So again, you really feel that if what is in this legislation was in place, in your opinion, this probably would not have happened.

Fortunately, the Senate, along with the House and President Bush, is moving forward in developing an energy policy to help alleviate these constraints.

the problem here in the Senate is that there is never a perfect piece of legislation, and too often, we let the perfect get in the way of something that is good

Well, it would be very important to this Senator and to Senator Carper if you could communicate that to several of the Senators on my side of the aisle

So that right now, the power is in the States to get utilities to join RTOs, and this legislation would give FERC the power to order them in?

They are responsible for siting it, correct?

So it is a governmental responsibility to make interstate commerce flow effectively, and that is not in anything before the Congress.

FERC should be able to say, these lines have to be sited. We are looking at the big picture. It has to be done.

I am particularly interested in whether or not the language in the energy bill... is adequate to get the job done

I happen to believe that this should stay in the energy bill. It is long overdue that this country have an energy policy.

I think it has got potential to really clarify a lot of issues here.

I want to commend the administration for its leadership. President Bush moved quickly to create the U.S.-Canada Joint Task Force on the power outage.