Byron Dorgan: “the bill on the floor of the Senate deals with energy. While there are many important things we discuss in Congress…”

“the bill on the floor of the Senate deals with energy. While there are many important things we discuss in Congress these days, energy ranks right near the top, in my judgment. I have indicated previously that most of us take energy for granted. We get up in the morning and turn on the hot water, and that comes from energy. We flick a light switch, and that comes from energy. We get in the car and turn the ignition key, and that comes from energy. I told a story a while back about John Glenn and energy. I was on a trip with John Glenn, the former astronaut and former Senator. I was a young boy when John Glenn orbited the Earth in Friendship 7. Late one evening on what was the old Air Force One, a group of us were flying to Asia, and John Glenn was with the group. We were meeting with heads of state in several governments, Vietnam and China and so on. We were flying over the Pacific late at night in this little cabin in this Air Force 707. I leaned forward and began to ask John Glenn about his first space flight. I pumped him with a lot of questions. One of the questions I asked him about was whether he actually saw Perth, Australia. The history that has been written about this, and I recalled as a kid, was when John Glenn, up there alone in this tiny little capsule orbiting the Earth in Friendship 7, was orbiting the Earth and went to the dark side of the Earth, the town of Perth, Australia, decided they would all turn on their lights.…”