On the recordJuly 9, 2014
I thank the gentleman very much for allowing me this privilege. I just wanted to rise in opposition to the gentleman's amendment and to say that one of the reasons we have a budget deficit is because we have an energy deficit. We have had an energy deficit for over a quarter century--well over three decades now--and every year, the average family in our country puts out over $2,800 now, just for gasoline for their automobiles. There were those who said we shouldn't incentivize the ethanol industry. Now, about 10 percent of every tank full of gasoline has ethanol in it, and that has reduced our imports. If you look at the hemorrhage from this country of over $10 trillion over the next quarter century with oil being $100 a barrel and you look at what is happening to the middle class in our country because we aren't energy independent, we had better be serious about changing the composition of energy production in this country because it is part of the major problem we face in lack of robust economic growth. You can't import economic growth; you have to produce economic growth. One of the major ways we can produce economic growth in this country is to invent a future different from the past, so I completely oppose the gentleman's amendment because you are going to increase the Federal deficit because economic growth will not increase at the level that it should be.…
