CNN’s Candy Crowley did an interview with DOT Secretary Lahood and challenged him on the effects of the sequester budget cuts. So glad I’m not the only one dumbfounded by the whole “we have to furlough Air Traffic Controllers” line of thinking.

At one point Lahood says the following:

Well first of all, we’re required to cut $1 billion. The largest number of employees at DOT is at FAA of which the largest number are FAA controllers. We’re going to try and cut as much as we possibly can out of contracts and other things that we do. But in the end there has to be some kind of furlough of air traffic controllers. And that, then, will also begin to curtail or eliminate the opportunity for them to guide planes in and out of airports. It’s a big part of our budget.

How do you take the following numbers and come up with $600 million in cuts to the FAA and furloughing 47,000 employees?

• DOT FY 2013 budget is $74.5 billion.
• FAA FY 2013 budget is $15.2 billion.
• FAA Operations FY 2013 budget is $9.7 billion. (Air Traffic Control is a part of this $9.7 billion, not the entirety)
• DOT FY 2013 budget cuts are $1 billion.

Politics and not problem solving.