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   >> 26 past the hour. here is the founder and ceo of bp capital management, boone pickens . and in washington we have former democratic representative from virginia tom periello who's now with the center for american progress . good to have you both on the show this morning.

   >> we've got a lot to talk about. boone , earlier today we had jim cramer and melody barnes talking about natural gas . it looks like we've got some good news coming down the pike that over the next couple of years natural gas , the price expected to go up. that could be a boon for america.

   >> if the price goes up?

   >> and we're exporting natural gas .

   >> why would you export natural gas and import dirty oil from opec ? i don't like that. you're sitting here with -- that is exactly what we're confronted with right now. we're frantically going to get our cheap natural gas out of here. it's cleaner by 30% than oil. and we're going to keep bringing the oil in. i saw the other day where the president said he's solved the mideast problem, we're importing less oil from the mideast than we have in the past. true. when he came into office, 42% of our imports came from mideast . now it's 39%. what he didn't tell you was, is that the cost when he came in was $86 billion from opec that year. this year it will be $170 billion. so the price has gone -- has doubled.

   >> we're paying opec twice as much for that oil that comes in?

   >> exactly. but we've gone down from 42 to 39, but that's because our economy has come off.

   >> you still believe , though, that natural gas can replace what you call dirty oil?

   >> sure, there's no question it can. all the technology is in place. heavy duty trucks are going over to it because they're saving $1.50, $2 a gallon. one trucker goes over, the others have to come with him because -- it's cheaper because your biggest cost for a trucker is their fuel.

   >> you know, the things you find out when you talk to boone pickens are amazing. please go through again about the heat wave in saudi arabia , the impact on oil that they take out of their own land, what they're using it for now, and the ripple effect on us.

   >> start first, the saudis claim they can produce 12.5 million barrels a day. that's out, forget it. they're 10.3 right now and they're coming up on -- they're producing 10.3 is what they did last month. they're coming up on summer. summer is severe. it's 100 today over there, 105 next week is predicted and 120 in three weeks. when they get up to 120, they now have to draw out of their own oil supply , they use oil to generate power for air conditioning . we don't do that in the united states . we don't use any oil for power generation . ours is 70% of all the oil we use goes to transportation fuel. but they're going to pull down 700,000 barrels a day out of what they would export and that will go for power. so that oil market now, you're looking at 91 million barrels a day is global demand. that's getting very, very tight.

   >> right.

   >> and so i still believe -- my neck is stuck out because i said brent north sea could go back to 150 this summer and i'm a long way from 150 today but you can get there in pretty big bites.

   >> let's bring in tom down in washington . tom, what's your take on all this? if we've got all this natural gas available and we're bringing in dirty oil, what's standing in the way? why aren't we tapping in and using all this resource that we have right in our own ground?

   >> well, we've been handed an unbelievable gift. this is a potential huge boon to the economy, and jobs and the environment if we do it right and the question is are we going to mess it up by not doing it right. industries tend to be defined by their worst actors, not their best actors. right now we aren't even doing basic disclosure on some of the chemicals being put into the kmub communities. one of the things about gas, as mr. pickens noted, this is one of the few energy sources where you're talking about both utility sector and the transportation sector. you do have a number of barriers. it's a relatively cheap to extract but expensive to transport. there's the issue about the infrastructure investments for bringing a fleet around. and i think one of the things that the long-term investors are looking at is, is there potential for a blow-back in this industry. i think where we get some certainty out there of making sure the public health and environmental considerations are taken care of, that's going to help investment flow into this area, not hurt it. so it's a win-win. it's a question of whether we're going to let some of the real instant sprint to it things get in the way of what could be a great long-term boon for the economy and the environment.

   >> boone , what do you say about that. the critics say fracking is a big problem, shooting chemicals and water into the ground.

   >> earthquake. they could have an earthquake too.

   >> but it is a concern for environmentalists. what do you say to that?

