[ applause ] [ applause ] >> thank you, ladies and gentlemen. what an awesome speaker. a token of our esteem to you and be watching your chairmanship closely from the hills of vermont. this is something or core of the color guard wears and we'd like to present it to you as a remembrance of your time with us today. thank you, sir. [ applause ] >> they want you to put it on.

tonight, espn president john skipper on the network's expansion. cnn correspondent john king on the ways technology has changed cnn, and cox business senior vice president phil meeks and their small business focus, on the communicators, tonight at 8:00 on c-span2. tomorrow morning, attorney general eric holder testifies before the senate judiciary committee. one day after the house oversight committee scheduled a hearing to consider a contempt citation against the country's most senior law enforcement officer. the move comes as part of an investigation into "operation fast and furious" where the government knowingly allowed weapons to be smuggled across the border with mexico. you can watch live coverage beginning at 10:00 a.m. eastern over on c-span. on wednesday, jpmorgan chase

ceo jamie dimon testifies before the senate banking committee about the company's $2 billion trading loss. live coverage of that hearing on c-span and c-span radio. and the house financial services committee will hold its hearing on the public policy implications of jpmorgan chase's recent trading loss on tuesday, june 19th. live on c-span3 and c-span radio. pulitzer prize winning author david maraniss traveled the world, "barack obama: the story" examining the president's family tree. a preview with exclusive pictures and video including our trip to can kenya with the auth. join ug. your phone calms, calms and tw davis maraniss. c-span2s "book tv." interior secretary ken

salazar last week said critics of the barack obama's energy policies are "living in this world of fairy tales." speaking at an event hosted by the law firm eric fox and george washington university, the secretary defended the administration's record on domestic oil and gas production saying new exploration off the arctic coast could begin as early as this summer. secretary salazar is introduced by byron dorgan, co-chairman at erin fox. >> chairman, she was vice chairman of one of the committees in the senate for some while and i've worked with her and admire her and thank you very much coming to be with us today, senator. it's my honor now introduce the next presenter. in north dakota we have something that mergeded with the democratic party -- it did. what's so funny about that? we thought it was a pretty good

thing at the time. so it became the democrat npl. non-partisan league. the old non-partisan league said we'll stick, we'll win, and it has a saying, the office seeks the man. so if ever that were the case, it seems to me, the job of interior secretary surely must have been seeking ken salazar. he has been an extraordinary secretary, and cabinet official. i had the opportunity, as did senator bennett, to work with ken salazar when he was in the united states senate and i know his background. it's extraordinary. he comes from colorado, a family that farmed and ranched. one of eight children. all eight kids went and got a college degree. i won't describe what the rest of them have done, but it's quite extraordinary what this family has produced, and secretary salazar went off to become a businessman, and a rancher and a farmer, and then

attorney general for the state of colorado. then united states senator, and then secretary of the interior. it really is, truly, an all-american story. and as a member of the senate democratic leadership, whenever we were confabbing and trying to figure out what comes to the floor, who's going to be where, who's vote what, the question was always raised, well, where is salazar on this? and the answer was, we don't know. and the reason is that this is truly, i think bonbon it would agree, this is really one of those senators who came to the united states senate to try to fig are out how do we advance the country's interests? not republican/democrat. how do we find a way through this to reach agreement? that was ken salazar's hallmark as a united states senator. he's a great friend. i think a great american. i'm really pleased that he's accepted our invitation to come here today. secretary ken salazar. [ applause ]

thank you very much, senator dorgan, and senator bennett. thank you for being leaders and for being statesmen for our country, and for being mentors and role models for me in our work in utah together. senator bennett on matters involving conservation, including wilderness issues in utah where we successful, notwithstanding head winds that were very strong in the other direction and to senator dorgan, his great legacy for energy, native american issues and so many other things, continues to be alive and well as we work on those issues across the united states of america. and i know we just heard from another former colleague, lisa murkowski. enjoyed the relationship we have working on energy matters. i was going to share some comments with you on the energy

overall, but how i see the world. i look at this--looking at this town and at the debate that's taking place, whether it's in colorado, or all across country, you are get the sense that the united states of america is very divided on the issue of energy. you get the sense that there is an impossibility in terms of how we as a nation can come together on a consensus on how we move forward with a sustainable energy policy for the united states of america for the long term. and there are those who, i believe, including some of the trade associations. maybe some of you who are here, who are part of this cabal that says, you know, there is a quick fix to what we do with energy policy for the united states that will get us to energy independence and energy security in the way all of us want to the get there, and yet the kinds of attacks that go back and forth in my view are simply not helpful to getting us what i

