Pence sees progress on the issue but continues to be one of the more vocal protestors.

"I think Speaker Nancy Pelosi's movement on this issue is the greatest evidence of the success of the gas price protest on the house floor," said Pence.

It now seems likely that pro-drilling legislation will come up in some form when Congress comes back from vacation next month. Whether it will be something both sides can agree on, in the heat of a Presidential campaign, is another question.

But the public should do everything in its power to drive a wooden stake through its heart. The Fairness Doctrine is evil disguised as goodness. It's fair in the same way the communist Chinese government is fair about airing various points of view at Tiananmen Square. No one gets to speak his mind. The government's doctrine ensures that no one voice dominates that public forum.

Lucious Newsom was believed to be 92 years old. In the two decades since moving here from his native Tennessee, his smiling gap-toothed face came to symbolize the kind of neighborhood activism that rolls up its sleeves and lets government and foundations catch up if they will. Till nearly the very end, neither fame nor vandal attacks nor age and illness could deter him from getting up every day to go meet the need...

Once a Baptist minister, Newsom converted to Catholicism after attending an Easter vigil at Nativity Catholic Church, where Rev. Schwab, now at St. Thomas Aquinas parish, was pastor. The activist was especially moved by the doctrine of the intercession of saints. A statue of St. Jude, patron of impossible causes, stands at Anna's House.

The faith Lucious Newsom lived out was large enough to include all brands of believers -- and non-believers. It touched people who'd seen everything and people who were not yet born when he reached old age. His work surely will live on, because he has left behind too many who will never again think of fighting poverty as a lost cause.

Pence, who represents the Anderson area, and other House Republicans have been pushing on Capitol Hill for House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., to call Congress into special session to deal with the energy crisis.

Pence has been at the forefront of the Republican protest, spending much of the past two weeks since the adjournment of Congress in Washington. On the floor of the House, on television, on radio, on the Internet and in print, Pence and his brethren have been applying serious pressure on Pelosi...

While speculators, oil companies and politicians jockey for position in the energy debate, here in the Heartland, folks are demanding immediate action. And that’s precisely what Pence, as our representative, should be generating.

Lawmakers will be able to "consider opening portions of the Outer Continental Shelf for drilling, with appropriate safeguards, and without taxpayer subsidies to Big Oil," said Pelosi, D-Calif.

Just weeks ago Pelosi seemed resolved to block any votes to allow offshore drilling, in part because Californians have opposed drilling off their coasts since an oil spill off Santa Barbara in 1969. New oil drilling is only allowed now in federal waters in the western Gulf of Mexico and off Alaska.

Pelosi's radio remarks were the latest to hint that the energy debate in Congress is still evolving, and that Democrats are budging on the issue.

Pelosi is to outline a plan supported by congressional Democrats and Democratic presidential contender Sen. Barack Obama (Ill.) to invest in clean, renewable resources like wind, solar and biofuels, and promote greater efficiency and conservation.

Earlier this week, Pelosi also said she’d like to see changes in the amount oil companies pay to develop taxpayer-owned oil and gas.

Pelosi and other Democratic leaders pick the person to respond to the president, but it is rare for the Speaker to deliver the address herself.

Republicans, who’ve staged a talk-a-thon on the House floor during the August recess, said Pelosi’s movement toward drilling is too little, too late.

“While the Speaker now claims to embrace a comprehensive energy plan that includes more conservation, more innovation, and more American energy
production, the Democrats’ utter inaction on this issue trumps their newfound, hollow support for the very reforms Republicans have been promoting all year long,” House Minority Leader John Boehner (Ohio) said in a written statement.

Contrary to alarmist depictions by their critics, shield laws are far from absolute. The one awaiting action in Congress after the August recess is no exception. It specifically allows for disclosure of sources when a court has determined that national security is indeed at stake. And in the way of allaying another purported fear, it defines "journalist" as a working news-gatherer, not someone making frivolous or malicious forays into public business under the false cloak of the profession.

Championed by two Hoosier Republicans, Rep. Mike Pence and Sen. Richard Lugar, the Free Flow of Information Act passed resoundingly in the House and ran into a filibuster in the Senate, nine votes short of the 60 needed to bring it to the floor.

Breaking the stalemate will not be easy. Saying no to the executive branch in a time of war is not to be done lightly; but neither is the vital role of the free press to be taken for granted. Legislation that asks government to get a court order before criminalizing a citizen who carries a notebook is difficult to characterize as extreme. Jailing journalists, or making them fear jail if they encourage whistleblowers, is impossible to reconcile with the First Amendment.

