Thank you. As I am listening to your presentation, talking about what could have happened, what should have happened, and looking at the magnitude of the devastation that we are facing in an ongoing disaster, I was reflecting on my experience here in the House under Republican control and the Bush administration where their first instinct--the gentleman will recall because he was an important elected official just across the Potomac and had a front-row view of what was happening here--that the Vice President convened a secret energy consultation group, his energy task force, which to this day has not been revealed in terms of who were the members--although we're most certain that there were people from BP, for instance, that were there-- that from the outset it was all about trying to cut through these red tape items, the environmental protection, things that got in the way of energy production, and not focusing on priorities that would have reduced our reliance on fossil fuels. Indeed, there were 105 recommendations. Only 7 involved renewable energy.…
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