U.S. Dependence on Foreign Oil Leads to Weaker Security (Sen. Larry Craig)

The reality is clearly that the demand in this country has outstripped supply by a significant amount. We have increasingly, since the 1950s, begun to have to go elsewhere than just in and around our country to meet the hydrocarbon or the crude oil needs of our refiners and, ultimately, the gasoline needs of our consumers. As that dependency has grown on foreign sources of energy, I would argue that America became increasingly less secure.

Now, I am one who in the 1980s, and probably the early 1990s, thought it would be just production, production, and more production. I have changed. I have spent a lot of time looking at the energy equation of our country over the last couple of decades and said, no, you have to do a variety of different things.