"Ten years, 2 cents," Pelosi said, arguing that 10 years would be the time needed to reap a small benefit to most Americans. "Even the president has said it isn't a quick fix. ... I can't allow a hoax to come to the floor."

But she would consider a vote on drilling "in the context of a fuller, more comprehensive energy package" that would include ending some of the oil companies' current tax breaks.Big Oil, she said, wants to drill and "not pass their royalties to the taxpayer. They want us to subsidize the drilling."

That's why alternative energy - solar, wind, oil released from the strategic energy supply and natural gas, which is clean and abundant - should be mandated as part of the plan, she said.

Back on the House Republican protest front, Pelosi’s fractional surrender was, unsurprisingly, met with skepticism. In a written statement from John Boehner (R-OH), the Republican House Leader challenged Pelosi to bring the House back into session for a vote. “If Speaker Pelosi is truly sincere about having a vote on oil and gas drilling to help bring down fuel costs, she should use her power as speaker to call congress back into session immediately and schedule a vote on the American Energy Act,” Boehner said.

Rep. Mike Pence (R-IN) was one of those who began this revolt when Pelosi hastily adjourned the House for a five-week vacation back on August 1st and blocked an up-or-down vote on domestic drilling. Pence told Indiana public radio, “I think that it’s a very significant statement by Speaker Nancy Pelosi last night that, to use her words, the House ‘can have a vote’ on more domestic drilling. This represents evidence that the Democratic leadership is hearing from the American people, is hearing from many Democrats in the Congress who would like the opportunity to vote on more domestic drilling. And I welcome it. But I still believe that Congress should not wait until this fall or sometime around Christmas after the elections to give the American people more access to American oil.”

BRIAN BEAVER: You guys have had this event going on on the House floor for days and I know that you said yesterday on Limbaugh—I’m paraphrasing you—that if it took a shut down of the government to get attention, serious attention, drawn to this – so be it, if that’s how it has to be. And then last night, Speaker Pelosi says “I’m open to a vote now.” How big a step is that in this ongoing process?

REP. PENCE: Well Brian, I think that it’s a very significant statement by Speaker Nancy Pelosi last night that, to use her words, the House “can have a vote” on more domestic drilling. This represents evidence that the Democratic leadership is hearing from the American people, is hearing from many Democrats in the Congress who would like the opportunity to vote on more domestic drilling. And I welcome it. But I still believe Congress should not wait until this fall or sometime around Christmas after the elections to give American people more access to American oil. Now that the Speaker has opened up the opportunity for an up or down vote on more domestic drilling, along with conservation, along with solar, wind, alternative, renewable energies, I think Congress should come back in session immediately and [let’s]
take this opportunity we have to do something important for the American people.

...

BRIAN BEAVER: Having a vote is one thing, winning that vote is another thing. Do you have the people lined up in place to maybe win this vote if or when it takes place?

REP. PENCE: Brian, I have always believed that we have arrived at a moment—and maybe it was with the advent of $4/gallon gas earlier this year—there is a bipartisan majority in Congress today that would vote for comprehensive energy legislation that included more domestic drilling. That’s not been true in the past. I’ve said many times, in the darkened chamber of the House of Representatives surrounded by tourists, that anyone that wants to criticize Republicans for not having voted for more drilling in the past has no argument with me – we couldn’t get it done when we were in charge. But something changed in the last year and a half, and I’m pretty sure its $4/gallon gas. And the reality is that I think there are between 20 – 40 Democrats in the Congress who would join virtually every Republican in voting for a balanced bill that had a long-term strategy for energy independence and included
drilling.

What started as an impromptu protest of Democratic strong-arm tactics shutting down the House floor has turned into PR gold for Republicans, who are canceling ribbon-cuttings, fundraisers and other events in their districts to take part in the protests despite an absence of television cameras or microphones, dim lighting and an audience of tourists.

“The American people are with us,” said Rep. Mike Pence (R-Ind.), one of the organizers of the protest that has attracted 87 Members so far. “They are with House Republicans who want to see the Congress come back to work and give the bipartisan majority of this House ... a simple vote on the floor.”

Although the chamber lights are dimmed, the microphones muted and the cameras shuttered, the Republicans say their message is spreading and that their populist-styled "talk-a-thons" are resonating with voters at home.

