Our solemn responsibility is to hold government accountable to taxpayers.

But I also know--and I want to address this to Mr. Williams--that there are issues out there that we must confront.

Americans have a right to know that the money Washington takes from them is well spent.

For example, in your testimony when you talk about how it is not the taxpayers, it is the customers, it is the rate payers that are more affected by this, I think you and I will agree that for years the U.S. Postal Service has been self-sustaining, self-sufficient.

If that service also includes the closing of Post Offices or retail facilities or mail processing centers because of a lack of capacity, would you not agree that is something that ought to be done?

Because where we are today as a country with the U.S. Postal Service is, after 230 years, it is still one of the most well-established, best infrastructures, going to 150 million homes a day.

In fact, we have to make some systemic changes.

You have to have the business plan on one side, and then you have to have the capital investment in order to implement that business plan.

So we need--as a Congress, we need to empower the Postmaster General to be able to make those decisions based on economic factors in order to reduce the size or the obligations of the Postal Service to stay in those.

If we are going to assess it based on it being a business, then we have to look at the facilities that are out there that provide the service.

this investigation, as you well know, relies intensely on your testimony.