Daily Democrat - Editorial: FAA budget stalled by ideology'

Area Congressman Mike Thompson is furious and he has a perfect right to be. He's been calling for action over the past week by both Congress and the Senate to a short-term extension of FAA funding which expired on July 22.

But the Senate recessed without taking any action. As a result, the government has lost more than $250 million in revenue due to expired ticket taxes and put tens of thousands of jobs at risk during a critical period of our economic recovery.

Pocketing that revenue has been the airline industry. And if you think they'll return it, you've been flying in the stratosphere and are oxygen deprived.

For pure, callous disregard of the health of the American economy, the holdup of the FAA budget in Congress is right up there with the brinkmanship that characterized the debt ceiling debate.

But at least Congress raised the debt ceiling in time to avoid irreversible damage. In the case of the FAA budget, the stalemate has shut down all but the most basic safety work at the agency, costing the government $1 billion in revenue and delaying billions of dollars worth of construction projects across the country.

This obscenely petty Congressional snit has swept away thousands of construction jobs that otherwise would be pumping life into struggling local economies.

This disaster has tossed 70,000 construction workers out of work nationwide, along with 4,000 FAA employees. Work has stopped on some 250 projects representing a whopping $10.5 billion in construction. And the government is likely to lose more than $1 billion in airline ticket tax revenue.

Ostensibly, the reason is Republicans' insistence on stopping subsidies to small airports that years ago were deemed essential transportation links far from a major airport. It's worth debating. But the government has already lost more because of the stoppage than the subsidy would have cost.

Now it looks like nothing will be done on the FAA budget until September, after members of Congress take their August vacation. Presumably all flying somewhere. Maybe their plane tickets should be canceled for non-payment?

Of all the outrages coming out of Washington in the past few years, none more clearly shows how ideology trumps the public good for a growing number of politicians. A system that allows this to happen against all reason is truly broken.