was passed. ``This bill has been around for over a year. So let's stop the excuses. American people don't want arguments about that process. They want relief at the pump, and that's what we're doing today. Lookit, today Members of the House have a very simple choice. Vote to stand up with consumers, your constituents, who are paying record gasoline prices, nationwide average, record prices, or vote to protect big oil companies' enormous profits.''

That was Representative Bart Stupak on May 23, 2007.

When this was passed, oil was $65.77. As you saw earlier, it's $136- and-change now. At the time this was passed, the national average was $3.22 a gallon. It is now $4.08 a gallon. So you see the price gouging does not work, Mr. Speaker.

Another comment: ``Mr. Speaker, again, the American consumers need us to act, they want us to act, they demand that we do act. Now is the time.'' Congressman Bobby Rush on May 23, 2007. I think that action was just a charade because it has not helped the price of our gas.

And so while we look at these things, we've got to understand that the things that the Democrats are wanting to do does not do it.

Now, let's look over here at what my petition does or at least asks to do on the Republican side. Bring onshore oil online, ANWR, shale, anywhere from 70 cents to $1.60 a gallon; bring deepwater oil online, OCS, 90 cents to $2.50 a gallon; bring new refineries online, 15 cents to 45 cents. That would bring it down probably to about $2.10 a gallon. These are actions. These others are charades.

And so I think the American people, Mr. Speaker, are tired of the charades. But let me just identify one more charade that we've had, and Mr. Speaker, that was when we had H.R. 6022, the Strategic Petroleum Reserve Fill Suspension and Consumer Protection Act of 2008. This was passed on May 13, 2008, and you can see, halt oil shipments to the strategic petroleum, a nickel. So this is the bill.

Here was the quote from Chairman Dingell: ``While there is no guarantee that putting this oil onto the market rather than into the SPR will lower

prices, even such a modest step could potentially prick the speculative bubble now characterizing oil markets.''

Mr. Chairman, it didn't prick anything because evidently it made them mad because it has gone up. But let me tell you what will prick that speculative market. What will prick it is when we vote to put a drill bit in the ground, and just by us voting to put the drill bit in the ground, the speculation will stop.

Representative Peter Welch, the lead sponsor, said this: ``When we have reduced oil going into the SPR in the past it has proven to actually have a direct and immediate impact on lowering the price of gas at the pump from 5 cents to 25 cents a gallon.

``And basically the question for us is whether or not, even as we have to proceed with long-term debates about our future energy policy, is this Congress going to be willing to take a short-term step that has the potential to bring down energy prices.''

Congressman Welch, there was not a lot of potential there because prices have gone up.

Representative Nick Lampson from Texas, somebody that should know about drilling and the benefits that drilling would do to bring down the price of energy: ``This bill provides a quick first step, maybe not much, but at least it's an action on the part of our Congress.

``Suspending the SPR will put an additional 70,000 barrels of oil on the market each day. It could help reduce prices at a critical time for us in our country.''

It has not reduced the price at all.

Representative Jason Altmire: ``This Congress has to act. And we are going to act today. And we are going to save the American people a quarter on the gallon.''

So, when you go into the service station to fill up tomorrow or the next day or tonight, ask them if they've heard that we have passed the Strategic Petroleum Reserve Fill Suspension and Consumer Protection Act of 2008, because I can promise you your gas will not be 25 cents a gallon less than what it was on the day we passed this.

I'd now like to recognize my friend from North Carolina, the battering ram as some people call her in here, but she's one of the most fierce legislators that I've ever met in my career, and the congresswoman from North Carolina (Ms. Foxx).

Ms. Foxx, after these bills come to the floor next week, or if we ever do get a chance to see them, we're going to have to bring back the old truth squad to make sure that the American people, Mr. Speaker, get the truth.

It's now my honor to yield to a friend of mine that came in shortly after I did to Congress, and if I could name anybody in this Congress a taxpayers's friend, I would have to name John Campbell. And so I yield to him.

Fifty-four cents a gallon.

Thank you, Mr. Campbell. And I'm going to go back down front and play a little musical chairs here.

Thank you, sir.

You know, I want to just show the American people: We're not going to immediately drill ourselves out of the spot, Mr. Speaker. But in 1995, the Congress passed drilling in ANWR. President Clinton vetoed it. Had he not vetoed it in 1995 we would be getting one million barrels of oil today out of ANWR.

So is this an immediate relief? No. It's immediate relief from, I think, the speculation and the amount of escrowing. But this is an all- of-the-above issue. We've got to start drilling. We've got to start doing alternative fuels. We've got to build refineries. We've got to be doing onshore and offshore drilling. We've got to do coal-to-liquid. There are a lot of things we have to do and not just lay here in a fetal position.

But this is what really burns me up when I think about being dependent on foreign oil. This is a picture of Mr. Chavez from Venezuela and Mr. Castro from Cuba. In a recent interview on al Jazeera, Chavez called for developing nations to unite against U.S. political and economic policies. ``What We Can Do Regarding the Imperialistic Power of the United States.'' ``We have no choice but to unite,'' he said. ``Venezuela's energy alliances with nations such as Cuba, which receives cheap oil and are an example of how we use oil in our war against neo liberalism,'' he said. If you saw it on TV this morning, you saw where he threatened the European nations with no more Venezuelan oil because they passed an immigration law that he didn't like. This guy is not our friend. The bottom, on March 15, 2005, Washington Post; or as he put it on another occasion, ``We have invaded the United States with our oil.''

Now, I'm fixing to show you something, Mr. Speaker, and I don't know if you can see it or not, but maybe you'll get a look at it. But Mr. Speaker, I'm going to show you something that's really going to burn you up. This is a copy of the check that American families and businesses write to Mr. Chavez. Every day, 365 days a year, we write him a check for $170,250,000. Mr. Speaker, that's a crime. We could be writing those checks to American men and women with the jobs that we would create if we would use our own natural resources for our own benefit.

So Mr. Speaker, I've got 5 minutes to close. And I want to put up this address, because this address, Mr. Speaker, is for real energy solutions. It's a simple address, www.house.gov/westmoreland. And you can go to that address, Mr. Speaker--and I hope you will go tonight, Mr. Speaker--and see the names on there that have signed the petition, the commonsense petition, a petition that just says ``I will vote to increase oil production to lower the price of gas for Americans.'' That's as simple as you can get, Mr. Speaker. We had 32,000 hits on this Web site either last night or the night before last. Americans want to know where their Congressman represent.

And Mr. Speaker, let me close by saying this: So many politicians today that the American people hear on TV are talking about change. And I don't know if it's the kind of change that we're thinking about because, as an American citizen, the change that I hope that Congress or that elected officials would have, Mr. Speaker, is a change that they would be honest, that they would be honest with what they tell the American people and not come to Washington and write a bunch of legislation that's very confusing about what it really means.

