WASHINGTON, D.C. – Sen. John Kerry today responded to President Bush’s comments on offshore drilling this morning:

“Today President Bush dusted off the worst of the Cheney special interest giveaways that have created record profits for big oil and a 250% increase in gas prices for consumers these last seven years. Selling off our nation’s coastlines to the oil and gas companies won’t make a dent in gas prices. If you started drilling tomorrow, you wouldn’t even see a drop of oil until 2017. President Bush and his new ally John McCain should use a little straight talk and explain why we’re even having this debate when the oil industry has 68 million acres available today that they aren’t developing. This is a fraud of a policy and a false choice. Rather than doing the bidding of the oil companies, we need a serious long-term energy strategy that reduces our dependence on oil and promotes affordable clean energy sources to address the urgent threat of climate change and help consumers.”

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