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August 04, 2008

Sens. Landrieu & Corker Discuss Energy

Hannity & Colmes

HANNITY: Joining us now, two members from the Gang of Ten, Tennessee Senator Bob Corker and my good friend, Louisiana Senator Mary Landrieu.

Senator Landrieu, we missed you. How are you?

SEN. MARY LANDRIEU (D), LOUISIANA: I'm just fine. Thank you for asking me to come back on. And I'm glad to be with my good friend, Bob.

HANNITY: And your good friend, Sean Hannity. We missed you. Welcome back. I actually think, Senator, we're going to agree tonight. The reason I'm saying that is we had a little bit of a run-in the last time the Senator was on.

All right. Here's what I want to ask. Senator Landrieu, Barack Obama says it's going to take ten years. It's not going to have an impact on prices. He wants a windfall profit tax on oil companies. That has been his position.

Now I'm trying to think, during World War II our Navy was decimated. We were able to organize our armed forces, defeat the Nazis, defeat imperial Japan. We did it in four and a half years. The country that did that, are they incapable of getting that oil for ten years?

LANDRIEU: Well, Sean, I am very happy that Senator Obama came out just a few days ago and said that he would look favorably -- I don't know if he used the word "endorsed," but he was happy to see some of the things in this bipartisan plan that we've worked so hard on.

I believe, and our group believes, that this country has its own resources to become energy secure and maybe even energy independent by drilling more right here at home. And I was pleased that Senator Obama has at least indicated that he's willing to look at this plan and said he liked some of the portions of it, and I'm hoping that John McCain will say the same, because we don't need an election-year issue. We need a Bill to lower prices.

HANNITY: Well -- well, but you've got to admit, it's the Democrats. It's Harry Reid in the Senate. It's Nancy Pelosi, specifically, in the House. She said this weekend that she is trying to save the planet.

Now, I'm with you. I'm for wind; I'm for solar; I'm for nuclear technology, coal mining expansion, refineries, and drilling. I say do it all so we lessen our dependence. I think Sean Hannity and Mary Landrieu found -- found agreement. You agree with all that?

LANDRIEU: We do. And I don't agree with Speaker Pelosi's -- Speaker Pelosi's position. I think she's got, you know, a tough situation on her hands, because more and more Democrats and Republicans are coming together and saying, "Look, where we know we can't drill our way out."

HANNITY: Yes.

LANDRIEU: "We know we can't conserve our way out, but we can do both. And we should do it now." And that's what our group has stepped up to do, and I'm very proud of the effort. It was tough, but we're laying out something that's very reasonable that we're going to...

HANNITY: Absolutely. And Bob Corker, what's really dangerous is, if we look at our economic security, that T. Boone Pickens' ad shows the largest transfer of wealth in history, but more importantly for national security reasons.

I mean, a lot of the oil we're importing are from countries that do not like Americans, and we have as many resources as they have in the Middle East. How were the Democrats like Nancy Pelosi allowed to dictate and promote an up or down vote for the American people?

SEN. BOB CORKER (R), TENNESSEE: Well, it's an unusual position to take. The transference of wealth, if we continue at this pace, is going to be $10 trillion over the next decade, and what we've tried to do is offer a Bill that focuses on production, that focuses on conservation, focuses on alternatives. As you've mentioned, all of the above. It's a very pragmatic, practical approach to energy, and my sense is that it will be the centerpiece of discussions in September when we come back.

COLMES: Senator, it's Alan Colmes. Senator Landrieu, welcome back to the show, as well.

Senator Corker, one of the things here is that part of the plan is higher taxes for the oil companies by excluding them from tax credits available to other industries. You're going to get conservatives to go along with that?

CORKER: You know, there's a number of people that have already supported, on the Republican side, exclusion of 199 for the oil companies.

If you look at how this came into place, it was almost serendipity that it occurred, if you will. In 2004, it wasn't initially intended for oil companies, and it's something that, look, I think we ought to pay for any Bill that we do.

Let me put it in perspective. Several months ago we packed an economic stimulus package where, in essence, we dropped $168 billion out of a helicopter and spread it across America.

This is an $84 billion Bill. By the way, I voted against that. This is an $84 billion Bill that's paid for that can change the energy dynamic in our country and truly move us to a direction that we've needed to move to for a long, long time.

COLMES: Senator Landrieu, among the other issues here...

CORKER: This is something worth paying for.

COLMES: One of the other issues here is Florida. You've got both senators, one Republican and one Democratic, both oppose the plan to drill on the eastern Gulf there, which is what your Bill calls for. How do you reconcile that, because Florida -- Floridians feel they don't have a say on this, because they can't vote on it?

LANDRIEU: Well, actually, one of the senators, Mel Martinez, is looking very carefully. He has not -- you're correct -- endorsed the plan. But he says that something reasonable, giving Florida a buffer zone and giving Florida 37 1/2 percent of the revenue.

I mean, states looking for money, transportation, for coastal restoration, for other worthy projects in their state, could get a lot of money from drilling safely off the coast. We've learned how to minimize the footprint. We know how to look for oil and gas. We didn't know several decades ago. We've only explored 6 percent of the Outer Continental Shelf.

So I know we've got to build support, but the American people deserve our best effort, and that's what Senator Corker and I plan, with our group, to give them.

COLMES: OK. We're -- we're glad to have you both on. Thank you so much for being on the program tonight.

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