Pete Domenici

Mr. DOMENICI

Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, how much time do I have remaining?

Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, I thank Senator Gorton for the remarks he made. I don't think people remember that when we first started this movement toward more flexibility and control by local government and accountability, Slade Gorton offered the first amendment. And there has been a constant evolution in that direction. I personally thank him for it.

Mr. DOMENICI. I yield 10 minutes to the Senator.

Mr. DOMENICI. If the Senator will be patient a moment, how much time does the Senator want?

Mr. DOMENICI. I yield up to 20 minutes to the distinguished Senator from New Hampshire.

Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, how much time do I have in opposition to the amendment?

Mr. DOMENICI. Could I say to the distinguished Senator from Alaska, there are only two ways I can think of that he could save his time: We could close up shop right now, and we are not going to do that, so there is an hour on each side. You could get consent, and you tried and haven't gotten that. So anybody offering an amendment tonight has an hour on each side if they want to use it. If they want to yield it back, they can yield back. Any amendment to an amendment has a half- hour, and we go that way until we finish tonight. I can tell you, I think you made as good an argument tonight as you can make. I don't think there are many votes going to be changed. I already complimented you immensely. I do it again. There will be 2 minutes before the vote. They will be in your control.

Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, I thank the distinguished chairman of the Energy and Natural Resources Committee. From the first knowledge we had that the OPEC cartel plus their friends had dramatically decreased production, thus having this terrible impact on American energy costs, Senator Murkowski has been trying every day, every time he could, to tell us we are doing things exactly the opposite of what we ought to be doing for America's future. I compliment him. He has a lot of people wondering about what we are up to. Frankly, I would like to add a little bit to that. While the United States grows more dependent upon foreign crude oil, we have an administration that, from the first day they went in office until today, has been engaged in seeing to it that the United States produces less oil--not more--from our own lands by overt, conscious acts of withdrawing real estate that we own as a nation on which to explore for oil and gas, to a constant insistence that we cannot solve the little, tiny problem of what do we do with nuclear waste, which every country in the world except America has solved. They have solved it at least for 50 to 100 years. We sit around acting as if we can continue to be dependent upon the very limited sources of energy for this great country's future. I will give a couple of facts about what has happened to the American energy economy, the production of oil in America, by Americans for Americans. In 1990, there were 405,000 jobs in America in the exploration and production of oil and gas. As of last year, there were 293,000, a 27- percent decline in people employed in the exploration and production of oil and gas in America. When you reduce the number of people involved in oil and gas exploration by 27 percent, there has been something consciously happening that says we will produce less in America. Ten years ago, there were 657 rigs working on oil exploration in the United States. Everybody understands what that is. Now there are fewer than 175. We did something wrong. Somebody would stand up from the administration and say: The cartel had something to do with that; they lowered the price of oil. But we didn't have a policy that said to our companies, in spite of that, we will help you explore for more. As a matter of fact, we had the opposite policy. New refineries in the United States: It used to be, if you could have an oil refinery and attach to it all the refined products that go with it, you would be delighted. It would employ your people. They are high- paying jobs. Guess what. In the United States, while we grow dependent, here we are with not a single new refinery built in the United States since 1976. That means we have decided other countries ought to produce the refined products we need and we ought to have such strict requirements that it is impossible for Americans to build them with American money and American workers to produce more refined products in our country--the opposite policy we ought to have. If we had another time and another day, we could discuss why Americans will not invest in oil refineries in the United States. I can tell you one of them, and I will use three initials for starters--the Environmental Protection Agency of the United States. Unreasonable restrictions, costing billions of dollars, that any neutral party would say are unreasonable, we impose them. When they can pay for them, they do; when they cannot pay any longer, they say: We will not refine anymore; we will do it somewhere else. There are Federal lands available for exploration. I suggest we have done it exactly the wrong way since this President has been in office. We have taken lands out of production because we have this kind of whimsical idea, if they are public lands, we sure don't want to find an oil rig out there. In fact, it is an attitude. We have to put up with oil rigs, but we really don't want them, even though it is ``black'' money for American workers. It is oil for American cars. It is America's investment. But it is like public domain. Man, we ought to just save that and forget about this dirty business of producing oil. That is America's policy today. I wish I could share with you, although I don't have the notes, how many thousands and thousands of acres we have taken out of production, out of development, because of what I have been explaining for the last 3 or 4 minutes. That leads us to tonight. In the past, I have heard Senators on the floor of the Senate talking about their States with great enthusiasm, great concern about what is happening to their States. I will tell you why Frank Murkowski and Senator Ted Stevens are concerned. If we were to produce oil in ANWR on one one-hundredth of 1 percent of the land, 2,200 acres is what we would need to explore for oil in a modern way and produce it in ANWR. That would produce 16 billion barrels of oil, produced by Americans, American workers, American oil for Americans. What does that mean in dollars? It means one-half trillion. Think of that, I say to the Senator from Wyoming. In the State of Wyoming, we have oil locked up. It is worth half a trillion for your workers, for your companies, for your businesses, and we are locking it up for the reasons Senator Murkowski stated, that we wanted to lock up Prudhoe Bay. We found none of the predictions about Prudhoe Bay were true, and none of them will be true about this one either. But it is as if we are kind of economically arrogant. We are so powerful and so strong that we do not have to worry about American oil for American people, produced by Americans, used for American cars. We just have to say this little tiny piece of property, just a strip of ANWR that you could go and explore to find out if it is there and then insist they advise the Congress if there is any environmental damage--they will not let us do that. I submit we ought to vote on this. I also submit anyone who votes no on this ought to be asked: What do you think America's future is? More oil from the cartel or less? With that, I yield to the distinguished Senator from Alaska. I thank him.