And I read your excerpts today, Mr. Speaker, that read what some of your colleagues had said about the legislation that they passed and what it was going to do for fuel prices. And some of that legislation was over a year ago, and it has just continued, gas is at $4.08 a gallon. But Mr. Speaker, if I could talk to the American people, I would tell them this: that there will never really be any change in this country, Mr. Speaker, until the people that get up every morning that are citizens of this land, that look in the mirror, and if that person, Mr. Speaker, that they see in the mirror will not change, then we're not going to change.

And so sometimes it takes effort, Mr. Speaker, from the men and women out there that watch us and listen to us and abide by the laws that we make to take things into their own hands and to let us know how they feel. Over a million people have signed a petition, ``Drill Here, Drill Now, Pay Less.'' We're hearing from them. We need to hear from you.

Mr. Speaker, if I could talk to the American people, I would tell them, your Congressman and your Senator need to hear from you. You need to know if they're willing to vote to increase the production of oil in this country from our own natural resources, be less dependent on foreign oil and foreign resources, and lower the price of American gas. And you can find out if your Congressman is on that petition or not by going to house.gov/westmoreland.

You're going to hear all kind of arguments of why they didn't sign it or haven't signed it, but Mr. Speaker, those arguments are so simple that the argument doesn't even hold up.

So Mr. Speaker, with that, I'm going to yield the well and yield my time here, and just thank you for your patience in listening to the truth that's been brought to you. And thank my friends that have come down tonight, my colleagues that have come down to help me, Mr. Speaker, try to explain to the American people that we're serious about bringing them some relief at the pump.

Mr. Speaker, parliamentary inquiry.

I feel like I know the answer to this, but if this motion should pass, could the bill not be referred back to the committee from which it came and be reported out the next legislative day?

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the opportunity to be here tonight to address you and the other Members of this body. And I wanted to bring to the attention, Mr. Speaker, the fact that I guess several weeks ago we had calls from constituents and seeing constituents at town hall meetings and other places. They had asked me if I had been on-line or on the Internet to sign some of the petitions that different people had up to bring down the price of gas. They were tired of going to the pump and paying $4 a gallon for the gas.

They had heard the promises from the Majority of the 110th Congress made back when they were running for office, that they had a commonsense plan to bring down the cost of skyrocketing gas which, at the time, was about $2.20. It's now about $4.08. So they were mystified as much as I was about what this secret plan was. And so they were going on-line and signing these Internet petitions asking us or letting us know, Members of this body, that they were demanding that gas prices come down, and by doing that, to drill here and to drill now.

One of those Internet sites, and there's many, but one is American Solutions. And I understand today, from reading an article, that over a million Americans have gone to that site and said, you know what? Let's drill here, let's drill now, and let's lower gas prices.

And so I was thinking to myself because I had gone into a service station to fill up with the $4 a gallon gas in my pickup truck, and there was a petition laying on the counter that said, you know, we want our gas prices brought down. Sign this petition.

And I thought, you know, not only is this an Internet, but people that are working at these service stations and I'm sure other places are having these petitions saying, you know, we need our energy costs brought down.

And Mr. Speaker, I said, you know, the American people need to know how their Members of Congress feel. We're hearing from them on all of these different petitions how they feel. They need to know how their representative feels.

So I came up with a petition. And basically, this petition says, American energy solutions for lower gas prices. And it brings onshore oil on-line. It brings deep water oil on-line. And it brings new refineries on-line. And that's pretty simple. That's about as simple as you can get in this body.

Everything we vote on here is so convoluted that many of the Members don't understand what they're voting on, Mr. Speaker. And a majority of the American people do not know. Some of these bills are three and four and 500 pages. And it's hard to consume all that information and understand what is going on. So a lot of Members can have an excuse to vote for or against it because, as Mr. Obey said today on the floor, they make these bills to get 218 votes. So they take these bills and put as many sweeteners in it as they need to to get to 218. So many Members can say, well, it was a bad piece of legislation, but because they put X, Y, or Z in it, I voted for it.

I wanted to keep this petition as simple as possible. And so basically, what the petition says, I will vote to increase U.S. oil production, to lower gas prices for Americans. How much simpler can you get?

Mr. Speaker, you can't imagine some of the answers from the Members of this body for not wanting to sign this. They're unbelievable. I don't know how they're going to explain it to their constituents, but their constituents have an opportunity to see, and we update this, Mr. Speaker, on our Web site, which is house.gov/westmoreland, W-E-S-T-M-O- R-E-L-A-N-D. We update it after every series of votes, so it will be updated probably in about 30 or 45 minutes. It will be updated and you can go to that Web site. And we had 32,000 hits on that Web site last night, for people wanting to go and see how their congressman felt about it.

Now, we've had about 160 Congressmen that have signed this so far, so we're probably about 58 short of getting to 218, which is what you need to pass this.

So, Mr. Speaker, I would encourage all Americans to go to that and to find out how the Members of this House feel about lowering gas prices in this country.

Parliamentary inquiry, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, isn't it true that if this motion were to pass, the bill could be recommitted back to the committees from which it came and reported back the next legislative day?

Madam Speaker, it is great to be back tonight to address some of the concerns that most Americans have today, and that is the cost of energy.

Let me start out by saying that I have gotten numerous calls and e- mails concerning the price that the average American is paying for gas today. As most Americans realize, gas is up over $4 a gallon. When the 110th Congress started and the new majority took over, after telling the American people that they had a commonsense plan to bring down the skyrocketing price of gas, and keep in mind at the time it was about $2.20 a gallon, we have seen the price of gas go up to $4.05 now.

I have had many people call and ask me if I had signed the petition on several Internet sites, such as AmericanSolutions.com and some other sites that were out there where the American people could go and sign a petition telling us, Madam Speaker, Members of Congress, that they wanted us to drill now, drill here, and bring down the price of gas.

And so as I was thinking about that, I thought, you know, we are hearing from our constituents about they want us to do something, to take action, to bring down the price of gas because that's what we do in this Congress, Madam Speaker, is we are here to help the American people, and especially with their pocketbook.

So as I got to thinking about that, I said you know we all hear from our constituents, but sometimes our constituents don't know how we really feel because a lot of times these issues are not brought to the floor, or when they are brought to the floor they are so convoluted and so hard to understand that someone could go home and answer their constituency as to why they voted for a bill or why they voted against a bill because you could probably take either side on any piece of legislation that is passed in this body. I said I need to come up with the simplest thing that I can to make sure that the American people understand and there can't be any wiggle room from their Member of Congress where they stand on bringing down energy prices.

And so I came up with this petition. What this petition says is ``American energy solutions for lower gas prices. Bring onshore oil online. Bring deepwater oil online. Bring new refineries online.'' We have not opened a refinery in this country since the late 1970s.

