Don Young

If you can't have passengers, you will not have efficiency.

If you fly empty, you know this, Mr. Chairman, if you fly empty going back you are going to raise that price of the potato chips up to $12 a pack.

They will take the cheapest bid. That is what concerns me.

I am not locked into any airline's permaturity as far as carrying mail, but I am locked into safety and efficiency.

I really think, in all due respects to the chairman of the full committee, it was being held because Mr. Cummings and Mr. Lynch raised this point on the letter I wrote, and I do think this is why this hearing is being held.

I have never read my BlackBerry in my life. The day I turn that sucker on is the day I am going to walk out of these halls, I will tell you that right now.

We have not had an accident. We have delivered the mail. There hasn't been any real problems.

The system has been working for a period of time where each carrier now has a system by equipment, loading capability.

This is about safety and efficiency.

I don't know where that came from. I don't know why it was used. It is not broken. It is working.

If you charge carriers and small businesses more to provide goods, those expenses will simply be handed down to the communities in the form of higher grocery prices.

Wrong again. Just to point out the issue that we responded to the IG report in regards to your example.

The bill will actually have the opposite effect, make the system more expensive and less effective for the Postal Service and customers.

This is not good legislation. It doesn't do what it says it will do.

We don't need to fix something that is not broken. It does work.

You are worried about $70 million that would cost $200 million. I don't quite understand that.

Why is the chairman pursuing changes that would increase costs for the Postal Service?

Bypass mail saves the Postal Service money.

It is forcing them to make it more efficient.

The efficiency goes out the door.

And I say it never should have been named the Magnuson-Stevens Act, it started on the House side.

I think I am the only one in this room that voted for this legislation when the original Magnuson-Stevens Act passed.

There is substantial bipartisan agreement out there that the current system is not functioning.

I am suggesting going beyond that and allowing, you know, arrangements for counties and municipalities, but even going beyond that and creating things that would be a public land equivalent of, say, a charter school.

A Park Service, bless your heart, and a Fish and Wildlife and a BLM have done a terrible job of management, period, and communicating with one another.