   >> look, there have been over 800,000 wells that have been fracked. the largest aquifer in north america extends from midland, texas, to the south dakota border across eight states. those wells have been through that aquifer. you just cement it back to the surface and you're fine. they have been fractured. the president said the other day the department of energy was one that developed fracking 30 years ago. that's not correct. i saw the first frac job in 1952 at border, texas. since then i fracked over 3,000 wells and i've never had a failure. the chemicals that are going down, the companies, apache, ana anadarco, they all put their frac recipe on their website. there's nothing they're putting underground that's going to hurt anybody.

   >> why don't you explain for people who are not familiar with fracking, what fracking is.

   >> well, the real -- what's happened, and the industry has done an unbelievable job. nobody ever says hats off to the oil and gas industry in america, they have done a great job.

   >> you don't hear that a whole lot, do you?

   >> what?

   >> you don't hear that a whole lot, do you?

   >> no!

   >> hats off.

   >> these guys are making too much money and polluting the deal, causing earthquakes and all these things are happening. stop them, stop them. get some more dirty oil from opec and help pay for both sides of the war. that's what we need to do. we need to look like idiots. here you are with a cleaner fuel, cheaper fuel. it's safe and available. what are we waiting on?

   >> all right. before we go to break, i'm just curious, boone , can i just ask you about mitt romney and if you think he has the capacity to turn the economy around?

   >> well, the economy can be turned around by anybody. the way you turn it around is get on your own resources. i'm serious.

   >> i understand that, and everything that you talk about has more to do with the environment than the jobs issue.

   >> are you excited about mitt romney ?

   >> i'm not excited about any of the politicians. i get nothing out of washington and i don't know whether you saw what i said the other day at that salt convention in las vegas . no, i'm not going to say it here.

   >> say it here.

   >> go ahead.

   >> my wife will kick me out if i say that again.

   >> oh.

   >> okay. don't say it, don't say it. i tried that once before, that didn't work.

   >> tom, you wanted to get in on what boone had said in the previous answer. go ahead.

   >> well, i think, first of all, we are moving forward in this area. we are seeing a tremendous number of wells being dug, and so i think this is an issue where the industry is going forward. in some ways the biggest barrier right now is that the price point is so low, so i think this is just a chance where if we do it right, we're going to see this for a long time and not see fits and starts. i think that's a better economic model in this area.

   >> well, you give vague generalities about if we do it right. hell, we've been doing it for 50 years. there hasn't been anything wrong with what we've done.

   >> "the new york times" reported hundreds and hundreds of clean water problems. this is an industry that i think is an important part of the future, but i think people have a lot of common sense. when they don't know what chemicals are being put in their water, they start to ask questions and i think that's fair of them to do so.

   >> wait a minute, wait a minute, you said putting chemicals in their water. i don't know about -- listen, i've drilled through the biggest aquifer in north america . i never put any chemicals in anybody's water. and if new york doesn't want to drill, don't drill. have a moratorium and don't drill. the gas has been there for 300 million years. it's not going to go any place. just don't drill. drill someplace that wants to drill. you look at what's happened to the economy in pennsylvania, and it's fabulous. tom corbett said i'm getting industries back into my state that i never thought would come back. i look at north dakota . it's totally employed. i was up there last summer. they're looking for people to work. truck drivers get $110,000 a year. i mean this thing is huge what it could do to the country. but if you don't want to do it, just keep getting opec oil because that's what's going to happen to you. but if we get out of -- if we get out of the dependence on opec oil, we can get our people out of the mideast and now we aren't going to kill people, our people. we're stupid to be over there.

   >> so when's your birthday, boone ?

   >> birthday coming up may 22. i'll be -- i'll be 34 years old.

   >> 34 years old.

   >> plus 50!

   >> 84!

   >> 84 coming up, man.

   >> may 22nd . all right. he's looking younger today than ever.

   >> hats off.

   >> hats off.

   >> he can run circles around you guys. boone pickens , thank

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