Obama: HSR Funding "Untouchable"

[James]

Obama has declared his $53 billion HSR plan "untouchable" in the debt and budget talks. What do you think will happen to this funding in the debt talks?

 

[The Davy Crockett]

It is nice to hear him say something about the funds, as he seems to have been pretty silent about them of late, but as the politicians continue to play 'chicken' with the debt celing limit, and the deadline nears, I think anything is possible. I can't believe it will give the tea party Republicans any political gain if they refuse to give an inch, we default on our debt, and the economy goes from the frying pan to the fire. One thing is clear though: Something/someone has got to give. I hope we don't find out what the ramifications of default are.

 

[Steve4031]

This should be untouchable. If our country contInues to cut cut cut and do nothing it will fail. I appreciate Obama drawing the line. Clinton talked a good game and nothing happened.

 

[GlobalistPotato]

Anything Obama wants is untouchable. That's politics really, especially when the politician is in an unyielding mood like Obama is right now.

Will he keep his word though? I don't know.

 

[leemell]

Anything Obama wants is untouchable. That's politics really, especially when the politician is in an unyielding mood like Obama is right now.

Will he keep his word though? I don't know.

You are a bit naive to believe that. While the President has great weight, politics can yield any result. In addition, the power of the purse is given by the constitution specifically to the House of Representatives.

 

[George Harris]

He is a politician. He is a Chicago machine politician. His primary agenda is self preservation. He will do anything and say anything that he thinks will enable him to achieve that end, which is above all, get reelected. To depend upon him for anything that does not work toward that objective is futility.

 

[Spokker]

He is a politician. He is a Chicago machine politician. His primary agenda is self preservation.

And I'll be more likely to vote for him again if he preserves high speed rail funding.

 

[George Harris]

Will he keep his word though? I don't know.

I think we have already seen the answer to that one. It is NO. If you are a memeber of one of the groups or demographics that he feels he has a lock on, you interests will be postponed, ignored, turned aside with nice words or whatever it takes to achieve what he sees necessary for self-preservation.

 

[Oldsmoboi]

Will he keep his word though? I don't know.

I think we have already seen the answer to that one. It is NO. If you are a memeber of one of the groups or demographics that he feels he has a lock on, you interests will be postponed, ignored, turned aside with nice words or whatever it takes to achieve what he sees necessary for self-preservation.

I don't believe that at all. He ran on repealing "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" and it's been repealed, he signed the certification today, it goes into effect late September.

He has come out in favor of repealing DOMA.

He has halted the deportation of same sex husband/wives who are foreign national that have been legally married in the states that allow gay marriage.

He has halted the defense of certain portions of the existing DOMA law in the courts.

He continuously stays his personal position on gay marriage is "evolving" which we on the supportive side take as a "wait till I'm re-elected" nod. I have no fear that he is against us on that one.

And who are we going to vote for other than him? Michele Bachmann? She'd stuff us into cattle cars and ship us off to concentration camps faster than you could say 1939. We're locked into voting for him... and he has already done a lot for us.

 

[DET63]

And who are we going to vote for other than him? Michele Bachmann? She'd stuff us into cattle cars and ship us off to concentration camps faster than you could say 1939.

You're a fool if you believe that. IAC, it's unlikely that Bachmann will be the GOP candidate next year. Romney has by far the biggest war chest, and those with the most money usually (not always, of course) win elections.

 

[George Harris]

And who are we going to vote for other than him? Michele Bachmann? She'd stuff us into cattle cars and ship us off to concentration camps faster than you could say 1939. We're locked into voting for him... and he has already done a lot for us.

Really do not know how to respond to you on what you have said, but I decided I had to say something. I am not part of the "us" that is happy about his positions in this area, and certainly not part of the "We" that is locked into voting for him becausse of his position on a myriad of issues where I considere him either wrong or delusional. Due to many of his positions in many other areas it is more that I felt locked into, as someone here so beautifully says, voting for "the old man and the hot chick." despite their, or more aptly his, positon on rail issues. However, if you believe Bachmann or anyone eles is going to do the Hitler 1939 thing to people of your opinion and lifestyle, you are swallowing a line of propoganda. With these statements, I intend to say no more on political or similar issues here.

