Rush Holt: “The obstacles this bill creates would hinder that kind of collaboration.”

We have not raised the civil penalties that can be levied by the Interior Department against oil companies that violate the law so that they are a meaningful financial deterrent.

These bills are relics of a bygone area--as relevant as the telegraph or the horse and buggy.

Many of these measures passed the House in the last Congress but were too extreme to pass the Senate.

This obstinacy by the majority won't stop my efforts to draw attention to these issues, to push for adoption of serious, meaningful reforms to make offshore drilling safer, not just more prevalent.