Political Quotes

“today, at the request of the President of the United States, I am introducing his proposal to address power plant pollution in the Nation. Introduction of his bill is an important step forward in the long progress of amending the Clean Air to ensure that we are both improving air quality and building upon the most successful environmental program in Federal law, the Acid Rain Program. One of the first goals that I announced when I became Chairman of the Environment and Public Works Committee in 1999 was to craft a multi- emissions bill for the utility sector. It was a new idea at the time, and we have had to work hard since then to build support for the concept. Recently the Environment and Public Works Committee held a markup during which four separate legislative approaches to a multi- pollutant system were considered, one of those was a complete substitute that I presented to my colleagues. Today the President offers us a fifth option for our consideration. Each of these legislative drafts contain worthy and groundbreaking ideas as to how we can move forward on the difficult area of reducing air pollution without harming our economy. None is exactly like the others, and there are some clear policy differences among them. I am obviously partial to my own approach, but all five should be discussed. I am confident that the Senate can, if we work together in a bipartisan fashion, find a consensus approach that will be acceptable to a majority of Senators.”