Douglas Alexander: “I will give the Senator from New York an A+ for creative imagination. Here we are wanting to debate the climate change…”

“I will give the Senator from New York an A+ for creative imagination. Here we are wanting to debate the climate change bill--which is a 53-cent-per-gallon gas tax increase proposed primarily by Members of the other side, and which includes a $6.7 trillion slush fund that Members of Congress could spend as they see fit--and members of the majority party were so embarrassed by it they tried to bring it down and pull it from the floor. This is a bill we should be spending all month talking about. If it is really important to deal with gas prices and electricity prices and climate change and clean air and our overdependence on foreign oil, where are the debaters on climate change? That is the bill we are on today. We-- the Republicans--said let's continue to discuss this important issue. They said: No, let's bring it down. And for what purpose? To bring up their no-energy bill. Their solution to gas prices--very cleverly disguised by the Senator from New York--is more lawsuits, more taxes, and no exploration. Our solution is more American energy now. The Senator from New York said: Well, why should we drill in the 2000 acres of Alaska that would produce a million barrels of oil a day? It would be 10 years before we would see that oil. The answer is that it would be 1 million barrels of oil a day, which would add 1 million to the 6 million we produce.…”