Highway and Transportation Funding Act of 2014

Floor Speech

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Mr. KING. Madam President, I rise to address the highway funding issue we are discussing today. Four or five years ago, Tom Brokaw wrote a book called ``The Greatest Generation.'' He was talking about the generation that sacrificed--I repeat sacrificed--on our behalf. They struggled through the Depression, they fought World War II. Then when it was over, they paid the debt from World War II and built the Interstate Highway System. I hate to think what Tom Brokaw would call the book written about our generation, which has, in effect, rebuilt the World War II debt, which we are passing on to our children. We cannot even keep the Interstate Highway System fixed. This is shameful.

I am here to support the Carper-Boxer-Corker amendment, because it forces us to deal with it in this Congress. It is not going to be any easier to deal with next May. Let's get it done. We have the answers. We know what we have to do. The highway system is a pay-as-you-go system. The problem is, now we are going more than we are paying. The gasoline tax has not been raised since 1993, 21 years ago. But the cost of maintaining the highways, of course, has been raised precipitously.

Not fixing infrastructure is debt. A lot of people around here talk about debt, and we are worried about the debt we are passing on to our children. I am worried about it too, but I want to make the point that if you do not fix a bridge or do not fix a highway or do not fix an airport, that is debt too because our children are going to have fix them. When they get around to it, they are going to have to pay more for it.

Senator Corker used the term ``generational theft.'' That is what it is. Our generation is giving ourselves tax cuts borrowing the money to pay for those tax cuts, and our kids are going to have to pay it. That is not a tax cut, that is a shift of a tax from us to our children and our grandchildren. It is wrong.

To think that generation went through the Depression, fought World War II, paid for World War II, and then built the Interstate Highway System in the 1950s and 1960s, and then we cannot even keep it paved, and we have rebuilt the debt from World War II with nothing much to show for it, is unconscionable.

There are a lot of problems we deal with here that are hard and complicated. I deal with, on Armed Services and Intelligence, some very complicated problems that are troubling and difficult to figure the right thing to do. This one is simple: Pay your bills. It could not be more straightforward. Pay your bills. If you want to drive on the highways, have the potholes filled, we have to pay for it. To delay this into next May is just that much easier, and then we are going to start talking about Presidential campaigns and other campaigns and 2016 is going to be coming up. There are always reasons not to do it.

This is the 11th time we have punted on this issue. This is what the American public is sick and tired of. They are sick and tired of us not doing our basic job. There could not be a more basic job than fixing and paying for and maintaining your infrastructure. So I hope we can pass this amendment.

Yes, it is going to go back to the House. The House has said: Well, we are not going to accept it. But let's see. Let's put something good over there, shorten the time, get to it this year, in December, November or December, and let's solve it. It is not going to be any easier to solve in May. I would argue it would probably be harder.

I think it is time for us to start talking straight to the American people and say: We have to pay our bills. That is what this amendment and that is what this bill is all about. I want that book to talk about another greatest generation, not the worst generation that just passed all the bills on to our kids.

I yield the floor.

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