[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 159 (2013), Part 4]
[House]
[Page 5944]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                    TRUTH TELLING WITH FLIGHT DELAYS

  (Mr. RIBBLE asked and was given permission to address the House for 1 
minute.)
  Mr. RIBBLE. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to give the American people 
some truth telling about what is going on with the FAA and flight 
delays. We have been told this is all the result of the sequester. And 
yet in 2001, there were about 30,000 takeoffs per day in the United 
States, and they did that with about $6 billion worth of funding. 
Today, takeoffs are only 20,000 a day, and they have $10 billion of 
funding. In 2001, there were 14,000 air traffic operators, and today 
there are 14,000 air traffic operators.
  So if it's not a demand problem because demand went down, if it's not 
a people problem because they have the same people, and it's not a 
resource problem because they have about 100 percent more money, what 
is the problem?
  I contend to you, Mr. Speaker, it's a political problem. It's time to 
tell the administration to stop playing politics with the American 
people.

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