I continue to be awed by what can only be sheer disingenuousness or an incredible level of diminished capacity on the part of the embittered former Daschle staffers/bloggers regarding the efforts (or lack thereof) since November of 2003 to pass an energy bill. Even Denise Ross at Mt. Blogmore can't seem to get her facts straight on the matter, as can be readily observed by her recent post. (What's up with that nonsense about Delay blocking the bill in conference, Denise? The conference report is what passed on Friday. Get your facts straight.)
On November 21, 2003, the Senate failed by two votes to invoke cloture on the conference report to an energy bill. This bill included a provision to protect MTBE manufacturers from liability, but DID NOT INCLUDE a provision for drilling in ANWR. You can read the conference report yourself right here. You can search high and low through it for a provision on ANWR, but you'll never find it. Yet embittered former Daschle staffer Chad Schuldt keeps on saying ANWR was included in this bill, and won't issue a correction.
The embittered former Daschle staffers also keep on saying that the fact that the MTBE provision was included in the 2003 energy bill is why Daschle failed to use his clout to get two more Democratic votes to invoke cloture. If the MTBE provision had not been included, they say, Daschle could have gotten the votes to invoke cloture. That statement contradicts the following facts, which the embittered former Daschle staffers seem to have difficulty grasping (or worse, they are willfully ignoring the following facts in order to inflict another cheap shot on Senator Thune).
On April 29, 2004, the Senate was presented with the opportunity to vote on the energy bill again, this time without the MTBE provision or the ANWR provision. And once again, the Senate failed to invoke cloture on the energy bill, despite the fact that it DID NOT INCLUDE either the MTBE provision or the ANWR provision. I strongly encourage readers to click on the following link to the roll call vote to see for themselves that this was most definitely NOT "just an ethanol amendment": Roll Call Vote #74. The statement of purpose for the amendment is "To enhance energy conservation and research and development and to provide for security and diversity in the energy supply for the American people." Obviously, that's not just an ethanol amendment, as embittered former Daschle staffer Schuldt falsely states in yet another post on the matter. Here's what he says:
The “bill” Thune’s supporters are pointing to was an ethanol amendment, and not the energy bill at all.
That's an utterly false, inaccurate statement, borne out of ignorance or a willful disregard of the facts. Follow the links from Roll Call Vote #74. Look in the pages of the April 28, 2004 Congressional Record at the text of the amendment (pp. S4506 to 4605). This indeed was a vote on the energy bill. Significantly, nowhere will you find a provision on MTBE liability protection or ANWR drilling in this bill. The fact is, an energy bill without MTBE or ANWR was defeated on April 29, 2004, which completely contradicts the assertion that Daschle could have gotten the necessary votes to pass the energy bill had those provisions not been in the bill.
Where does that leave us? Since Daschle's ouster, an energy bill has now passed and will soon become the law of the land. Before Daschle's ouster, an energy bill could not get passed, even one that did not contain the controversial MTBE and ANWR provisions. Despite the tendentious claims and outright falsehoods by the embittered former Daschle staffers, the energy bill, with its ethanol provisions so important for South Dakota, could not have become law without the critical support, hard work, and effectiveness of Senator John Thune.
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