So what I did, this is the petition we have had on the floor all today for Members to sign. What it says is very simple; very, very, simple, ``I will vote to increase U.S. oil production to lower gas prices for Americans.'' That's about as simple as it gets. It's not politics. It's not gotcha politics, it is the kind of change that I think the American people want, honesty and common sense. Honesty and common sense.

So today we have had a total to date of 126 people out of 435 sign this petition. So 126 out of the 435, and I hope that it will continue. But I hope, Madam Speaker, that people understand that they can go to House.gov/Westmoreland and find out if their Congressman has signed the petition or not. And if not, you might want to ask them why because the thing is pretty clear. It just says ``I will vote to increase U.S. oil production to lower gas prices for Americans.''

That's about as simple as it gets. So we are proud to have this petition and we are proud of the American people, Madam Speaker, for going to these Web sites to sign these petitions to let us know how you feel about paying these outlandish gas prices at the pump.

What I want to do is make sure that the American people know how their Congressman feels about the pain they are suffering at the pump.

I yield to the gentleman from Indiana (Mr. Burton).

I thank my friend from Indiana for being here with me and supporting this initiative that we have. And I want to just hit on a couple of points that Congressman Burton made.

You can go to house.gov/westmoreland and find out who has signed a petition that basically just says, I will vote to increase U.S. oil production to lower gas for Americans. There are also some links to some other sites where you can get some of these energy facts that we're giving you and find the truth for yourself.

One of the things that he mentioned was the size of ANWR and where we're drilling. And he mentioned that the drilling site is about the size of Reagan Airport. And it is, in comparison to the total State of South Carolina. Here is the comparison of ANWR to the Continental United States. You can see the size of Alaska compared to the United States. This is the wildlife refuge here, and we will show you, in a moment, Madam Speaker, what this wildlife, the refuge area looks like.

Here is the drilling site up here. So you can see that this is, the ANWR, the wildlife is about the size of South Carolina. And where they're talking about drilling is about the size of Reagan Airport, in comparison. You can see how much land is there.

The other thing the gentleman from Indiana mentioned was the amount of land; 68 million acres is what the majority party claims is out there, and that may be a true statement. I can tell you that 54 percent of the exploratory holes that have been drilled between 2002 and 2007, 54 percent of them were dry holes.

Now, we all want to use common sense. We don't go to the hardware store to buy groceries. So why would you drill somewhere that there's no oil? You wouldn't do it. Or no natural gas. Why would you do that? You would not do it.

And so after they do all of these tests that they do that is required by the government for them to do, they find out on these leases that have been offered up by our government that there is no oil. There is no energy resource there, so why are we saying drill there?

Now, also I've heard that these energy companies are stockpiling these leases. Well, that's not true. It's already in law that if they don't drill, they lose it. If they do not go with the terms of the lease, they lose that lease. And so if they have a problem with them not drilling where they said they would drill in the time that they said they would drill, according to the lease agreement with the government, that's not their problem. That's our problem, that we're not enforcing the laws that we have. And so, you know, there's a lot of myth going on here, Madam Speaker.

But I did want to bring up one thing because I think this is really what gets my blood boiling when I think about our dependence on foreign oil. Let's look at Mr. Castro and Mr. Chavez down here. And I want to read something to the American people, Madam Speaker, and to you and to the people in this House. It says, in a recent interview on Al Jazeera, Chavez called for the developing nations to unite against U.S. political and economic policies. What can we do regarding the imperialistic power of the United States? We have no choice but to unite, he said. Venezuela's energy alliances with nations such as Cuba, which receives cheap oil, are an example of how we use oil in our war against neo-liberalism, he said.

Another quote, right down here under the picture of him hugging Castro, or as he put it on another occasion, we have invaded the United States, but with our oil.

The next thing over here, Madam Speaker, is a check that American families and businesses write out every day to Hugo Chavez for $170,250,000. That is a day. That money could be coming to American companies and to

American workers and creating Americans jobs and bringing down the price of gas at the pump for Americans.

Now, we're writing one of our enemies a check for $170 million a day when we could be using that money to create jobs in this country.

The other thing I think is important to realize is that not only have we not drilled and used our own natural resources for our own citizens, but we've not built any refineries. Our refining capability has not been added to since 1978. We have not built a new refinery.

Now, we are importing, and listen to this--this is not oil, crude oil that we're importing--we are importing gasoline, a product that has been refined in another country, we are importing about 6.9 billion gallons of gasoline, refined crude oil into this country every year, and probably the same amount in diesel.

There is no excuse for us sending our hard-earned dollars to foreign countries when we could be doing it ourselves, and especially, going to the pump and paying over $4 a gallon when this new majority for the 110th Congress had a commonsense plan to bring down skyrocketing price of gas when it was $2.20.

Last month we had a motion to recommit that demanded that within 90 days we recognized three bases that had been under the BRAC, or the base realignment, to start looking at refineries and it was voted down by the majority.

Thank you.

My friend, Mr. Peterson, who is a real expert on energy, I'm glad you joined us tonight.

So if they think the price at the pump is painful, wait till they start trying to stay warm.

Would the gentleman yield?

Isn't it true that we have a 54 percent tariff on ethanol brought into this country? Fifty-four cents a gallon on ethanol brought into the country, and already right now corn is at $7.

And with the devastation that we've had in Iowa, in some of the corn-producing States, it would be nice if we just give a temporary halt to that tariff to get this ethanol in.

Well, Mr. Peterson, let me say this. We have that technology, and there was a push in the late 1990s, mid- to late-1990s to convert gasoline engines to propane. Then the EPA put such testing regulations on the emissions testing for these different types of makes and models of cars, a lot of people just got out of the business. It was not a commonsense thing for EPA to do. They should have gone to these people doing the conversions and said, What can we do to make it easier and faster for you to do this propane conversion and the same thing with natural gas?

Did the gentleman offer an amendment in the appropriations bill that was voted down?

We need to be doing something about it, and that's what we're trying to do.

And to my friend from Pennsylvania, and thank you for coming down tonight and helping Mr. Burton and myself with this because we know that you are an expert on it and that you have been trying to correct a situation. Even when the Republicans were in the majority, you were the lone voice crying in the wilderness about this; and I really wish we would have paid more attention.

But now is the time when natural gas is $13-plus, the price at the pump is over $4, the price of oil in a barrel is up to about $140. And the gentleman mentioned some of the Norwegian countries. And you know Norway, you know, 30 years ago was dependent on foreign oil. And they said, You know what? We're going to do something about it.

Norway is dependent on tourism, fishing. I mean, they are very conscious of their natural resources. Today, they are the third largest exporter of crude oil in the world.

