Earl Blumenauer: “When it has never been clearer that the United States needs to catch up to the rest of the world dealing with energy…”

“When it has never been clearer that the United States needs to catch up to the rest of the world dealing with energy efficiency and global warming, even the supporters of this legislation agree with the taglines in the New York Times and the Washington Post, ``it is not a disaster'', ``it could have been worse''. Forget about explaining to our grandchildren; how will the Members of this Congress explain to next Congress' interns about why we settled for the lowest common denominator, continued to finance both sides of the war on terror with our continued dependence on Middle East oil. If we could not get landmark legislation, hopefully this bill will be a tombstone for the energy policy for the last century.”