united airlines is planning a major purchase of airlines in the next few years. host: that host: is from the washington post this morning. -- that is from "the washington post" this evening. there will be an apple event this weekend. mortgage rates hit a six-month high. the piece points out that rates have risen to the highest levels in six months. it is threatening to the late housing turnaround by discouraging potential homebuyers. the issue this morning is unemployment. it is at 9.4%. robert is up from new york city on the democrats' line. caller: thank you so much for having me on. it is surprising that they are showing 9.4% in terms of the rate of unemployment. the line directly beneath that says that it is the most in 25 years. i had an opportunity to work with an organization hiring individuals for customer service representatives. it over the last few months, we have seen an enormous amount of individuals applying for this particular job. my question to yourself and the viewers is this. even though we are showing 345,000 in terms of job loss, what type of

among those that did not have a positive return last year -- g.m., united airlines, time warner, ford, cbs and macy's -- all these companies lost billions in what financial analysts tell us was the fortune 500's worst year ever last year. there were two sectors of the economy that did well: the oil industry and the health insurance industry. the top four health insurance companies in america -- united health group, well point, aetna and humana -- made more than $7.5 billion in combined profit last year, while the bottom fell out for sreurt wastefulry other company, short of the oil industry, across the board. the goal of the democratic health insurance bill is to create health care and quality. republicans want to preserve a broken system, one with escalating costs and no guarantee that the policy is going to be there when you need it. rather than health insurance companies, democrats want to put american families first and help those who are struggling with high health care costs. i think this is a moment of truth for us in this congress. this isn't an easy issue. right now the finan

more than 50% of all of the scheduled airline passenger flights in the united states are on regional airlines, and most notably, 3 out -- three out of every four regional airports are served exclusively by regional airlines. our airline, as you indicated, largely operates in seamless partnership with major airlines. regional airlines provide the crew and the aircraft, major airlines said the flight schedules, fareset the flight schedules, fares and customer service policy. they operated a single system, one ticket, one trip, one safety standard. all passenger airlines are subject to the exact same faa safety standards and requirements. it has been this way for more than a decade. our goal is to prevent accidents, and that is why we are earnestly and eagerly supporting the faa's call to action and why the regional airline association has embarked on our own strategic safety initiative to underscore our safety culture and prevent accidents. this strategic safety initiative has four elements -- first, bringing together our safety professionals review all of the procedures and address any

and if there is ever an faa inspector that shows up, by the way, the united states pay for that. -- pays for that. not the airlines. the taxpayers are underwriting the outsourcing. they're not even doing drug and alcohol tests. as we have talked about before, their locations that have been on the state department's watch list where there have been repair stations that have been utilized. if you could get back to us, i think it will be helpful as we move forward tried to get these important reforms done in the area of maintenance repair. >> we will attempt to get all of that information. i am well familiar with the issue of the inspections and repair stations. we have written about one of the carriers that fly is an empty airbus for repair after having a repaired in el salvador. my guess is, it is probably another issue of dollars and cents. let me go back to icing. this co but said, i have never seen icing conditions, i have never deiced. i have never experienced any of that. i did not want to have to experience that and make those kind of calls. the actual transcript as a co- pilot that appears to me to have had

the united states has done in the past lots of nasty things including nasty things to iran. we shut down a civilian airliner by mistake in supported saddam hussein even in his use of chemical weapons. there is every reason for iranians to be suspicious of the united states doing bad things. but there's no evidence of this at this time. president obama has gone out of his way to ensure that the united states is keeping its distance. it is interesting to me that the regime has ski coated the british rather than the americans and the last few days. host: the president has taken some criticism for his comments or in some people's views, lack of strong comments. what is your take on his posture? guest: he is in a very difficult situation. ideally, he would act as ronald reagan did in the last days of communism, that is dealing with the soviet union as the established date, but at the same time criticizing its policies and offered support to dissidents. it is more difficult in iran because we have not had established relations for 30 years. do we begin to establish them with this regime just as it is acting worse

