The Senate finance committee approved a $9.6 billion package of funding offsets for transportation as part of the “The Highway Investment, Job Creation, and Economic Growth Act of 2012.” Designed to cover gaps in The Highway Trust Fund, an infrastructure support project that traditionally gathered funds from the federal gas tax, this new transportation bill also controversially greenlights the Keystone XL pipeline in Nebraska. Joe Nocera is an op-ed columnist for our partner The New York Times. Todd Zwillich is The Takeaway’s Washington correspondent.