the average subsidy per ticket is about $51. It's actually $50.97.

Amtrak subsidies, whether it is for capital or operation are not manna from heaven, they are actually dollars out of the Federal treasury.

The worst offender, by far, is Sunset Limited. That is Los Angeles to New Orleans. Every ticket on that route is--was subsidized in 2011, $375.

I certainly look forward to continuing--I hope one day I can go from Memphis to Nashville or Memphis to Little Rock.

We have congressional staff and I have investigative staff. We corroborate and we try not to interfere or duplicate.

I think we have to go further, and I think we have to, again, make sure if we are going to use taxpayer dollars--which we probably always will have a portion of taxpayer dollars--we got to make sure we are good stewards of the taxpayers'…

Amtrak is the key to our future, and competition with the airline industry as well.

One of the most important aspects of not passing that legislation was not having a blueprint, a formal blueprint, which the FAA authorization provides.

I want identifiable people in place, the positions, and what the law provided for.

Some of them are working in dumps. And some of them are working in conditions that are not conducive to doing a good job or being on the job alert, awake, and all of that.

If you work for me and you had a $330 million or a half-a-billion dollar cost overrun and a 4--I give you a 3- to 4-year delay, your butt would be fired.

We are losing a competitive advantage in manufacturing and opportunities for putting people to work and capturing markets.