White House Working Too Closely With Oil Companies

Sen. Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) criticized the relationship between the Bush Administration and oil companies, and discussed its negative effects on the country on This Week with George Stephanopoulos yesterday.

We need a bunch of things being done, which this administration doesn’t want to do. Number one is conservation. We have the worst conservation program in the world. China, a country that doesn’t even believe in the environment, has much better oil — gas mileage standards than we do.

Then we need a Manhattan Project to become independent of fossil fuels and, particularly, imported oil. We have to drop our exports in half in 10 years, and we can do it. But what happens is, because this administration believes what’s good for Exxon/Mobil is good for America, they simply do what the oil companies want. The oil companies are happy with high prices and record profits.