And they're celebrating. I saw in the paper where they found that big oil reserve offshore, and the Brazilian people were celebrating over finding it, and we know it's there and can't even get our country to drill.

We import from them.

To the point the gentleman makes, if we had started back in the seventies or the eighties or the nineties, we'd be further down the road. I don't want my grandkids to say, ``Pa Pa, why didn't you start it in 2008?''

I don't want to have to answer that question to my grandkids.

If you will remember, this Congress in 1995 passed drilling in ANWR. President Clinton vetoed it. Today, we would be getting 1 million barrels of oil a day from ANWR.

The American people do not want us to stay here in the fetal position. They want us to act. And they don't want to hear the excuses that the majority is giving for us not taking action. We need to act, and some of the things that the gentleman has mentioned are so common sense.

I mean, we can drill as environmentally sensitive as anybody in this world. Our technology is the best. We've got the smartest and the brightest. We can do what France is doing with their nuclear waste. We can do what France is doing with their nuclear power. We can do what Brazil is doing with the coal-to-oil. We can do what Norway's doing with being environmentally sound drilling.

This is America. This is the place where we are the leaders of the world in so many things, and for some reason, we want to have our hat in our hand, going to even our enemies, begging them for them to increase their oil production, use their natural resources, because we are not willing to do it.

American jobs. We're losing American jobs.

To the point that you're making, and I think that's what, Madam Speaker, the American people don't understand, the reason the majority is failing to act on our ability to drill in our own lands is that their base wants gas to be $10 a gallon at the pump because they do not want us driving cars, and they want us to be dependent on them.

And so they are not doing anything. They are laying in that fetal position in a hunkered-down state because their base does not want this to come down. They don't want us to drill. They don't want us to use the shale-to-oil or coal-to-oil. They don't want us to use the clean coal technology that we have. They don't want us drilling for this natural gas.

And this is one of the things that we were just talking about. The gentleman from Pennsylvania mentioned these different organizations. If you receive something in your mailbox about the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, you may get some pictures like this.

The reality of it is that is a real picture of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge right there. It's a tundra. It's a frozen tundra. It's what it is. I don't even see a tree on it.

This is the part that is talking about being explored for oil.

That is the part that we know the billions of gallons of oil are under. That's the part.

See, this is a picture of it. It's a frozen tundra.

It goes back to the fact that we are continually getting further and further behind. I think the American people, Madam Speaker, are at a point where they're saying we are wanting some action. And that's the reason we came up with the petition for Members of Congress to sign because we are the ones that can create the action. The American people can't create the action. It's our duty to create the action.

And so we started the petition, and this is a petition for just the Members, the elected Members of this body.

It says: American energy solutions for lower gas prices. Bring onshore oil online, bring deepwater oil online. And I guess we need to add natural gas to that, too, because that sounds like something we need to get on in a hurry. But also bring new refineries, bring new capabilities of refining this oil where we don't have to import 6.9 billion gallons of gas into this country a year.

And so what we did, we came up with a petition that's simple. This is not hard for anybody to understand, and you can't dance around it. It basically says: I will vote to increase U.S. oil production to lower gas prices for Americans. And we've got every Member, even the Delegates, a place to sign here. So far, out of the 435 Members, plus the Delegates, I don't know if that's seven delegates or whatever it is, we have 126 signatures. And so it's going good, and you can go to house.gov/westmoreland to find out if your Member of Congress has signed it or not.

We're trying to make this as simple as we can, to make us a responsive body, a body of action, rather than just laying here saying ``we can't'' to ``we can.''

And I think that the gentleman from Pennsylvania and the gentleman from Indiana have made terrific points here tonight, and I want to thank you all for coming.

We've got about 8 minutes, so I'll give you a couple minutes a piece to close, and then we'll wrap it up.

Mr. Peterson.

Twelve percent lower production and an increase in drilling.

Thank you. And let me just close with saying this: You're probably going to hear later on tonight that there are 68 million acres out there to drill on. Keep this in mind, Madam Speaker, we don't go to the hardware store to buy groceries. We're not going to drill on land that does not have resources under it. If you look at the Outer Continental Shelf and the lands that the Federal Government have inside this country, it is 2.5 billion acres of land. You're going to hear that the oil companies have these leases and they're not drilling them. It is law today that if a company that leases land does not honor that lease agreement, that lease is taken away from them.

These arguments will not hold water. It is time to act, and the time is now.

It is time that this Congress turns into a Congress of action that wants to move forward--our being less dependent on foreign oil--and quit relying on our enemies in an unstable region to produce our oil, to produce our energy.

So I want to thank the two gentlemen for joining me tonight. I hope you will go to house.gov/westmoreland and see the people that have signed up and believe in the fact that we need to increase U.S. oil production to lower the gas prices for all Americans.

And Mr. Peterson, you can close.

And Madam Speaker, with that, I know you have enjoyed this, we yield back the balance of our time.

Mr. Speaker, I want to take just a moment, before I start with any of my energy remarks, to welcome President Chen, Joy and Sean Chen here with General Protecht that is opening up a business in my district in Barnesville, Georgia. It's great to have them visiting Washington, D.C.

What I really want to talk to the people about today, Mr. Speaker, is the fact that it is time that the American people understand where Congress is on providing them with our own resources to bring about lower gas prices and lower energy prices.

I have had several constituents and people e-mailing me and calling me, asking me about a number of petitions that were on the Web or that were in service stations or in Wal-Marts or in Home Depots, and they were wanting to know how I felt about drilling onshore, about drilling in deep water and about bringing more refineries on line.

So, as I looked at some of these petitions--and some of them I saw-- one was on American solutions, and there were others, but the one on American solutions had about 600,000 signatories. Six hundred thousand Americans had taken the time to go to that Web site to sign the petition that said, ``Drill now. Drill here. Less price.'' Less gasoline price.

So I thought, you know, that's interesting because we know how these constituents feel, but do our constituents really know, Mr. Speaker, how Members of Congress feel? Because we do things up here to keep the American people from knowing exactly what we do think because we make these issues as to so many different subject matters that we can find excuses to vote for or against most any proposal that is brought to this floor. So what I want to do is simplify it, simplify it for the American people--for our constituents--and, Mr. Speaker, for the Members of Congress.

So I came up with a petition for this House of Representatives, and the petition is simple. The petition says: ``American energy solutions for lower gas prices. Bring onshore oil on line. Bring deep water oil on line, and bring new refineries on line.''

I've got a petition here. Don't worry. This is one board. We've got five boards. We've got every district, all 435 Members who can vote in this House. We've got a petition, and it says, ``I will vote to increase U.S. oil production to lower gas prices for Americans.'' How simple is that? That's pretty simple.