call the real energy world. and the real energy world is what i came to work on when i was elected as a united states senator from colorado. and it's a real energy world that president barack obama and i have been working on very hard now for the last three and a half year, and that real energy world that is capturing the future of energy for the united states of america in the way that will bring us to the kind of energy security that all of us want. now, some may say this can't be done in washington. this country is too divided. but there was a time. in fact, two senators who invited me to come here are very much of part of this effort and i was part of their efforts in 200 2005 and 2007 when we passed the last two pieces of energy legislation in the united states, and what we were able to prove in those two pieces of energy legislation is that we could find common ground and

could find together a way in which republicans and democrats could come together to chart a future for energy in the united states of america. unfortunately what's happened somehow in the last the two years, especially in this town is that it's become so divided that people seem to -- seem to want to battle the common ground. they want to battle the common interests of the united states of america, rather than to getting to results that would actually fashion energy policy for the long term for the united states of america. well, i reject the notion that we can't do the right things as americans, because i think that americans overall believe that we have a huge consensus about what we ought to be doing as an american society. as a nation. as the united states of america. and i would say that most americans would look at all of us, look at members of congress and they would say, we want the united states to cut its dependence on foreign oil. they would say that they

remember the days when richard nixon coined the term energy independence and when opec was formed that we thought we could get to energy independence. they would say that jimmy carter, in declaring energy independence in lull of a period of war was signaling something very important to the our future and also cognizant, especially those here today who are students of the subject that no matter how important those leaders of our country felt, that when you go through the '80s, ronald reagan, and you go through the '90s under bush and clinton, and in the early part of the last decade, not really much was done in terms of moving us forward to an energy security. somehow it started happening in 20 2005 and 2007 and the bills we past getting us to the kind of security we want in the united states of america. when you look at what was

happening and what happened during that time frame, we went from the 1970s, importing about 30% of foreign oil from countries to the point where the we were having debates, importing about 60% of our oil from foreign countries. one of the things i think most americans including the people who work near this town and in the senate and the house of representatives would say, we agree that we ought to the cut our dependence on foreign oil. i think most americans also would agree that what we need to do is broaden our energy portfolio. they would say that what we have done is to have too much of a focus on only oil and gas. and so our work to capture the power of the sun and geothermal and the power of the wind and build out transition lines and do all the rest on renewables and bio fuels is something americans would say is important for us to do. they would say we're on the right track and we need to doll

more of that. i think americans would also agree that we need to do more with respect to drilling, including both offshore and onshore drilling and we need to make sure that we are developing in a responsible way. america's oil and gas resources, both on the onshore as well as on the offshore. i also think, finally, that most americans would say that those who say we can simply drill our way to energy independence, that there is no other alternative than to produce more, including biofuels, that there's another component that is missing, and that's the area of efficiency. how is it that we can take our transportation fleet and have it go longer and have it go farther on the same amount of oil? so it's no surprise that as part of what has been a major accomplishment in terms of what's happening with the automobile industry in the

united states of america, the part of this fueled the recovery of all of the workforce and all of the companies that are dealing in the automobile world is the fact we now today for the first time are producing vehicles that are much more highly fuel efficient. in fact, just in march, gm sold more than 100,000 cars. that made over 30 miles to a gallon. over 100,000 cars that made more than 30 miles to the gallon. remarkable that that monthly sale from gm represents 40,% of the entire fleet sold. some would say three or four years ago that was not possible. yet because industry stepped up to the plate, along with the leadership of the president getting them to do what they should have been doing a long time ago, we now are producing vehicles in this country that are much more energy efficient.

so this world that ideal with every day, sometimes testifying in front of committees of the house or senate, and even testifying or giving speeches to industry groups or energy groups, gas group, set set cetee live in what i call the world of fairy tales, for me my days in the senator as well as the secretary of interior and being a key member of the president's energy team, we've tried to center our work around the real energy world. we've tried to focus on those things that we know we can do that reflect what it is that the american people want us, as their leaders to do, and i believe that when you take an honest look at the achievements over now almost four years, you'll actually see that there has been great progress that has been made on all of the above energy strategy. the all of the above energy strategy was not picked out just as a slogan. it was something we started

