Political Quotes

“I also say about a Bond-Levin amendment that will be offered that it does not set goals for increased fuel economy for oil savings. That is unfortunate. It gives the decisionmaking over to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. They do not have a very good track record in holding the automobile maker selling in America to increased fuel efficiency. I like dual E85 vehicles. I think those are sensible. Sadly, at this point, there are very few places to turn to to buy the fuel. My colleague, Senator Obama, was talking about a tax treatment that would give incentives to set up these E85 stations. It was, unfortunately, not included in this bill. I think it should have been. Right now, there are precious few to turn to. Dual-fuel use is part of the Bond-Levin amendment, but it is a very rare occurrence where you can actually find the E85 fuel to put in your car. Plus, we find when they are dual-fuel use vehicles, which the Senators rely on a great deal for their savings, fewer than 1 percent of the people actually use the better fuel. They stick to the less fuel efficient source of energy for their car. They do not use the E85 fuel. Sadly, the Bond-Levin amendment will increase our 2015 oil consumption by almost as much as we currently import from Saudi Arabia. So no more fuel efficiency, a response to the problem which is not realistic and, unfortunately, even more dependent on foreign oil in the future. Mr. President, I reserve the remainder of my time.”