So what we've done is we've got this. Congressman Price and myself didn't bring it out until, really, after everybody had kind of gone home up here last Thursday, and we've already gotten 20 signatories. I've got two pens that I'm going to attach to these petitions. Mr. Speaker, I'm going to put them over here by the back door here on the minority side, and I'm going to invite every Member of Congress who believes that they would vote to reduce these prices to come by and sign them.

Just to give the American people, Mr. Speaker, a way to look at this, we are going to post, and are going to try to post in as real a time as we can, on different Web pages who has signed it. So, if you want to know who has signed so far, you can go to House.gov/Westmoreland, and you can also go to GOP.gov/energy. Now, these are two Web sites that are going to have posted by the end of the day who all has signed. If you, Mr. Speaker, or if anybody out there might want to know if your Congressman has signed, then you can go to that Web site.

We have had all different types of arguments in this House about energy, and the Democrats had an energy bill that they proposed and actually passed that President Bush signed into law in December of 2007. The Democratic majority passed this as one of their big issues in January of 2007.

With that, I'll leave it up to Mr. Price, but for every Member in this House, the pens are here; the petition is here. Let the American people know how you feel.

I thank my friend for yielding.

I found some of the facts today pretty interesting about this monkey bill, this monkey business, Mr. Speaker. I've only been in Congress 4 years, I was in the State legislature 12 years, and I've never had a call about a monkey bite or monkey bites being rampant in my district. I'm sure that it's important. As my friend from Utah stated, don't be real alarmed that your Congress has brought this front and center, the first bill on the floor today in the House of Representatives. You can take comfort, because only one in 38 million, that's your chances of getting bit by a monkey today.

Now your chances are pretty good if you are driving a gasoline- powered car, when you pull into the service station, you are going to pay about $4.08 for gas. Now that's for sure. We need to be concentrating on that pain that you're feeling, not the pain of a monkey bite, but the pain at the gas pump that you're feeling.

And, you know, we're going to spend, as my friend from Utah said, a half million dollars per monkey bite in this country. Those are expensive monkey bites. Not only are they rare, and that may be the reason they're so expensive is they are so rare; but we could be spending that money towards drilling, towards exploring our own natural resources.

That's the reason I came up with a petition. I heard about all of these petitions on the Internet about where American citizens could go and sign a petition to let Congress know how they felt about high energy prices. And I thought, you know, why don't you come up with a petition that the Members of Congress can sign to let the people of America know how their Representative feels about the commonsense issue of providing our own resources.

So we came up with the American Energy Solutions for Lower Gas Prices, bring onshore oil online, bring deep water oil online, and bring new refineries online. And just to make it special, I made every Member of Congress a separate line on the petition. And what the petition says is: I will vote to increase U.S. oil production to lower gas prices for Americans. And there are two pens on it. So I am going to invite everyone to sign it.

Mr. Speaker, today when we vote on the monkey bite bill, there will probably be a little over 400 Members, probably around 410 or 412, that will vote on the monkey bite, and I would hope that we would have that many signatures on this petition. There are 435 slots over here for people who have the ability and under the Constitution to vote on this floor, have an opportunity to sign that petition to let their constituents know that they are for commonsense energy practices.

You know, the keyword today, Mr. Speaker, in all of the campaigns you hear about is change. I think Americans do want change. I think our voters do want change. I don't know if it is the radical, rock-your- world, turn-everything-upside-down change that some of the candidates are talking about, but I think it is this kind of change, I think it is a change for honesty. I think the American people want to know where their Member or their elected official stands on the issues. And we make them so complicated that every Member of this body can go home and give a good reason why they voted for or against something. This simplifies it so the American people can see the honesty in their Member that says yes, I will vote to increase U.S. oil production to lower gas prices for Americans. That's simple.

The other thing they want is common sense. They want common sense. Common sense, Mr. Speaker, is to use our own natural resources rather than going into other countries in the world hat in hand begging for their natural resources. That's not common sense. It is not common sense to be in this body passing a law today about monkey bites when you have a 1 in 38 million chance of getting bit. Or that it is going to cost a half a million dollars per bite, that's not the kind of common sense, that's not the kind of change that American people are looking at.

What they're looking at is the commonsense change of us getting out of fetal position in this body, Mr. Speaker, and doing something to lower the price, to lower the pain for them at the gas pump, not reduce the pain from monkey bites.

I thank my friend from Utah.

I want to just address a couple of things that have been brought up; use it or lose it, drill it or lose it. That is already the law. That's already the law.

We have 68 million acres out of 2.5 billion. Now we talked about common sense, at least I talked about common sense, about what we are doing here. And, I'm sorry, I didn't have time to write down all of the dog bites. I noticed we were quoting all of the monkey bites. But what I will tell you as far as common sense goes, if you were an exploration company, if you were an oil company, would you drill where you knew that there was no oil? I would say no. But evidently the majority, the Democrats, believe that because you have 68 million acres of land, that you need to drill on it. Although 54 percent, 54 percent of the holes that were put in the ground for exploration between 2002 and 2007 were dry. So would you continue drilling on that 68 million acres out of 2.5 billion acres? I don't think so. I think that the American people with common sense would say, you know what, if there isn't oil there, why would you drill?

Do you go to the hardware store to buy groceries? I don't think the average American goes down to the hardware store looking for Quaker oats. He goes to a grocery store.

And so if you are going to be drilling for oil, the commonsense thing is that you would want to drill where oil is at.

We know how many barrels are under ANWR. We know how many barrels of shale, a trillion barrels of shale in the western United States, enough oil in ANWR to last us 50 years at the rate of what Saudi Arabia produces. So there is some common sense, and there is truth that there is 68 million acres leased. But the truth of it is half of the exploratory holes have been dry, so why would you want to continue to drill.

We need to open up new oil reserves and we need to make this to where companies want to go and explore for oil. We need to use our common sense and say we are not going to be dependent any longer on foreign oil in foreign places and foreign resources. Let's use our own resources. We have the technology to do it. We can do it in an environmentally safe way.

But it is time that the majority of this country is quit being held hostage at the gas pump for gas over $4 a gallon by a small, radical environmental group that is controlling the majority party in this Congress.

Mr. Speaker, I hope that we will bring some energy legislation to this floor rather than the monkey bite bill.

Mr. Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.

Parliamentary inquiry, Mr. Speaker.

How did you count? You said a sufficient number having arisen. I only see four Members in here, and I only saw one rise.

Okay. Well, all right. But further parliamentary inquiry. If there's four of us in here, and one stands up, is that, in the Chair's opinion, enough to call for a vote?

Will the gentleman yield?

I just want to ask you one question and give you time to rebut it, and I will leave.

To my friend Mr. Ryan, you mentioned not being able to use our technology. In the energy bill that we passed in January of 2007, section 526 really limits the government agencies' ability to use fuels that could come from our technology. It says we cannot use these fuels, such as oil from shale, fuel made from that, for NASA, our military or other government agencies.

