I see that my opponent in Illinois 6^th District, Congressman Peter Roskam, is in Washington today doing typical election year grandstanding. He claims to be at work lowering gas prices. However, he has spent the past two months delivering Big Oil’s message to the House floor instead of protecting 6th District consumers. He voted against preventing price gouging, he voted against requiring oil companies to drill on land they already lease and he continues to be the spokesman for his Big Oil contributors, who have given him in excess of $100,000.

The consumers in the 6th Congressional District need relief on high gas prices right now, not ten years from now. I agree with Senator Obama that we need to release oil from the Strategic Reserves today to get gas price relief immediately. When we have released oil from the reserves in the past, gas prices have gone down within weeks. Unfortunately Roskam and many of his Republican colleagues voted against this proposal too.

I’ve watched Roskam repeatedly vote against bills designed to help the consumer, and now he’s backing legislation which gives Big Oil even bigger profits, without providing the real relief at the pump that consumers need. I worry that this ploy is designed to work in Roskam’s best interest, but not in the best interest of the people in Illinois 6^th District.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, August 5th, 2008 at 9:44 am and is filed under Uncategorized .