Mike Conaway: “I would not take offense--I should--but I won't take offense that the gentleman suggests that somehow this amendment has…”

“I would not take offense--I should--but I won't take offense that the gentleman suggests that somehow this amendment has anything to do whatsoever with respect to oil and gas that we produce in Texas. When you don't like the merits of your own argument, you go ahead and attack the folks on the other side, and I understand that technique. The truth of the matter is the Department of Defense can, in fact, make judgments for themselves once a product is available to them at commercial products. This just prevents them from going ahead and trying to build something, build up a market and build a fuel that no one else wants. It is only available here in the United States. It would not be available anywhere else in the world to fuel our airplanes, or our ships, or our tanks and other things. So, this is a misguided attempt driven by the White House on this green initiative that is spending millions and millions of dollars of taxpayer money, and it is a waste every time they do that. I would argue that the better argument is to say ``no'' to this, allow the Department of Defense to spend their dollars, as has been said previously, on guns, tanks, ships, and salaries for our soldiers. This is a wrong-headed tip. It ought to be authorized by the HASC and by the Senate equivalent, and these two subcommittees on Appropriations ought to be offended by this backdoor approach at spending hundreds of millions of dollars on a program that has no oversight. Mr.…”