"I just returned from the farm fields of Indiana, and I can say with conviction the American people are with us," said Rep. Mike Pence, Indiana Republican.

A new national poll shows broad public support for government action in the face of $4-a-gallon gas and other energy concerns, giving Republicans a rare opening to go on the offensive against congressional Democrats and Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.).

Nearly two-thirds of Americans now put a priority on "finding new sources of energy" over improving conservation -- a significant shift since 2001 -- and majorities support all of the five potential federal initiatives tested in a new ABC News poll.

There is overwhelming backing for stricter fuel efficiency standards, as large majorities of Democrats, Republicans and independents alike line up behind the idea. There is also widespread support across party lines for a more controversial proposal in the battle over energy policy: offshore oil drilling.

Overall, 63 percent want the federal government to lift its embargo on new drilling in U.S. coastal waters. Nearly eight in 10 Republicans and seven in 10 independents back the idea, as do just over half of Democrats in the poll conducted in partnership with Stanford University and Planet Green.

Congressman Pence was interviewed, just off the House floor, by Erick Erickson of RedState, which can be viewed on their blog HERE.

Congress could pass a "comprehensive energy plan" if politicians set aside partisan interests, Rep. Mike Pence (R-District 6), told locals Tuesday afternoon.

During a two-day break from his protest in Washington, where he is demanding that Congress return from recess to address high gas prices, Pence visited Muncie on Wednesday and Richmond on Thursday for town hall meetings addressing energy policy.

Rep. Mike Pence was one of the Republican lawmakers who stayed in the chamber after recess to make a point this week. He reiterated it in Richmond Thursday.

"Congress should not be taking a five-week paid vacation while Americans struggle with high gas prices," he said.

Pence remains convinced there are enough bipartisan votes on the floor of the House to pass the American Energy Act and he continues his effort to bring lawmakers back to the nations capital to vote on it.

“I really do believe we’re at a moment in time where we have a bipartisan Congress that will lead us away from dependence of foreign oil,” Pence said to the crowd of approximately 50. “I believe (comprehensive energy reform) would pass, I’m not positive, but what’s the problem with letting elected officials exercise their judgment?”

Since Pence’s election into office this decade, he said two special sessions have been called. One concerned the 9/11 commission report, while the other provided immediate relief to victims of Hurricane Katrina.

“Do I think we’re at that level? Yes,” Pence said. “I think we’re in a new energy crisis, and the American people want Congress to get back to work and help solve this in a bipartisan way.”

House Republicans are gearing up to continue their revolt of Congress’ adjournment for at least the next two weeks – right up to the start of the Democratic Convention in Denver – according to a memo sent Wednesday to GOP
members from Minority Leader John Boehner.

“Republicans will not rest until we have an honest, up-or-down vote on the American Energy Act,” Boehner wrote in the memo written by Republican leaders. “To that end, we request that you contact the Whip’s Office and indicate any time you may have available to come to Capitol in the coming weeks. We specifically request that you indicate your availability for any days during the next two weeks, August 11th through 22nd, as soon as possible.”

“IT IS just simply wrong for Congress to take a five-week paid vacation when so many families…are struggling under the weight of $4-a-gallon gasoline.” With those words Mike Pence, a Republican congressman from Indiana, explained to a crowd of bewildered tourists, including a troop of Boy Scouts, why he was refusing to leave the floor of the House of Representatives when its summer break began on August 1st, even though the lights, microphones and television cameras had been switched off. Instead, he and a few dozen Republican colleagues have returned to the chamber repeatedly in recent days to demand that Congress reconvene and vote on a proposal to increase the scope for oil-drilling in America’s territorial waters.

Transcript

Congressman Mike Pence on CNN’s American Morning

8-5-08

KIRAN CHETRY: Welcome back to the most politics in the morning. House Republicans are giving up their vacations to stage a protest in the walls of Congress. They’re back from their August recess that began Friday and they're demanding that Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi bring Congress back into session to vote on an energy bill. Joining me now from Capitol Hill is Indiana Congressman Mike Pence. He's helping lead the protest and says he'll continue to do so for as long as it takes. Thanks so much for being with us this morning.

REP. MIKE PENCE: Thanks, Kiran. Good to be with you.

CHETRY: Good to have you with us. People are calling this protest a little bit of a political stunt, including Nancy Pelosi. What do you say to that?