Mr. DOMENICI. So we need 4 minutes before we vote at 5:30, and the rest of the time will be divided equally, which is giving him a very big break, but I am glad to do it.

Mr. DOMENICI. We need 2 minutes to talk about the amendment that is up, that is going to be called up. Why don't we split the remaining time.

Mr. DOMENICI. At what time are we supposed to vote?

Mr. DOMENICI. He has used 12 minutes. How much time has he used on his amendment?

Mr. DOMENICI. Twelve only? Whatever anyone wants to do, we have to leave some time.

Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, I thought we had an implicit understanding when I yielded back all my time on the amendment that Senator Conrad would offer his amendment, it would be a half-hour on his side on his amendment and a half-hour on our side. That is what second-degree amendments carry.

Mr. DOMENICI. I yield back the time and assume the time has been consumed on the Allard amendment.

Mr. DOMENICI. The Senator has 2 minutes under the unanimous consent to do that.

Mr. DOMENICI. Wouldn't you rather speak before your amendment is voted on?

Mr. DOMENICI. Up until the time we allow 2 minutes for each amendment.

Mr. DOMENICI. Under my proposal, we yield back our time on Allard, he yields back his time, and we are finished with Allard except for the 2 minutes.

Mr. DOMENICI. I am ready to let the Senator proceed with his amendment although there is time remaining. I want to yield my time. If the Senator will yield his time, he will not have time left except the 2 minutes for each side.

Mr. DOMENICI. So they have 2 minutes each.

Mr. DOMENICI. The unanimous consent said each of them can speak 2 minutes before the vote. That is agreed to in the unanimous consent; is that correct?

Mr. DOMENICI. We have been working very well together on this but I don't want to agree to that. That means on your side you have 10 minutes to speak on the education matter and you have not yielded anything to us in opposition.

Mr. DOMENICI. It could, and it could be tax cuts in the future, which is not what Republicans have been thinking either. The Senator from Colorado says he doesn't intend to affect them. But the truth is we don't know that.

Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, I say to the Senator that all good intentions are attributable to this amendment. But this amendment prejudges everything that we need for the next 5 years, and perhaps 5 years after that. Assuming we know right now about everything we need-- and we ought to use his number, which is 4 percent for defense and everything else--and decide all the rest goes on the debt, then budget committees will start with those ground rules in the future. Pretty soon, we will just write a budget right here on the floor like this. We don't have to meet. Nothing happens any differently every year. We just determine this is exactly how much will be left over, and all the rest goes to the debt. I am already against the amendment. I don't think it is the right thing to do. I didn't yield time off my amendment, but I would have if I had been here.