Jeff Denham: “I thank the gentleman for yielding. I rise today in support of the rule and the underlying legislation. The rule we have…”

“I thank the gentleman for yielding. I rise today in support of the rule and the underlying legislation. The rule we have before us today allows for an open process and provides this body the opportunity to debate an issue of increasing importance to our constituents back home. The future of our energy policy in this country is at stake here today, which is why I'm proud to cosponsor this bill reversing the President's offshore drilling moratorium. This past weekend, I visited with a number of constituents at gas stations throughout my district. Some are asking, Will we get to $5 gas prices? If you come to my district, we're already there. I visited Wawona, California, last week. Everybody likes to talk about tourism. In California, we've got a great deal of tourism. But everybody that I talked to at that pump said, We planned this trip quite a while ago. We can't afford to do it today. We wouldn't have done it had we known gas prices would have been this high. Well, gas prices are still going up. We're afraid that in Wawona, we'll see $6 gas prices. You want to affect tourism, try hitting America's pocketbook at $6 a gallon. But it's not just tourism. If you go to one of the farms in my district, diesel gas has gone up. If you are frustrated about paying higher gas prices, wait until you pay higher grocery prices, because in California's great ag economy, the prices are going up.…”