Political Quotes

“Mr. Chairman, my amendment prevents scarce dollars from being wasted to fund two of President Obama's executive orders regarding climate change and green energy. These are dollars that should go to the readiness of our Armed Forces. A similar amendment has already been adopted by voice vote for the past 2 years during House floor consideration of the Defense appropriations bills. My amendment is supported by 28 outside organizations, including the Competitive Enterprise Institute, Americans for Prosperity, Council for Citizens Against Government Waste, and many others. These executive orders require the Department of Defense to squander--squander--precious defense dollars by incorporating climate change bureaucracies into its acquisition and military operations and to waste money on green energy projects. EPA bureaucrats and other political appointees are directing our military commanders on how to run their installations and procure green weapons, which undermines ongoing acquisition reforms in the NDAA. These activities are simply not the mission of the U.S. military. Regarding DOD's energy policy, decisions by installation commanders and DOD personnel need to be driven by requirements for actual cost- effectiveness, readiness, not arbitrary and inflexible green energy quotas and CO<INF>2</INF> benchmarks. My amendment does not prevent the DOD from considering renewable energy projects where it makes sense. But these decisions should not be driven by these mandates.…”