Lowering Gas Prices: “Find More, Use Less”
Tennesseans are feeling the pain at the pump. Hundreds of Tennesseans have written me with their stories about how record-high fuel costs are affecting their family budgets. I read some of those stories on the Senate floor to share with my colleagues and the rest of the country.
Pat of Morristown, who is the director of the local Meals on Wheels program, told me the drivers travel 1,100 miles a day to deliver meals, but food and gasoline prices could force many meal recipients into retirement homes if something is not done. Abbie of Johnson City is a third-year medical student at East Tennessee State University. She said cost-of-living loans do not cover expenses or traveling to all the area hospitals and medical centers, and most of her fellow students are living by maxing out their credit cards. Jonathan, a Marine for 18 years, is a Tennessee native who returned from 12 months in Iraq. His family was given a flat rate for moving costs. Gas is so high, they have had to make cuts in about everything else, he says. He had to forego his family vacation because it is too expensive to go on now. Christy in Maynardville is a diabetic. She is having trouble paying for her insulin shots due to the rising gas prices. She says: “Gas for work or insulin to live. That is the decision I have had to make several times daily.”
It’s time Congress took action.
And that’s why I led a group of 22 Republican senators at an event to invite our Democratic colleagues to sign on to legislation to address these high costs. This bill – the Gas Price Reduction Act of 2008 – is already cosponsored by 44 Republican senators and can be summed up in four words: “Find more, use less.”
“Find more” means we would increase U.S. production by one-third through offshore exploration and western states’ oil shale. This will over time produce at least 3 million barrels a day. “Use less” means we would reduce imported oil by one third by making it easier for millions of Americans to drive plug-in electric cars and trucks. This will over time reduce Americans’ use of oil by 4 million barrels a day.
We shouldn’t be begging other countries to explore for oil when the United States is the third largest producer of oil and should make its own contribution to increasing the world supply. Republicans will do BOTH – find more oil and use less – and we intend to work hard and in good faith to find a way for Democrats to say “yes we can” to finding more oil, as well as using less.
Striving for Clean Energy Independence
The United States uses one-fourth of all the oil in the world, and our cars and trucks use almost all of that. When we buy less oil and use more electricity, we save money on fuel, make the air cleaner and reduce the dollars we send overseas to countries funding terrorists who are trying to kill us.
Earlier this summer, I co-hosted an event in Nashville about ways to combat our record-high gas prices that featured electric and hybrid vehicles from several automobile companies, as well as electric hybrid delivery trucks used by FedEx. Sixty percent of Americans drive less than 30 miles each day. Those of us who do could drive a plug-in vehicle without using a drop of gasoline. If we plugged them in at night, there is so much idle electric capacity available in existing power plants that Americans could over time replace three-fourths of our light vehicles with plug-ins. That could cut in half the amount of oil we import – or reduce our overseas oil bill from $500 billion to $250 billion at today’s prices. That’s good news for the environment as well as for our family budgets.
As we look for ways to use less oil, I’ll continue working to bring hybrid vehicles to the forefront.
Ensuring Every Vote Is Counted
It is very disturbing that nearly half of the 1 million absentee ballots requested by servicemen and women serving in the military or overseas in 2006 never reached election officials to be counted. As we look to the next election, we need to fix this problem.
That’s why I’ve joined in supporting legislation that would call on the Department of Defense to make it easier to collect and transport the ballots of military and overseas voters.
The bill – the Military Voting Protection Act of 2008 – would authorize the Defense Department to contract with services like FedEx and UPS to expedite shipping of ballots. The measures would apply to all regularly scheduled general elections for federal office, beginning in 2008.
Part of the problem is that the military is spread out in countries throughout the world, and voting in U.S. elections is a very local process handled by individual counties across the country. But the military has great logistics expertise, and making the Defense Department part of the process should make a big difference.
Improving the GI Bill for Veterans
On June 26, I voted for and the Senate passed an update of GI benefits for servicemen and women on active duty, those in the National Guard and reservists who have served since 9/11. It is a great improvement over earlier proposals because it now extends this educational opportunity to the spouses and children of these troops. But I’m still unhappy that this GI bill update passed by the Senate treats Tennessee veterans differently from veterans in other states when it comes to the amount of tuition payments, and that is why I will introduce legislation to correct this inequity.
