Political Quotes

“I wanted to be recognized in opposition to this Carter amendment. This has nothing to do with saving costs. This has nothing to do with lowering the deficit. What this amendment would do is to stop EPA from going ahead and enforcing a rule that they put into place dealing with mercury toxic emissions. It took them 10 years to get that rule in place. And why did they finally adopt a rule? Because mercury is a powerful neurotoxin that causes learning disabilities and developmental damage, especially in young children. {time} 1530 Every year an estimated 60,000 American newborn babies are threatened with a diminished ability to think and learn due to exposure to mercury pollution. Now we have to balance things out. We want to protect the cement manufacturers. We want them to be profitable. But if we're going to let them continue with that mercury pollution, we're going to have 60,000 kids that are going to be born with neurological problems. Are we a Congress that cares about life? Well, I think we want both--the industry to prosper and to stop the poisoning of our kids. So we asked the Environmental Protection Agency to adopt a rule. They met with the industry people. They put out a proposed rule. They got comments to their rule. They finally put it into place. And now we would be asked under this amendment to stop it. As the gentleman from Texas suggests, go back and renegotiate. Well, there's nothing to renegotiate. There's no rule in place.…”