Could you kind of rectify that and how that relates to what you are saying? Because I agree with you, we have some of the smartest people in the world here that can look at some of the technology that has been in place in Europe for years of coal-to-liquid. But how does that translate in your energy policy, compared to what you are saying about the technology? Because I certainly agree with you about the technology, but I don't necessarily agree with the energy policy.

Mr. Speaker, I am glad Mr. Ryan was here, and we will continue this discussion, I am sure.

I will.

Thank you.

As we continued listening to my friend and colleague Mr. Ryan talk about the amount of land that is open for drilling, it is only 3 percent of the Outer Continental Shelf. That is only 3 percent of it. There are only 6 percent of the Federal lands on shore that are open to drilling. Now, these oil companies may hold some of these leases, but why would you want to drill on something that did not have oil? I don't think that makes good sense.

He is talking about the $14 billion tax. Well, you know, I am not the smartest guy in the world, but I had an economics teacher, Colonel Walford, in high school, who made it very clear to me that taxing a producer or manufacturer did not lower the price to the consumer. You don't have to be an economist to understand that if you raise taxes on somebody, it is not going to lower the price to the consumer.

Now, the other thing is that the majority has been in control for 17 months. When they took over, the price of a gallon of gas was $2.26. Right now it is up over $4. I believe it was in April of 2006 that then Minority Leader Pelosi, now Speaker Pelosi, made the statement that the Democrats had a commonsense plan to bring down the skyrocketing price of gas. Now, it was probably $2.08 then, right at $2. So I don't know where this plan is.

They passed an energy bill in about January of 2007 that Mr. Ryan referred to, and in that energy bill they had specific language that said our government could not use certain alternative fuels. So they are saying one thing and then doing something else, and it is real confusing to the American people.

But I have something I want to unveil tonight, Mr. Speaker, for the American people. We have got some of it up here. What this is, Mr. Speaker, there have been all kind of petitions on the Internet. I went into a service station in my district and there was a petition there on the counter about the price of gas. There are petitions all over. Our constituents have an opportunity to go on the Internet and sign these petitions or go into their local grocery store or gas station and sign a petition for drilling, against drilling, for any variety of things as far as what the energy costs are that are affecting the average person.

So as I thought about this I said, you know, we need to make this simple. We need to make it so we have a petition for the House of Representatives. We have 435 Members here, and the American people need to know how their Representative would vote.

What would they be voting on? American energy solutions for lower gas prices, the things that we can control, our resources.

You know, China and Cuba are fixing to start drilling 45 miles off the coast of Florida. That's our natural resource, we could be drilling there, but we are not. So we have got 97 percent of the Outer Continental Shelf that we control we are not drilling on, 94 percent of the Federal lands that we have in this country, we are not drilling on. So we have got a real simple thing, bring onshore oil on line, bring deepwater oil on line and bring new refineries on line.

You might realize or might not realize that we haven't built a refinery since the late 1970s. We import, right now--this is probably going to surprise some people--we import 6.9 billion gallons of refined crude oil that's gasoline into this country every year, because we do not have the refining capabilities.

We had a motion to recommit, I believe, on May 22 that Mr. Conaway offered that said, within the 90 days, that the government would identify three locations on some of our military bases that have environmental problems, maybe, that the BRAC has closed immediately and in 90 days identify three of those to build new refineries. The majority voted against it. They stand and say one thing, but their actions do something else.

We need to build and expand our refineries, and we need to make this to where our oil companies are willing to invest. But when you import 6.9 billion gallons of gasoline and probably about the same amount of diesel fuel, that we come in.

What we have got is a petition here, and this petition starts out with Alaska at large, it goes out through Alabama and goes all the way through every State in this Union, and we have got everybody a district line.

Now, we just kind of, we had it back here in the corner today and some people came by and said hey, what you got, and I told them it's a petition. What the petition says, ``I will vote to increase U.S. oil production to lower gas prices for Americans.''

That's pretty simple. It's not convoluted, it doesn't have anything to do with anything other than Americans providing their own resources for our energy. Now, what's wrong with that? We are a country that is known for our resourcefulness.

Mr. Ryan mentioned the technology. Germany, back in the late 1920s, had technology that converted coal to fuel. That was back in the late 1920s. Surely technology has come to where it's better. We have got over a trillion, that is a trillion with a ``T'', barrels of shale oil out west, a trillion, a trillion, and we are not doing anything with it.

In fact, not only are we not doing anything with it, but Mr. Udall from Colorado last year passed an amendment that said we couldn't do anything with it, that we couldn't drill, and it passed this House 219 to 215. You might remember, I believe that was the stolen vote. But those are circumstances that we have got, and so we want the American people to know where their Congressman is at.

We have got this petition, we are going to update it, every day we are going to have it back on the floor. I have got two pencils with me today, two markers. If anybody is listening that's still in town, wants to come down, they can certainly come down. I will give them some time to speak and they can tell their constituency why they want us to support us using our natural resources, our resources to provide energy for our people.

I will yield some time to Mr. Burton of Indiana.

Let me say this, the American people sometimes get confused, just as you spoke about, the bill that was in the Senate. They don't hear all of the things that were in that bill. That's one of the reasons I wanted to make this as simple as I could. It is not confusing. This is not confusing.

If anybody calls their Congressman and asks them if they signed this petition--and, by the way, the one petition I found online, I think, was American Solutions had over 500 now people, I think it has been up for less than 2 weeks, have already sent in and said we want to drill. There is a radio station in Tampa, Florida, that has started sending drill bits to Members of Congress and Members of the Senate to show their support for drilling.

This is a radio station in Florida that's doing this, and I imagine it would probably catch on all over the United States, and we will probably have more drill bits. I hope they will send a whole set that we will have to remind these people that we need to rely on our own resources.

That's the reason that we made it as simple as we could. All it says is, ``I will vote to increase U.S. oil production.'' Ninety-plus percent of the Republicans in this House have consistently voted for more domestic oil production. Eighty-six percent of the now majority party have consistently voted against more domestic production. This is going to put everybody on equal footing.

Everybody has an opportunity to sign it. I hope we get 435 Members to sign it and then, Mr. Burton, we can get on with what you offered to Mr. Ryan that we could come together, because we really don't have an opportunity to come to the floor in front of the American people. We only have a certain time where we can do it.

Maybe we ought to get a 2-hour thing where we could all come down here and talk and see if we can't straighten some of these facts out, because the facts are totally different from what I am getting from land management and evidently what somebody else has gotten from land management.

Right now I am proud to yield as much time as he might take to my good friend from Georgia, Dr. Price.

I just wanted to say that in relation to that, between 2002 and 2007, 52 percent of all the exploration wells were dry, 52 percent of them, of all of them that they drill. So it's not all there.

