Political Quotes

“Once again, I stress the point, this is Pennsylvania specific. Pennsylvania has made a considered decision not to allow these. I think it ill-behooves us as a Congress to say we know better about the roads and the condition of the bridges in the State of Pennsylvania than the local authorities do. So in the interest of deferring to the States, I think we should adopt the Feinstein-Wicker amendment not to mandate these longer trucks on States that do not want them. Also, I do want to stress a few things. If this goes forward, it will have been done with no hearings in this Congress in any committee. The Appropriations Committee, which voted on this, did not have a hearing. The transportation committee, which I serve on, did not have a hearing. The commerce committee, which is another committee of jurisdiction on this matter, never had a hearing about this. Wouldn't it be a good idea--before we tell States they have to do this--to get proponents of this Federal mandate before us to answer questions about it--perhaps opponents of this Federal mandate to come and give us their considered opinion, experts about the safety issues, experts about what this will do to bridges, about what it will do to tear up our highways. Wouldn't that be a good idea before we decide in our wisdom inside the beltway in Washington, DC, that we know better than 39 States? I think it would be a good idea. We might want to hear from AAA.…”