Political Quotes

“Mr. President, I had a good time this afternoon listening to the debate on the amendment I have offered and visiting with Senators. I think there is an important distinction that needs to be made in the arguments that have been brought forward. The first is we have a mandated level of ethanol that has to be produced and blended into gasoline, and it grows from now on. There will be zero job losses if this amendment is approved. The second thing is, my colleague--and I love him to death--from South Dakota says we are going to save $1 billion. We can save $3 billion if we eliminate the VEETC blending subsidy. Now, why should we do that? Here is a subsidy that goes to all the blenders of gasoline in the United States--all of them--and they all have called and written and said: We do not want the $3 billion for the rest of the year. We do not want it. We actually have a letter from the National Petrochemical and Refiners Association, which they are all members of, saying: We do not want this money. So the best way to get money against the deficit is to not give money to people who do not want it on something that is already mandated anyway. I spent a great deal of time listening to my colleague from Iowa, Senator Grassley, and his figures were very good. But they were only up through 2008. According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, 40 percent of last year's corn crop was utilized, converted to ethanol.…”