Yes.

Sure.

Absolutely.

Thank you, and it is real simple, too. It can't be confused with anything else. American energy solutions for lower gas prices simply reads, ``I will vote to increase U.S. oil production to lower gas prices for Americans.'' It is real simple.

And what you were talking about, Dr. Price, is we are not going to drill in these leases that don't have oil. And when you've got I think it is 1.76 billion acres in the Outer Continental Shelf, and we have only opened up 3 percent of that. We have got 700 million on shore of Federal land that we have only opened up 6 percent to.

And let's look at this. Let's remember back because Mr. Ryan made a statement that it would be 10 or 15 years before we get any oil, and then it would be only 40,000 barrels a day. Let me remind the American people of this. In 1995, this Congress passed drilling in ANWR. Then President Clinton vetoed that bill in 1995, 13 years ago. Today, by conservative estimates, we would be getting 1 million barrels a day out of ANWR. Today.

Now Senator Schumer on the other side of the hall made a statement last week that if we could get Saudi Arabia or OPEC to increase production of a million barrels a day, it would reduce the price of gas 50 cents a gallon. Well, isn't that swell. That we are going to go to some people that haven't always been our friends, and we are going to say to the OPEC nations that we want them to drill. We want to use their natural resources, but we don't want to use ours. That doesn't make good sense. So just remember if President Clinton had not vetoed that bill in 1995, we would be getting a million barrels a day.

This might be a long-term plan, but you have to start some time. There has been a proposal by Senator McCain to give some temporary relief with a gas tax holiday during the summer to allow some people some extra spending money. It is not a great amount, but it is something.

We could also take off-road diesel and let people burn it on road. If you remember after Hurricane Katrina, there was a shortage of diesel. They didn't have any diesel and the EPA and the IRS got together and said all right, let's start burning this off road and let them use it for 30 days, and then I believe we extended it for another 30 days until we got the supply of diesel back.

So there are some commonsense things that we can do immediately. And Dr. Price hit on this. The day I believe that we pass some type of bill in this body that said we are going to look after our own solutions for energy from within our own natural resources, this oil speculation would come down. You wouldn't even have to put the first drill bit in the ground. Right now they understand that the majority that is in

control of this Congress are being held hostage by the radical environmentalists and that we are not going to do anything such as this with long-term planning about our energy future. And while we all want to conserve, we cannot conserve ourselves out of the dilemma that we are in right now. And so we have got to do something. We have to have some initiative to go forward. And right now, we are laying around in the fetal position talking about a commonsense plan that we had 2 years ago that we have not done anything about. So it is time for action.

You know, I have seen a knee-jerk reaction to everything up here. You let the least little thing happen, and we will have a knee-jerk reaction to it. And that is something. We have had tragedies that we have had. We put $140 billion down after Katrina, $62 billion in 2 weeks that we addressed down there, and it wasn't that we responded fast enough. So we have a habit of throwing money at things but not providing the boots on the ground or the substance to back it up.

Well, this is something that we just can't throw money at. This is something that calls for action. We, as the duly elected people by our constituents, we are the representatives of this country, and they sent us here to do something, not just lay here in a fetal position. And I yield to Dr. Price.

Yes, closed it down.

Going back to Hurricane Katrina and the fact that a large number of our refineries are on that gulf coast which is subject to hurricanes, it seems like we would take some proactive decisions and look at other places where we could put some of these refineries where they would not be as subject to hurricanes.

Once again, the people in New Orleans could not spend as much money as we sent down there as fast as they could. They needed action. They needed boots on the ground. They needed physical people down there helping them.

So we have an opportunity now to do something physical. We can put 435 pairs of boots on the ground right now and let the American people know that we are here to help. And what we are going to do, we are going to be at the forefront for making sure that we give the ability to extract oil and natural gas and clean-burning coal and any type of energy that we can from our own natural resources.

Now the Republican plan that Leader Boehner and others have put out talks about the on shore, online and that is estimated, and that is the shale and ANWR, that would save anywhere from 70 to $1.60 a gallon.

And if you look at the deepwater drilling, the OCS, that would be between 90 and $2.50 a gallon. And then the new refineries. And Dr. Price, before you got here, I made a statement that we import 6.9 billion gallons of gas every year, plus probably just as much diesel. But if we built a new refinery, it would save us 15 to 45 cents. So taking just a conservative estimate, that's about $2 a gallon that that would save us.

Now, if you look at the Democratic plan that they had, sue OPEC. Well, I don't think that's going to bring us in anything to reduce the price of gas.

They want to launch their seventh investigation into price gouging, their seventh. They've already had six investigations of price gouging.

They want to launch their fourth investigation into speculators, the fourth one. And they want $20 billion in new taxes on oil producers.

Now, here again, I've looked at all those things and I've kind of weighed both sides, and their savings is zero. Nada. Ours would be about $2 a gallon.

Is it going to happen immediately? No. Is it going to start happening immediately? Yes.

And so, what I wanted the American people to do with this, Mr. Speaker, is to allow them to see who's on their team for bringing down the price of gas, and who's on their team for using our own resources, rather than sending our President into foreign lands begging for other people to increase their oil production.

Dr. Price.

Well, we got about 20 signatures today just by showing it to people walking out the door.

And keep in mind, we only use 3 percent of those offshore resources. Only 3 percent. Out of 101.76 billion acres, we only use 3 percent of it.

Well, those resources, that shale that you're talking about, Mr. Udall from Colorado, if you'll remember, had an amendment on the bill that we passed in this House that said that was off, can't use it. Can't get it.

219-215.

And Senator Allard, from Colorado I believe, had an amendment in the Senate Appropriations Committee to overturn the Udall amendment, and it was defeated 15-14, along party lines.

But Dr. Price, that's the problem that the majority has because a lot of their base is the radical environmentalists don't care if gas goes to $10 a gallon. They don't want us driving SUVs. They really don't want us driving cars. They want us riding bicycles or motor scooters like you would see in China or somewhere in an Asian country. They don't want us driving. And they don't care how high gas gets. That doesn't matter to them.

And so that's a problem that the majority is facing. And I think one of the reasons they have not been quick to act is the fact that that has been a large part of their base.

But hopefully, the American people are going to realize that they can have a voice in this. They can have a voice, and that they can see, on a chart, how their person stands; are they for U.S. energy independence or not?

And so that's what we have given, a plain visual of them to be able to see.

I yield to you.

And I think you're right. And Mr. Burton's been here a lot longer than you and I have. But we have seen what complete authority is in this body, and really one person controls any legislation that comes on to this floor. So it wouldn't matter.

And we saw an example of that when we had the votes to pass the FISA bill, the national security bill. We had the votes to pass that in a letter that the Blue Dogs had sent to the Speaker. And our side we had enough to pass a good FISA bill that would have protected America, but we couldn't get it to the floor.

