Political Quotes

“Mr. President, what you will find with these issues is that they are bipartisan. Fish know no boundaries of political persuasion. They look at what is important to them. We like to catch them and eat them. So it does not matter where they come from, whether from the seas of Alaska or from the gulf. So I thank the Senator for the opportunity to say a few words. To Senator Whitehouse, my thanks for organizing and allowing this opportunity. I will tell you, we do not mean to outnumber you, having two Alaskans here. We are so dedicated to this issue. I can tell you having this opportunity to have these four treaties ratified is incredibly important for us. I know lots of times we talk about illegal, unreported, unregulated fishing. I like to simply call it pirate fishing. These are people who steal our fish out of our waters and then try to sell them back to us. Clearly it is what it is: stealing our stock and packing our fisheries and passing, as was just mentioned, the cost to our markets of $23 billion a year nationwide--worldwide--because of these pirate fishermen and fisherwomen. Alaskan crab fishermen, for example--for people who like to watch a reality show, ``The Deadliest Catch'' is one of those. ``The Deadliest Catch'' guys tell me that there is over a half a billion dollars in lost crab because of illegal imports that are coming in. They may be stolen or labeled incorrectly. The human impact is even more appalling, when you think about it.…”