Orrin Hatch: “at the center of our Nation's current financial crisis are our Nation's automakers and our homeowners. These are our two…”

“at the center of our Nation's current financial crisis are our Nation's automakers and our homeowners. These are our two areas that we cannot afford to ignore, if we are to have any hope of an economic recovery. I would like to focus on our automakers. Some economists have remarked that as our automakers go, so goes our Nation. Other economists have complained that the auto industry has been too slow to modernize and too slow to prepare for the future. We all know that 97 percent of our vehicles run on gasoline and diesel. But what you don't hear often enough is that American automakers are actually poised to lead the world into the next era of vehicle technology. They are prepared to produce flexible, affordable, attractive, and long-range vehicles that run on an alternative fuel that is much cheaper, much cleaner, more abundant, and completely domestic. That alternative fuel is electricity from our electric grid. Other than natural gas, there is no other alternative fuel that comes close to having so many of these qualities.”