David Thomas: “actually, this would be a lot more fun if it was real. It is the phoniest debate I have heard in a long, long time. If…”

“actually, this would be a lot more fun if it was real. It is the phoniest debate I have heard in a long, long time. If we look at the amendment, this significant move on the part of Florida is going to last until April 1, 2002; maybe April 2001 is more appropriate than 2002. The fact of the matter is if they were serious, they would have made it permanent. They did not make it permanent because it costs money. We have heard about this particular area. It is in the Gulf of Mexico. The area looks like this. Why does it have this long neck? Because Florida said they did not want any drilling over there within 100 miles of their coastline. Frankly, most of the natural gas is probably in this area. So there was an agreement between Florida and the other States. Mr. Chairman, this literally is 200 miles from Florida there and 100 miles from Florida there. But here is the dirty little secret that no one in Florida will tell you. Guess what this line is right across the gulf? That is an already-agreed-upon pipeline 740 miles to supply oil and gas to Florida. No, they do not want to drill near you, but they want the oil and gas to use. How hypocritical can you be? How far is 100 miles? It is from New York City to Scranton, Pennsylvania. It is from Madison, Wisconsin, to Waterloo, Iowa.…”