REP. PENCE: Look, I think Friday when more than 50 House Republicans were lined up to give regular speeches on the floor objecting to the fact that Congress was taking a five-week paid vacation when we hadn't taken an up or down vote on giving the American people more access to American oil, Friday afternoon probably was a stunt. But the sustained effort by the Republican leadership that will go throughout this week and perhaps into next week, I think it's not a stunt. It’s a feat. Members of Congress are giving up time with their families and with their constituents, and on a rotating basis, either here on Capitol Hill, on the floor, or in front of citizens back home with energy town hall meetings, Republicans are taking the case we ought to be here, we ought to be working. And Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi ought to call this Congress back into session, and give the bipartisan majority that supports comprehensive energy legislation with more drilling a vote.

CHETRY: If you were able to get Speaker Pelosi to bring Congress back into session, do you have the votes to pass this bill?

REP. PENCE: You know, I really believe that we do, Kiran. I’ve been in Congress about eight years, and during that time, I’ve seen votes on drilling falter again and again. But in this past year with gasoline going over $4 a gallon, it's clear to me that there's now a bipartisan majority of Republicans and some Democrats that would support comprehensive energy legislation that included more drilling, particularly off the Outer Continental Shelf and in the Gulf of Mexico. But we obviously can't make progress on that. We can't send those signals to global markets that would affect futures, that would affect oil prices, and give relief at the pump if Congress isn't in session.

CHETRY: You guys can't even agree on whether or not it would provide immediate relief. Many Democrats, including Speaker Pelosi, says for years you wouldn't see any benefit to the average taxpayer who's going to fill up their tank for $4 a gallon gas if we started drilling right now.

REP. PENCE: I know the opponents of drilling make that argument very consistently. But, you know, I take case in point, a few weeks back when President Bush lifted that long-standing Executive Order banning drilling on the Outer Continental Shelf, in the next two days as you saw here on CNN, Kiran, we had the largest two-day drop in the cost of oil per barrel in 20 years. I have no doubt that the futures market would be affected in the immediate short term the day that this Congress came together in a bipartisan fashion and gave the American people more access to American oil. And as the future markets dropped, I believe you'd see the cost per barrel drop and that would have an effect and relief at the pump for working Americans.

CHETRY: You talked about President Bush. He also has the power to call Congress back into session. Have you guys called on him to do that?

REP. PENCE: A number of us have called on the President to do that. And I know that his press secretary said yesterday that he doesn't have any current intention to make that happen, and frankly, the President has a good point. He can call the Congress back into session, but he can't make them work. The reason we're focusing on Speaker Nancy Pelosi is the Speaker of the House can call the Congress back into session immediately, and she can also send to the floor the American Energy Act or some other comprehensive bill that includes, you know, conservation, alternative sources of energy, and an opportunity to vote up or down on giving the American people more access to drilling into American resources.

CHETRY: All right. You guys are still out there giving up your summer vacation. No cameras rolling, but you guys are there on the floor. Representative Mike Pence, great to see you.

Congressman Pence on Your World
FOXNEWS
8-4-08

NEIL CAVUTO: All right, this was a big change here folks. So why not just vote on it right now? Welcome everybody, I’m Neil Cavuto and this is “Your World.” Very glad to be back. With me now Democratic Congressman Bill Pascrell of New Jersey is going to be joining me shortly but right now we have with us Representative Mike Pence a Republican who has been leading the push to get this drilling going and now. But Congressman, your party is not in the majority and it does not look like it is happening.

REP. MIKE PENCE: Well that’s right Neil and that is why for the second day in a row and for the balance of this week, Republicans are back on the House floor even though the House adjourned at about 11:00 a.m. last Friday. Last week, some 50 House Republicans continued the debate in a darkened chamber with the microphones turned off and today I am so proud that more than 20 Republican members of Congress flew back to Washington, D.C., left their families and their vacations and their districts behind, and they have been on the floor today conducting the closest thing to a House version of a filibuster that I've ever seen in my life.

CAVUTO: Why doesn’t the President who has the power to call Congress back do so?

REP. PENCE: Well, I urged him to do that last week along with Jeb Hensarling from Texas. We encouraged the President to use his Article 2 power to call the Congress back into session.

CAVUTO: But he hasn’t. He hasn’t. Why not?

REP. PENCE: Well, he hasn’t yet and I understand that the last time that happened was 1948. Whereas in the eight years I have been in Congress, Neil, in the last eight years Congress has called emergency sessions on two different occasions. It is much more routine for the Congress to be called back into session by the Speaker and our message on the floor today—dozens and dozens of Republicans speaking just to citizens in the darkened House gallery—is that we want Speaker Nancy Pelosi to call this Congress back into session immediately and give us an up or down vote on giving the American people more access to American oil.

