David Thomas: “First of all, I want to talk about energy. Certainly, during this whole year we have been giving consideration to and…”

“First of all, I want to talk about energy. Certainly, during this whole year we have been giving consideration to and having some emphasis on energy. The public interest has been higher, and we have problems. When gas prices are higher, everybody recognizes the issue that we have with energy. But when those settle down a little, the problem is still there. We in the Congress have tried to deal with it for this whole year. Now we are in the process of having a conference committee try to come out with conclusions. I just wanted to urge that we move forward with the conference committee and that we finally come up with an energy policy in this country. We do not have one. We find ourselves in the position of being nearly 60 percent dependent on importation of oil in order to meet our needs. We don't want to be in that position, particularly with the unrest in the Middle East from where much of our oil comes. We certainly need to find solutions that will make us less dependent. It is not only an energy issue, it affects our economy. I do not know of anything that affects our economy more than energy.”