totally do not understand how this protects the travelling public... if it is to shield them from dangerous regionals.... tell me which mainline has never had an accident? (i'm sure someone is going to name one, but you get my point. and even then you'd have to take into account how long they've been in business because it's not fair to compare a 5 year old airlinee without a single accident, as opposed to a 20 year airline with one accident.)
and, regionals do make up more than 50% of all the flying... so unless people are travelling from hub to hub, how would they plan on ever avoiding a regional aircraft? (and even hub to hub is often flown by regionals with larger aircraft like RAH.) i cant believe this chuck is serving my beloved home state, he could be spending his time on a gazillion other things that matter.