CAVUTO: Now let's say Congressman you get your wish. The president I would think is opposed to making this call because, as you know, Senator Obama has called for tapping the Strategic Petroleum Reserve which is generally reserved for emergencies or times of war. So if he were to call the Congress back into session he would essentially be acquiescing to what Senator Obama has said is a real crisis. Right? So he is kind of on a sticky wicket here, right?

REP. PENCE: Well I don’t know if it’s a sticky wicket. I do not know whether Senator Obama and identifying that we have a new energy crisis makes it so. It’s just a reality. People in Indiana, people all over America are hurting, Neil. As I have said repeatedly on the House floor in a darkened chamber here with my colleagues, the American people are not going to get a vacation from $4 per gallon gas so Congress should not take a five-week paid vacation.

CAVUTO: Understood. Are you for tapping that reserve right now?

REP. PENCE: Well look strategic reserve is for strategic purposes. We have vast reserves off the Continental Shelf, and the Gulf of Mexico, and in Alaska. I think if you brought this Congress back, I really believe that for the first time ever Neil there is a bipartisan majority in Congress that would vote for a comprehensive energy bill that allowed more drilling. We will do conservation. We will do additional sources of energy—wind and solar—but I believe there is a bipartisan majority that would support more drilling. That is why Republicans are here talking to darkened chamber, to hundreds of civilians on tour of the nation’s Capitol, saying to Speaker Pelosi bring ‘em back!

CAVUTO: Just to be clear, you would be for looking at alternatives and looking for more exploration as well as tapping the reserve.

REP. PENCE: That’s exactly right. I think it was The American Energy Act that was introduced just a couple weeks ago by Republicans in Congress. It’s an all of the above agenda that includes conservation and alternative sources but it also includes more drilling. I really believe that the reason why the Democratic leadership has not brought that bill or a compromise bill like that to the floor is because it would pass. There is a pro-drilling majority on Capitol Hill. Speaker Pelosi needs to bring this Congress back to Capitol Hill and House Republicans are fighting in that darkened chamber to get people to call their Congressman and tell them to come back to work in Washington.

CAVUTO: I am sure the next person with slightly disagree.

Congressman Pence and a group of other Republican lawmakers decided that there was still some work left to do before leaving town. While Speaker Pelosi and the rest of House Democrats decided to adjourn the Congress for a five-week recess, Congressman Pence rallied his Republican colleagues to continue speaking out about the direction this Congress needs to move in order to effectively address the energy crisis facing our country...even if the microphones, the lights and the cameras were all turned off! This has been picking up steam in the media...


[click on images below for their stories]




Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and the Democrats adjourned the House and turned off the lights and killed the microphones, but Republicans are still on the floor talking gas prices.

Minority Leader John A. Boehner (R-Ohio) and other GOP leaders opposed the motion to adjourn the House, arguing that Pelosi's refusal to schedule a vote allowing offshore drilling is hurting the American economy. They have refused to leave the floor after the adjournment motion passed at 11:23 a.m., and they are busy bashing Pelosi and her fellow Democrats for leaving town for the August recess.

The GOP may not be going quietly, but they haven't been amplified, either. "The microphones have been on, and they have been off, and by God's grace, I can not tell whether right now whether they are on or they are off!" Pence shouted.

"Republicans will not go quietly," said Rep. Mike Pence, R-Ind. "Let us demand that the president of the United States ... call a special session of this Congress on energy."

The microphones are off, the C-SPAN cameras are no longer running in the House chamber, but all is not silent as a group of House Republicans has stayed behind to continue to speak about energy issues.

The House voted 213-197 at 11:23 a.m. to adjourn, but Republican conservatives eager to speak on high gas prices were unwilling to disperse, and their guerrilla campaign was quickly embraced by House Republican leaders.

The fly in the ointment? Fifteen or so 22 House Republicans, led by Minority Leader John Boehner (R-OH), refused to leave the floor, where -- after the Democrats turned off the lights and the microphones -- they continued talking gas prices and energy solutions, which the House was scheduled to do this afternoon already before Pelosi, et al declared an early adjournment.

As their effort went on, GOP members escorted tourists onto the House floor to watch the highly unusual proceedings. “You probably came here expecting to be bored,” said Rep. Mike Pence , R-Ind. “We are disappointing you.’’