working on on day one when my counselor, steve black and i walked into the department of interior on january 21st, and we said we're going to work on all of the above energy strategy, and it's going to include the production of oil and gas, because it's that's essential to our country, but it's also going to open up a new frontier for renewable energy and a host of things important to our country. that's my island, we have made significant progress on those fronts. the statistics speak for themselves. you've heard them, but i'll repeat a few of them. on the broadest scale we know this is both private lands and public lands, not getting away from the reality that much of this has been caused by the new technological innovations of hydraulic fracturing on public and private lands, but today gas production is at an all-time high. gat production is at an all-time high. oil production in the united

states is at an 80-year high. the oil production of the united states from domestic energy sources at an allyear high. some people who like to live in the fairy tale world of energy politics will say that that's all for private lands. it's not the kwcase. we have supported what's going on in private land in our policies but in public plans themselves, the total oil production, oil production from from lands and waters has increased 13% during the first three years of this administration, compared to the last three years of the previous administration. so anyone who is out there's saying that we are somehow stopping oil and gas production, they're simply wrong, living in a world of fairy tale, not in the world of reality. now, america's dependence on foreign oil has gone down every single year since president has become president of the united states. for all of us who worked and

america's national security as an imperative to the security of this nation for the long term know how important that is. and so for us, the fact that we are now importing less than 50% of oil for foreign countries, it's something that we ought to celebrate. it's something that the american people want us to make sure is happening here in this country, and last year for the first t e time, oil imports went down to 4578%. which is a far cry from where we used to be at 60 on the way to 70 just a few years ago. now, if you look specifically at what happened just, say, in the last year, last year alone there was a 10% reduction in the amount of oil that we are importing into the united states of america. that's 1 million barrels of oil less a day. that were being imported into the united states. a million barrels less of oil that were being imported into this country. all of you here are very smart, because you're here at george washington university. so you can imagine what a

million barrels of oil would look like. stack those 50 gallon, 55 gallon barrels from new york all the way across the country back and forth a couple of time, they'll tell what you a million barrel as day is. quantify that to a year. that's a lot of oil. now, why are we using less oil? why are we importing this oil? in large part it has to do with the fact that we have a much more fuel-efficient vehicle system coming up out of the ground today as we speak. so it's important that we all recognize that we've made significant progress on what we are doing in terms of energy imports. renewable energy. many of us have spoken about a bright future for renewable energy, and yet when we look at the world of the fairy tale purveyors, they'll say, well, it's not going to work. you ought to just go back to the way it was in the old day, and forget about wind energy. forget about solar energy.

forget about geothermal, bio fuels and other tuttive fuels. i'm froud say in the world of reality which adds up top what the american people want, that the united states has doubled its energy production in the last three years. we've doubled our production in the last three years and it is, in my view, not time for us as a country looking for a long-term sustain energy program to dom a u-turn or to press the pause button of what we're doing on renewable energy across the country. so that's a world that i live in. it's the world of reality. it's the world of dealing with what we have to do to accomplish the imperatives of our national, economic and entirnl security for the united states. and that's what i've been working on since i game interior

secretary. let me review a couple of things related to them, because another reality of this town is that sometimes those who live in the fairy tale world of politics have a sense of -- a very short memory. they forget that it was just 2010, just a little over two years ago. in fact, right at this time two years ago there was a loyal -- well, 5,000 feet below the surface of the gulf of mex called the makonda well spewing out approximately 50,000 barrels of oil a day into the gulf, and nobody knew what to do, and we through every conceivable resource, threw every conceivable resource we could to stop that well from gushing. all the calculations of industry, all the heads of the company would come into the office at the department of the

interior, where i would ask of them how they could help bp do what bp's responsibility was and that was to shutting that well. not even the department of defense had the ability to do what needed to be done there in the gulf. so i leaded team. lived with thad allen and stuv c steven chu and so many others. and the days were the same, until we shut the well 87 days later until we were convinced we could declare the well dead, dead, dead. over a period of three, four months. and so we believed then, and we believe that we were correct it was important to inject a sense of reality any terms of the safety requirements for offshore drilling. not only in mexico but across all of america's oceans and because oil and gas is in fact a global industry but it has to happen around the world as well. so we have worked very hard to make sure that we are restoring

