Ray LaHood was gloating on Chris Matthew's show about how Florida's mistake was helping out the Washington corridor, Chicago and LA. Florida's Governor Rick Scott wisely rejected $2 billion in tax money for high speed rail that would have created way more problems than it would have solved and put the State in the red for years.
Now LaHood has divvied up $1.5 billion of that money in the northeast, midwest and west coast.
He credits the foresight of Obama and Biden with bringing rail travel back in this country and for envisioning 80% of the population having access to rail. I have access to rail - if I want to drive 25 minutes to the station and have no way to get around once I get to wherever I'm going. Hardly sounds like a plan.
So far it seems we have spent $13 billion on planning for high-speed rail. When we are faced with the kind of mounting debt that we have in the country, high speed rail is a folly we can do without.
There is a reason Railway Express - once the UPS of its time - went away. There's a reason no private passenger service exists in this country. There just isn't the demand, and there is not the service that can be provided in a responsive, economical way.
High-speed won't work because people will have to drive for up to 5 hours to get to the nearest station, or there will be so many intermediate stops that it will be nothing more than a glorified commuter system.
This is not the time for public officials to be ecstatic about spending money - regardless of how appropriate they think it is. Shame on you, LaHood. If you want to spend some money that will do us all some good, take every last dime that you can from any program that is not essential - by America's standards not yours - and give it back to the Treasury. Then, you can smile, and we will join you.
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