Political Quotes

“Madam Speaker, it is always an honor and privilege to speak on the floor of the House of Representatives where so much history has been made. There are a number of things we need to cover. I had some interesting things going on in the Natural Resources Committee today because we are taking up legislation as a result of the oil spill. Those pesky words keep resurfacing, ``never let a crisis go to waste,'' and it appears that is what is happening here. We had 11 people lose their lives in the Deepwater Horizon explosion. Many thousands may lose their livelihood. We know that it is the worst environmental accident we have had in the United States. It has been amazing that so little had been done to try to assist from the Federal Government. Eventually the Coast Guard came on board, but three days after this terrible accident, it is nations like the Netherlands that have extraordinary expertise in building barrier islands, in actually taking in water and separating out the oil, people that had all these wonderful inventions and ideas and things that would help capture the oil, should have all been utilized because so many of them have merit, and yet the Coast Guard kept turning them away. Kevin Costner had spent $10 million of his own money to see this thing developed that would separate oil and water and do so in large numbers, but didn't get a lot of attention. So I know there were a lot of pressing things to do.…”