the confidence of the american people and the work that we do with respect to offshore energy, and because of the leadership of many people in the department of interior, we are there now. we have divided up conflicting missions of what was then bmms created by secretary lawyer james watt and put into position the agency's anall so they don't have the conflicting issues. natural resources revenue. an agency that does planning for the future of the outercontinental shefoutercontit outercontinental shelf and and agency which is essential lay cop on the beat. that's the bureau of environmental safety enforcement now led by the admiral who helped bring the oil leak in the gulf to an end. and between thosation e agencie in a better position to make sure we move forward safely and

responsible in texploration of gas. some people in washington who represent the state of louisiana and the other states, the fact of the matter is we are back up to three spill levels of exploration and development in the gulf of mexico. as a matter of fact, i conducted one of the, a large sale, a robust sale at the end of last year. we're planning on putting another 38 million acres up for auction in the gulf of mexico in both the central and western section this month. when you know the world of reality, you know that we're moving forward with development of offshore oil and gas. when you hear the world of those who live in the fairy tale land, they would say that we are shutting everything down. the fact is that we are moving forward, and embracing oil and gas in the offshore areas of

america as part of the energy portfolio of the united states of america. now, onshore, i could speak to similar statistics, because we continue to move forward with energy development on the 700 million acres which we control through the bureau of land management around the country. and there are many things that are going on there, including the fact that we have cut through some of the litigation and some of the processes that had been in place to the point. >> now where we expect to reduce permitting for oil and gas wells on public lands by as much as two-thirds. now, when you hear those who come from the fairy tale world that we sometimes deal in washington, they'll tell you that we've stopped it. that we are putting all kinds of road blocks in the way of permitting for oil and gas on public lands, but the fact is, we have an agenda that's going to cut down on the amount of time that you have to use to get

your permit for an oil and gas well by two-thirds at a time. that's making government work on behalf of the american people. if i could -- i could choose lots of examples. i'll give you three -- two places and one statistic. we have 7,000 permits that are out there, which are in the hands of the oil and gas companies. the oil and gas company, not yet acting on them. they should go ahead and act on the oil and gas permits because they have been given. secondly, a look at north dakota, the formation, my department and the gps that did the studies to move forward and assess what the resources were. they are tremendous. it was also said three years ago, took me to a reservation and showed me that there was huge oil and gas development occurring. discovery and oil resource potential for the united states of america that rivalled some of

the discoveries that had been made in the middle east and saudi arabia and places like that. and yet this million acre reservation had one oil and gas well in its whole place. it had been permitted. he said, how can that be? it is not good for our energy security and it's not good for our responsibility for the tribes of the united states of america. and so we set up a one-stop shop at a reservation, and for those of you who have been to north dakota in the last several months, the last several year, you will see the difference on the ground. it's a place transformed. there is so much oil and gas activity on the reservation and across north dakota that there are man camps that have been built to bring people in from around the country, to come and work in those oil and gas fields. and so we're making it happen in a place like this in that reservation as well as the other bml labs that we work on not

only in north dakota but in montana and other areas around the west. another area that i will choose as an example, this is an example because of the people who invited me here, senator dorgan and senator bennett. the state of utah. if you hear some people in the state of utah, we have shut down oil and gas production in the state of utah. yet i was there a month ago with the, some of the leadership of anadarko and others and announced that the environmental community as well as the oil and gas community had come together, and we in the blm and idot signed a letter of recognition allows 3,500 wells to move into the natural gas and be constructed. they're going to be constructed in the right way with the newest technology using horizontal drilling and limiting surface to surface and staying away from ripe areas and doing that kind of thing. we have other announcements

we'll be making soon. this in utah, because of the way that we are bringing people together. so i give you those three examples, and i might as we give awe fourth example since senator murkowski was up here a few minutes ago. our work in alaska, in the antarctic has been exemplariy and something i'm very proud of. in a holding set up a long time ago for oil and gas production, there is not a way in which it will be accessed through a place called cd-5. con connecticutic khouw will move up. a fine accomplishment. when you look at the beauford and the arctic seas knowing it is not an easy decision and we have not made the final decisions about what we will do

in it arctic yet, we are looking at the possibility of moving into the area. in large part because we need to nope what america's resources are and ought never to be afraid of the science and the knowledge that does come from exploration. now if it is done it will be done under the utmost cautionary measures that can be taken in the history of human kind. because we know and have learned a lot from what's happening it places like the gulf of mexico and we also know what's happening in other places around the country, around the world. but you look at norway and russia, what they're planning to do with respect to oil and goods production in the arctic circle, we don't want the united states of america to be left behind. so secretary clinton and i two, three years ago went to a meeting in antarctica and in greenland this year, all