Yelling At The TV

April 24, 2013 - Hal Rogers, Chairman of the House Appropriations Committee claims that the FAA never mentioned having to furlough air traffic controllers before it happened.

This mirrors the claim made by another Kentucky Republican in the Senate the day before.

Perhaps they should pay better attention.

From the Statement of FAA Administrator Michael Huerta to House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, Subcommittee on Aviation:

The sequester is looming, and massive budget cuts are set to go into effect just two days from now.

I want to make a clear distinction about how sequestration differs from previous government shutdowns that have been caused by failure to pass a budget, or by the temporary lapse in our authorization in July 2011.

First, almost all of our FAA accounts would be affected. Therefore, this would affect almost all of our employees.

We are looking at all options to reduce costs. We’re looking at a hiring freeze, and at cutting contracts and travel and other items not related to day-to-day operations. But, to reach the large figure we need to cut, we have little choice but to make up the rest through furloughing employees. This is not something that we take lightly.

Unlike a government shutdown, under the sequester, almost all of our employees would be affected, even what we would traditionally call “essential personnel.” The vast majority of our employees, including “essential workers” would have to be furloughed.

Under sequestration our flexibility is very limited because we must cut proportionately from all affected accounts. We can’t move money around and we have limited flexibility to choose what it is that we’re able to cut.

Now a very large portion of the DOT’s budget is exempt from the sequester. What this means is that the FAA will take more than 60 percent of the sequester cuts for all of the DOT, even though our agency makes up only about 20 percent of the department’s budget. Now, within the FAA, the airport grant program also is exempt from the sequester. So this again limits the choices we have on where to cut the money.

Finally, we have a very short time frame to make the bulk of these massive cuts—about six months. And that means the cuts would need to be deeper to have the same effect as if we could spread them out.

Having spent over a year at school in Kentucky, and having known many Kentuckians in my life, I can safely assert that this attention deficit afflicion is not common to all the people of the state. So what’s wrong with these two?

April 23, 2013 - Mitch McConnell accuses the Obama administration of “hiding the ball” from the “traveling public” on FAA furloughs.

He claims that the FAA Administrator didn’t mention the furloughs in his testimony before Senate Committees last week.

From the Statement of FAA Administrator Michael Huerta to the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation, April 16, 2013: 

I want to emphasize that as we undergo the difficult process of implementing the deep cuts required by the sequester, we refuse to sacrifice safety—even if this means less efficient operations.

In addition to contract towers, large facilities will also be affected. To reach the figure we need to cut from our payroll—which is our largest operating cost—we have to furlough 47,000 of our employees for up to 11 days between now and September.

The furloughs will reduce controller work hours at all airports with towers, but also at radar facilities across the country. Again, safety is our number one concern. We will only allow the amount of air traffic that we can handle safely to take off and land. This means travelers should expect delays. Today we are meeting with air carriers to go over specific operational impacts related to the furloughs facility by facility.

From the Statement of FAA Administrator Michael Huerta to the Senate Committee on Appropriations Subcommittee on Transportation, Housing and Urban Development, April 18, 2013:

The cuts required by the sequester have forced us to slash contract expenses and furlough 47,000 of our employees. With employees working fewer hours, we will have less efficient air traffic operations and less time for safety inspectors to certify new aircraft for the market.

Is Mitch McConnell spending so much time trying to score political points that he isn’t paying attention to what is actually being said in these hearings, or is he lying to the American people by accusing the Obama administration of “hiding the ball?”

That seems like a fair question.

February 26, 2013 - On MSNBC’s Morning Joe, GA Congressman Jack Kingston urged the Senate to take up the sequester bill that the House  passed in December…even though it no longer exists.

Jack Kingston has been in Congress since 1993, he should understand the basics of lawmaking by now, shouldn’t he?

For instance: When a new Congress begins, bills from the last Congress don’t carry over.

There is no longer a bill for the Senate to “take up.” Asking the Senate to “take up” a nonexistent bill is idiotic. Pass something in this Congress, then complain about the Senate.

December 31, 2012 - Senator Bob Corker (R-TN) goes to the floor of the Senate to respond to President Obama’s remarks to middle class Americans.

He says he thinks Obama’s remarks may have cost the President votes. “Not my vote,” Corker says, “I’m not that way.” He obviously thinks some members of his party are “that way.”

Corker goes on to say that if revenues are going to be used to offset the sequester cuts, “count me out!”

Republicans have been complaining about the cuts to the defense budget that are coming as a result of a bill that they voted for. The bill called for the “super-committee” to come to an agreement on cutting the budget, and set in place automatic cuts (sequester) that would occur if no agreement was worked out. Now that the automatic cuts are looming, the GOP has decided that it’s not a good idea after all. It turns out that setting spending caps with a sequester to back it up is an idea that GOP budget guru, Paul Ryan, has been trying to do since he was first elected to Congress.