Pickens On the First Rule of Holes

I had to smile at at the utter beauty of it, the 84-year-old oil billionaire invoking the First Rule Of Holes* in this article on CNN.com today.

He meets today with the entire House Democratic Caucus. The venerable Texas oilman has not always been the most popular among this group during his long career as a corporate raider, which started in the 1980s — not to mention his role as a funder of the Swift Boat Veterans in the 2004 presidential campaign. But his current status as a champion of alternative energy has their attention.

In an interview, Mr. Pickens said Democrats have reached out to him. “I haven’t come up here trying to talk to anybody,” he said. “I felt like the grass roots is where I’d have my support.”
Last week, the “Pickens Plan,” which he’s touting in a huge national television, Internet and newspaper campaign, was mostly ignored on Capitol Hill. Many congressional offices knew no details of the plan, and most staffers said their bosses were too busy to bother.
However that was before word got around that Pickens was coming to town. His campaign has now reported “dozens and dozens” of requests for sit-down meetings. Senate Majority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.), a strong critic of speculators, who he says are inflating the price of oil, last week called Pickens "my political friend." The Sierra Club's executive director recently flew in Pickens's private plane. And House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (Calif.) invited him to speak to the Democratic caucus tonight. Strange bedfellows? When America's best interests are at stake, no surprise. Stay tuned, this is gonna get INTERESTING.

QUOTE Texas oilman T. Boone Pickens told Congress Tuesday that the government must act quickly to curb the nation's dependence on foreign oil.
"Our country is in a deep hole and it's time to stop digging," said Pickens, founder and principal of BP Capital, in testimony before the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee.
"We have walked into a trap and we are the ones that put ourselves there," he said. "I'm not pointing the finger at anybody because it isn't going to help, but we have to work together to get out of it."
Earlier this month, Pickens unveiled a plan to curb America's dependence on foreign oil through increased investment in domestic renewable resources such as wind, and through use of natural gas as an alternative transportation fuel. UNQUOTE

* definition: when you find yourself in a deep hole, stop digging!

CSPAN Today, a must-see video of Mr. Pickens before the Senate.