we are not doing our job.

I am rabidly supportive of cutting Federal funds for States that don't have stronger drunk-driving laws.

Prepared Statement

Thank you Mr. Chairman. I thank Chairman Thompson for convening this important hearing to examine President Obama's Presidential Study Directive.

I think this is an important discussion and, as well, hopefully at the end of the 60 days of the study that the President has authorized that we will have the right answer, and I think that is certainly a challenge.

I think security equates to urgency.

I am not yet committed to a merger. I think that collaboration is truly key, but there is a directive from the White House and likely we may have that.

That was obviously a fractured response, and we needed urgent response.

Senator Lugar and I introduced the Global Food Security Act, and it was just moved out of committee yesterday.

Well, thank you very much, that's very good advice. Thank you.

I wanted to, first of all, thank each of the witnesses for your testimony, for the perspective that you bring to this issue from long years of experience.

We can obliterate obesity, too, but we have to have some standards that are ranked right up there with air and water and immunization.

I am a great believer that every child is born with a bright light inside them which represents, of course, their potential.

Guidelines are great if people are adopting them and implementing them.

I have a real concern about guidelines not being enough.

So how do you make that work in the context of a desire for national standards, the desire for a national commitment, with a tradition and the reality, not just a theory, but the reality of local control, local decisionmaking?

I think now we are beginning to realize that CEOs know this now better than they used to, that if we don't work on those issues in the dawn of a child's life, you can't even begin to talk about an educated person or a high-skilled person…

I am here to help these kids and all kids across the United States beat those odds.