Judd Gregg: “I wish to continue what I think has been a fairly lively and informative discussion on the Energy bill which is before…”

“I wish to continue what I think has been a fairly lively and informative discussion on the Energy bill which is before us. A lot of the time has been focused, of course, on the language which exempts the manufacturers of MTBEs from liability and which does it in a retroactive way which is extremely penal to those States that decided to use their rights to try to protect the ground water of the populace by bringing lawsuits and, as a result, will now be barred from those lawsuits, not only prospectively but actually ex post facto. That seems to be an outrage in and of itself, of course, coupled with the fact an additional $2 billion is going to be spent to subsidize the companies that are producing the MTBE. That just adds insult to injury. The list of issues involving MTBE goes on and on, and they have been explored at considerable length on the floor. I want to return to another element of this bill that concerns me, and that is the fact that it is extremely profligate in its use of Federal tax dollars and especially the manner in which those tax dollars are used. It would be appropriate to have an energy policy in this country. That is absolutely necessary, in fact.…”