Photograph by Dennis Brack-Pool/Getty Images

Vice President Joe Biden speaks to the National Governors Association in the State Dining room of the White House on Feb. 25, 2013 in Washington.

Leave it to Vice President Joe Biden to prove that every sequestration has a silver lining.

Due to the across-the-board federal spending cuts set to begin tomorrow, Biden is ditching his usual military plane and returning to his preferred mode of transportation: the train.

While speaking to the National Association of Attorneys General on Wednesday, Biden — after whom the Wilmington, Delaware, train station was renamed in 2011 — said he took almost 8,000 train trips between Washington and Delaware as a U.S. senator. As vice president, he flies because ”the Secret Service doesn’t like” him taking the train.

“They concluded it gives too many opportunities for people to interact with me in a way they wouldn’t like to see them interacting,” Biden said. “And so they fly me back and forth.”

Biden said his cost-saving travel decision is the one thing to his “benefit” to come of sequestration.

“Now I was able to say, ‘Look, guys, I’ve got to take the train now. It’s cheaper than flying,’” Biden said, prompting laughter from the crowd. “So I get to take the train again.”

Original post is Biden’s Silver Sequestration Lining by Political Capital.

It is time to synchronize the watches, it appears.

In Washington, where the White House and Congress cannot agree on how to avert $85 billion in across-the-board budget cuts scheduled to start March 1, they also are having trouble agreeing on when that “sequestration” starts.

The White House today is saying 11:59 pm Friday night.

That helps serve a narrative that the administration is trying to do something about it with a meeting among the president and congressional leaders of both parties scheduled at the White House on Friday.

On Capitol Hill, they’re saying the clock runs out on finding an alternative at midnight Thursday. The Senate, House Speaker John Boehner claims, is sitting on their “asses.” It’s the House, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid maintains, that’s sitting on its “posterior.”

And March 1, after all, starts at 12:01 am Friday, on anyone’s clock.

Still, this is what the law says: “On March 1, 2013, the President shall order a sequestration for fiscal year 2013 pursuant to section 251A of the Balanced Budget and Emergency Deficit Control Act of 1985.”

That  allows the president to release that order as late as he likes Friday.

Remember, this is the government that runs Amtrak.

Lisa Lerer and Kathy Rizzo contributed.

Original post is Sequestration Starts… Uh, When White House is Good and Ready by Political Capital.

Photograph by Andrew Harrer/Bloomberg

Passengers walk beneath an Amtrak sign at Union Station in Washington.

Amtrak CEO Joe Boardman had hoped for an easier ride in 2013 after Florida Republican John Mica had to relinquish the chairmanship of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee.

Mica, who was term-limited out of the post, took great pleasure in poking fun at Amtrak’s losses from its food service and its federal subsidy.

With Pennsylvania Republican Bill Shuster in the new T&I post, Boardman had hoped for smoother track through that committee, which is due to reauthorize Amtrak this year. He was in for a rude awakening yesterday, when Shuster named California Republican Jeff Denham as the Railroad Subcommittee’s chairman.

Denham last month lit into California’s high-speed rail project at the final hearing Mica held to grill Boardman about Amtrak. Denham said he supported the project as a state senator before the cost ballooned and the state’s credit rating was downgraded.

“Let’s put it back on the ballot so that we can end the project once and for all,” Denham said then.

Denham earned his stripes chairing another T&I subcommittee that last year probed excessive spending at conferences by the General Services Administration.

Boardman today said he doesn’t know Denham too well, only having “experienced him” in the Dec. 6 hearing.

“He’s got a steep learning curve,” Boardman said in an interview following a press conference to announce a plan to buy trains for California’s rail project. “He had a history in California of what in-state issues are, but his view now has to be larger. It’s not just California parochially.”

Original post is Amtrak’s Rough Ride Renewed by Political Capital.

Photograph by Mel Evans/Pool/AP Photo

New Jersey Commissioner of the Department of Transportation, James Simpson, second left, Commissioner of the Department of Environmental Porotection, Bob Martin, right, and Lt. Gov. Kim Guadagno, third right, walk with New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, center left, past damaged homes along the Atlantic Ocean on Nov. 2, 2012 in Mantoloking, N.J.

New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie is in Washington to lobby Congress for a Superstorm Sandy supplemental. The White House could send emergency aid request for more than $50 billion to the Hill as early as today.

Speaking of Sandy, Amtrak and New York-area transit agencies are sending officials to testify at a Senate Commerce subcommittee hearing on the storm’s  transportation and infrastructure damage.

The Senate is to vote on a bill to normalize trade with Russia, while a Senate Judiciary panel considers a measure that would require Apple Inc. and Google Inc. to get permission from people before collecting data on location. The House is gone for the week, with only a pro forma session tomorrow.

On the fiscal cliff front, Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody’s Analytics, and Kevin Hassett, senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, testify at a Joint Economic Committee hearing about the effect on the middle class and the U.S. economy should lawmakers fail to stop automatic tax increases and $607 billion in spending cuts from taking effect next month.

Federal Election Commission filings due today will disclose expenditures by, and contributions to, the campaigns of President Barack Obama and Republican challenger Mitt Romney in the final weeks before Nov. 6 election. Super-political action committees and Congress candidates also must report.

Rep. Frank Lucas, and Oklahoma Republican, and Sen. Debbie Stabenow, a Michigan Democrat, will provide updates on farm-bill negotiations at a Farm Journal conference. The Natural Resources Defense Council Releases report on affects of global warming on ski resorts in the U.S. FedEx Corp. CEO Frederick Smith speaks at an Economic Club of Washington luncheon.

And Obama takes a break from wrangling over the fiscal cliff this evening to light the National Christmas Tree tonight on the Elipse.

Original post is Washington Daybook: Christie Turns Lobbyist by Political Capital.

Photograph by Andrew Harrer/Bloomberg

Union Station in Washington.

Rep. John Mica may not be able to yank the Transportation Security Administration’s chain during his final month as chairman of the House transportation committee.

But he’s still got Amtrak.

Mica, the Florida Republican who ceded his bid to remain chairman of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee past his term limits, hauled Amtrak Chief Executive Officer Joe Boardman before the panel today for the fourth time this year. And he announced two more hearings on what he refers to as  the “Soviet-style” Amtrak for December.

“Everybody’s focused on the fiscal cliff,” Mica said. “Sometimes people give me a hard time for focusing on Amtrak. But we have put $1.4 billion into Amtrak in the past year. We do have a responsibility for taxpayer dollars.”

Today’s hearing was benign by Mica’s standards, as he praised Amtrak for its work recovering from the damage caused by Hurricane Sandy in New York. Yet he noted he didn’t purchase any food on his train trip to the Big Apple yesterday because taxpayers would have lost money on anything he bought.

At an August hearing, Mica brought hamburgers along to illustrate his criticism of Amtrak’s losses on food and beverage service. He followed that up with a press conference outside a McDonald’s, during which he pointed out the cost difference between the fare there and on Amtrak and, according to Politico, yelled at a passing train, “Please don’t buy the hamburgers!”

Today’s latest Amtrak hammering comes a day after TSA Administrator John Pistole sent word to Mica that neither he nor his agency will show up for a hearing critical of the security body tomorrow. Pistole said Mica’s panel, even though it helped create the TSA after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, doesn’t have jurisdiction over the agency.

Who has jurisdiction over Amtrak isn’t in question. So look for Boardman to return to Capitol Hill on Dec. 6 and 13 when Mica holds hearings on high-speed rail and Amtrak’s Northeast Corridor.

Original post is Amtrak CEO Running on Lame-Duck House Chairman’s Borrowed Time by Political Capital.