inspector that shows up, by the way the united states pays for that, the taxpayers pay the cost of the faa inspectors to go look at foreign repair stations, not the airline so the taxpayers are actually underwriting these outsourcing. they aren't even doing drug and alcohol tests. as we talked about in his hearing before they are actually locations that have been on the state department watch list for terrorist activity where there have been repair stations that have been utilized. so if you would get back to us with whatever information your associations have on this information, i think will be helpful as we move forward trying to get these important reforms done in the area of maintenance and repair. thank you. thank you, mr. chairman. >> senator mccaskill, thank you very much. we will attempt to get all of the information. on the inspection and repair stations. we have in fact written about one of the carriers that flies an empty airbus 322 el salvador for repair and implies an empty 320 back to united states after having it repaired in el salvador, or inspected or maintained. my guess is that's probably another issue of dollars and cents. let me go

airlines. host: who you work for? caller: a very large red road and that u.s., united states. host: thank you for your call this morning. we are looking at an article @ "usa today." here is the front-page of the money section today, about the chinese. car sales boom, reshaping the way of life. china's love affair with the automobile is thriving despite the global recession. it is changing the way people live here in ways reminiscent of the usa potsy bloom in car ownership after world war ii. a couple of other stories, from of a "of the houston chronicle." yesterday was flag day. the front-page have a picture of the flag of going up on a front porch in the houston area. we will also have a look at "the baltimore sun." their newspaper had a picture from fort mchenry as high school students from mississippi help out in the flag day celebrations at fort mchenry just outside baltimore. ohio, good morning to carl. make sure you turn down your television or radiator -- radio. caller: well, the federal bureaucracy -- the faa is equivalent to the department of education, and these are

airline. our airport on guam facilitates the daily transiting of international passengers to destinations in the united states, other pacific islands, major cities in the pacific rim, including, japan, korea, taiwan and australia. the security arrangement requires significant resources to be expended in constant around the clock monitoring by security personnel to prevent the co-mingling of transiting and departing passengers. the security enhancements made subsequent to the terrorist attacks of september 11, 2001, particularly with respect to preventing the co-mingling of passengers at our airports all across the country have been costly and in some cases difficult to fully implement. moreover, the current decrease in tourist arrivals and departures due to the economic downturn erodes the financial capability of small airports to implement such security improvements. the guam international airport authority has been operating from a waiver from the t.s.a. for several years. the t.s.a. and the guam international airport agree that the temporary solution which amounts to placement of removable par tissu

argues against to increase tourism in the united states, bring in more foreign visitors who will spend more money, who will help hotels and restaurants and airlines and businesses large and small. 11 republicans cosponsored it. last night we said, let's pass it, let's move on. this is the type of thing that's good but it shouldn't take all of this time to do. only two of the 11 republicans who cosponsored the tourism bill will willing to vote for it last night they wanted to delay it again. they want us to end up this week accomplishing little or nothing. at the end of the week, if they get us to do nothing, they considered a -- consider it a successful week. i don't see how it can be. this bill we're talking about on tourism is designed to help create jobs in this country. something we desperately need. health care is a serious issue which we need to move on and not delay. democrats believe the role of the federal government is to keep the best interest of the american people in mind, half of those questioned in the "the new york times"-cbs poll said they thought the government would be better at providing medical coverage than private insurers.

of the maintenance by the regional airline members is done here at this country either by themself on their own to a faa certified maintenance operation in the united states including our manufacturers which have locations in the united states in miami, tennessee and west virginia. so i hope that may be a walk long way of answering your question -- >> i'm interested in which to sell because i am sure you are aware that it is perfectly acceptable to the faa for the repair work to be done in on certified stations. i mean, you are aware of that, right? you are maintaining today that all of the maintenance work is being done because this is one of the problems we have right now is that a repair station does not have to be certified by the faa in order for it to be utilized by either the commercial carriers or the regional carriers. are you aware of that? >> senator, again it is my understanding on the maintenance that and having the maintenance that we are talking about, the heavy maintenance checks that c and d checks are conducted in what i am assuming are faa certified -- >> if you reject that because i think i would be surprised if that were a fact