Protecting an Individual’s Right to Keep and Bear Arms
I’ve always been a supporter of Second Amendment rights. Last month the Supreme Court ruled that a sweeping ban on handguns in the nation’s capital violated the constitutional right to bear arms. This was the right decision, because Americans in D.C. and everywhere have an individual right to keep and bear arms under the Constitution. I believe this decision is key to ensuring that law-abiding residents of the District of Columbia will be able to protect their homes and families from criminals who already have guns.
Helping Children With Food Allergies
This June, I joined Senator Corker and country music star Trace Adkins in Nashville to announce our support of a bill that help schools protect the more than 2.2 million children nationwide – including 41,000 Tennesseans – who suffer from life-threatening food allergies. Parents should be able to send their children to school without worrying that their son or daughter might suffer a life-threatening allergic reaction at the lunch table. Equally important, children should be able to attend school and focus on learning and on having fun.
We need to help our school administrators, teachers and nurses have the best training possible to keep safe the 41,000 children in Tennessee and millions throughout the country who suffer from potentially fatal allergies. The Food Allergy and Anaphylaxis Management Act will provide guidelines and grants that will make it easier for schools to prevent emergencies and be as prepared as possible if one occurs.
Respecting State Labor Laws
This spring, the Senate began debate on legislation that would impose unionization and collective bargaining rights for public safety employees on states that do not have existing statutes that meet minimum federal standards spelled out in the bill. The bill is called the Public Employee-Employer Cooperation Act, but a better name would be the "Washington Knows Best" or the “More Unfunded Federal Mandates” Act.
Every year that I was governor, and just about every year since, the state of Tennessee has considered whether or not it is in the public interest to force local communities to engage in collective bargaining with public employees. And the answer has consistently been, “No, it is not.”
It is inappropriate for Congress to overturn laws in Tennessee and 20 other states, effectively telling them that we know how to run their communities better than they do. That’s why I offered an amendment to the Public Employee-Employer Cooperation Act that would change the bill so that local communities could opt out if they concluded that the law would lead to higher taxes, cuts in other services or otherwise compromise public safety. I think the people of this country should admire, respect and honor our first responders. But we should also admire, respect and honor our Constitution and our federal system and say that we may have different opinions in different states and different cities about what we should do.
Filling Gaps in the TVA Board
In May, I had to fight Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid’s blocking of the appointment of Bishop William Graves, a Memphian, to the TVA Board. After a lot of back-and-forth, I was pleased to announce that Bishop Graves’ nomination was approved by the Senate, and on June 24 he was sworn into a new term as a member of the TVA Board. After twelve years on the Memphis Light, Gas and Water board – and as the only Memphian and only African-American ever to serve on the TVA board – he will continue to serve our region well.
Supporting the National Parks Centennial Challenge
This month, I’ve joined a bipartisan group of senators to cosponsor the National Park Centennial Fund Act to create a new source of funding for the Great Smoky Mountains National Park and other national parks across the country as part of the “Centennial Challenge” celebrating the 100th anniversary of the National Park System in 2016.
The funding for this bill would come through a new conservation royalty from offshore oil and gas exploration in the Gulf of Mexico. The Centennial Challenge could bring up to $4 million to the Smokies – the country’s most visited national park – and will go a long way toward improving park facilities, aiding conservation efforts and helping build upon the excellent visitor services already offered.
Celebrating American Eagle Day
This summer, the Senate unanimously approved my resolution designating June 20 as American Eagle Day and calling attention to the 2008 Bald Eagle Commemorative Coin Program, which could raise over $10 million for the American Eagle Foundation in Pigeon Forge, TN. American Eagle Day is a good opportunity to commemorate and recognize the great recovery story of the bald eagle, which rebounded in the lower 48 states from only 417 nesting pairs in 1963 to almost 8,000 nesting pairs in 2006. Now the Department of the Interior has officially delisted the bald eagle from both the “endangered” and “threatened” species lists under the Endangered Species Act. Additionally, the Bald Eagle Commemorative Coin Program – which was created by legislation I introduced in the Senate in 2004 – has been a great success and has raised over $5 million for the foundation’s efforts to protect the bald eagle, our national symbol.