And so I think you're right, Dr. Price. I think there are many Members on the other side of the aisle that realize that we need to be looking at our own natural resources that would vote with us for a good plan, for a good energy program. But they'll never have the opportunity to do it.

And so that's the reason I felt the need to have this chart, so at least they can tell their constituents, hey, look, if leadership would bring this up, I'd be with you. But they won't bring it up.

Mr. Burton.

And we can get out of the fetal position and start some action. And that's what we need to be doing.

And you brought up a great point. Cooking oil, the fat, the grease pots that are there that people are actually going and robbing these things and making a biodiesel fuel out of it.

We've got some companies up in northeast Georgia that are making biodiesel out of chicken parts. The ingenuity is out there. We have just got to feed that and make these people have some ideas to come up with it. And we're not doing that. And that is an immediate thing that we could do.

The other thing we could do is propane. You talk about natural gas. You know, propane conversion was going very well in this country. And it's clean burning. It was going great. And then the EPA said no, you've got to do these specific tests on every different type of engine, on every different make of car.

And rather than going to the people that are making these propane conversion engines, these natural gas conversion engines, the hydrogen cell, we need to be putting every dime we've got towards technology and the hydrogen cell, because this is something that is very real that would really solve a whole bunch of our energy problems. But, rather than the government going to them and saying, how can we best help you develop a conversion energy from gasoline to natural gas, or from gasoline to propane, gasoline to a hydrogen cell, what can we do to help you? We don't do that. We put regulations on them and taxes that burden them from doing anything.

The slant drilling.

These are top exporters of gasoline into the United States in millions of barrels. Now these are exporters to us in gas, not crude oil, in gas.

United Kingdom, 147 million barrels a year. That's about a billion gallons; the U.S. Virgin Islands import 990 millions of gasoline to us; France, 470 million gallons; Canada, 445 million gallons; the Netherlands, 441 million gallons; Norway, 353 million gallons.

And let me say this, 20 years ago, Norway--it may have been a little bit longer ago than that--Norway was kind of dependent on foreign oil. And Norway, they're basically a tourist, fishing, snow skiing country. They are now the second largest exporter of crude oil in the world because they said we're going to drill and use our own natural resources.

Germany. We import 250 million gallons of gas every year from Germany; 310 from Russia; 410 million from Italy, and 231 million gallons of gasoline we import from OPEC countries.

Think about this. Think about the number of jobs that would come here, that we would have ourselves bringing new refineries, expanding them, drilling, taking this shale out of the ground. These would create good-paying American jobs. We have a lot of people from this country that are in OPEC countries and in other nations that are working on these rigs, they're making big money. They could be doing the same thing right here in this country.

And we've got about 5 minutes left and so I want to just--I will end my part, and I will let everybody have a little bit of time.

I want to end my part in saying that I have tried to come up with as simple a way of getting information to the people of this country, Mr. Speaker, as I knew how on drilling. Because like I said, I have heard and gotten e-mails from this petition on this site, this petition on that site, and the one most people are doing is the American Solutions site, which I think has over 500,000 signatures now about drilling. You have got radio stations in Florida sending drill bits. And then I listen to all of the talk down here, and it is so confusing for people to understand exactly what we have voted on, what got enacted, what didn't get enacted.

So I wanted to come up with the simplest thing I could, and I came up with this petition: American energy solutions for lower gas prices. Brings onshore oil on line, bring deepwater oil on line, bring new refineries on line. And then it's simply asking 435 Members--we're giving 435 Members an opportunity to sign a petition, this is our energy petition, that says, I will vote to increase U.S. oil production to lower gas prices for Americans. And that's about as simple as we can get.

Dr. Price, would you like to close?

I yield back the balance of the time.

Madam Speaker, more smoke and mirrors that we are hearing this morning from the majority party about, oh, there is plenty of land to drill in, the big oil companies just aren't drilling. Let me just straighten that out just a little bit. Ninety-seven percent of the Federal offshore drilling sites are off-limits. Ninety-four percent of the federally owned onshore areas are off-limits. Fifty-two percent of the area that oil companies drilled in between 2002 and 2007 were dry holes. We need to allow these oil companies to drill in areas where there actually is oil.

I don't know the economics that the majority party has, but if there is no oil, why would you drill there? That does not make sense. If the government would sell companies leases that have oil in them instead of selling them places that turn out to be dry holes, then we would have more oil produced in this country. We imported over 600 million gallons of gasoline last year. We need to add to our refinery capabilities, also.

It is my honor to be here today, and I do want to thank my colleague, Sanford Bishop, for his hard work and helping me get the required number of signatures to get this commemorative coin, and anybody who has ever done that knows what a challenge it is to get the number of signatures required. I want to thank him and his staff; and also Edward Jones from my staff for all of their hard work and dedication that we have had over the months trying to get the requisite number of signatures.

For more than 200 years the United States Infantry has sought to protect our freedom. H.R. 3229 will honor the legacy of the United States Infantry with the minting of a commemorative coin. Eighty percent, as has been mentioned before here today, of American casualties are young men and women who have lost their life in battle were members of the infantry.

The Infantry Museum Foundation, in coordination with the United States Army, have already broken ground on this new National Infantry Museum. It has been my honor to visit it, and with General White walk through the street, the World War II street, to see the buildings that will afford our young men and women an opportunity to see what Army life was like during World War II. It also has the parade field which is now under construction, and will be a place where many ceremonies in the future will be held. Also, this building is going to be a green building. It is high tech. There is geothermal heating and cooling in the building. And as Mrs. Capito mentioned, a professional museum planner has worked very hard on this.

I would like to tell one story General White told me. In doing some of the exhibits, they have one exhibit where paratroopers are flying on a plane to jump out, and the architect of this one ride told General White, ``I don't know how we are doing on this. A lot of the people who are testing it are getting motion sickness, almost to a point of losing their lunch.''

And General White said, ``Then you're almost there.''

This museum is going to be a place where people can go in and feel the sense of battle that these young men and women feel.

And as you know, Fort Benning is the place where about 80 percent of our young men and women go that are going into harm's way in Iraq and Afghanistan and other places that we may send them, and it will give a great opportunity for them to go and see some of the legacy that has come before them and also give their families a chance to visit this great facility.

So it is with great honor that I introduce this bill, and I want to thank all of the cosponsors of this bill. It was amazing the number of people that I would go up to and ask to sign this legislation that said, you know, I spent 3 months of my life at Fort Benning going through my military boot camp; and so I hope that when this thing is open next year, that these Members that have gone through there and experienced that type of military life will

come down and join us in a grand opening.

Mr. Speaker, I ask all of my colleagues to please support this resolution.