Political Quotes

“I thank the Senator from Oregon. I have been thinking a lot about the job of the EPA Administrator. It is one of those things we have taken for granted over many, many years, that we are going to get someone who is going to sort of play it right down the middle of the fairway, but now we are forced to sort of challenge all of our assumptions with respect to what we can expect in an EPA Administrator. When I think about the Clean Air and Clean Water Acts, they are very important, especially for young people who are so passionate about the environment, as they may not know what life was like and what the environment was like before the Clean Water Act. The majority of waterways in the United States were not swimmable. You had rivers catching on fire. I went to college in Southern California in, I guess, 1990 through 1994, and the success of the Clean Air Act is incredible. I mean, L.A. still has its smog, but because of CAFE standards, because of the Clean Air Act, because of other environmental regulations, you don't have nearly the air quality problems that you had even 20, 25 years ago, and this is a nationwide success story. Kids had to stay home from school because of air pollution. I know everybody understands that is happening in Shanghai and in Beijing, parts of Africa, parts of the developing world, parts of the industrializing world. But 10, 20 years ago, you would have smog alerts, and kids would have to stay home from school in the United States of America.…”