 

[jis]

Obama has declared his $53 billion HSR plan "untouchable" in the debt and budget talks. What do you think will happen to this funding in the debt talks?

A more accurate statement would be that Karl Rove has declared that Obama has declared that his $53 billion HSR plan is "untouchable". I have not seen Obama quite say that yet, unfortunately. Afterall this was stated in a Karl Rove penned Op-ed piece in WSJ.

 

[Oldsmoboi]

And who are we going to vote for other than him? Michele Bachmann? She'd stuff us into cattle cars and ship us off to concentration camps faster than you could say 1939. We're locked into voting for him... and he has already done a lot for us.

Really do not know how to respond to you on what you have said, but I decided I had to say something. I am not part of the "us" that is happy about his positions in this area, and certainly not part of the "We" that is locked into voting for him becausse of his position on a myriad of issues where I considere him either wrong or delusional. Due to many of his positions in many other areas it is more that I felt locked into, as someone here so beautifully says, voting for "the old man and the hot chick." despite their, or more aptly his, positon on rail issues. However, if you believe Bachmann or anyone eles is going to do the Hitler 1939 thing to people of your opinion and lifestyle, you are swallowing a line of propoganda. With these statements, I intend to say no more on political or similar issues here.

Going to? No.

Wishes she could? most definitely.

 

[Ryan]

as someone here so beautifully says, voting for "the old man and the hot chick."

Beautiful? It's sad and pathetic to take politics and treat it like a game. Perhaps if people took it a little more seriously and didn't treat it like a team sport, we wouldn't be in the bind that we're in now.

 

[James]

So any word yet on what the potential budget deal entails for Amtrak and HSR funding for FY 2012 yet?

 

[jis]

So any word yet on what the potential budget deal entails for Amtrak and HSR funding for FY 2012 yet?

Clearly it will get cut some, it being part of the Domestic side of discretionary budget. The question is how much, and that we won't know just by looking at the current bill, since it is not about budget but about constraints that budgets for each year must meet. Congress will now have to come up with a budget that is consistent with the agreement for FY 2012. My guess is that the cut will not be as deep as in the House 2012 budget proposal, but will be pretty deep. Deep enough to cause possible curtailment of some service here and there, but not completely disastrous cutbacks. Again, the worst performing trains without any state support will be under the gun, as has happened before.

 

[George Harris]

A serious anti-fraud effort for a lot of the fluff programs would save more in a year than Amtrak costs in a decade.

Think of such things as "National Endowment for the Arts". There are also many absolutely useless studies done. Not useless in the sense of planning for things that were never intended to be built, but such things as the multiple page analyses for potential habitat of critters nobody ever heard of that are instigated by or for people that really do not care at all about environmental issues, but are simply prostituting the system to achieve their objective of stopping whatever it is they do not want. As one example, BNSF spent a few years and several million dollars in studies to work through the objections of one landowner in the area of Abo Canyon before they could start constructing their second main. And: It appears that the objectors had come into the area only a few years before the proposal to build the second main was raised, did not own any land, or very little of the land that was taken, and disappeared from the area about the time construction started.

 

[DET63]

Not useless in the sense of planning for things that were never intended to be built, but such things as the multiple page analyses for potential habitat of critters nobody ever heard of that are instigated by or for people that really do not care at all about environmental issues, but are simply prostituting the system to achieve their objective of stopping whatever it is they do not want.

George's comment brings up a point that has crossed my mind a few times: If we need HSR to get people out of airplanes that contribute to global climate change, which in turn leads to the extinction of x number of species or subspecies every year, then what purpose in the grand scheme of things is served by delaying an HSR project just to determine its impact on a particular species (or, often, subspecies) of "critter" (frog, fish, insect, whatever)? What good does it do to determine whether or not a new HSR line is going to lead to the extinction of a subspecies of butterfly when every day spent delaying the project causes the extinction of another butterfly somewhere else in the world?

 

[George Harris]

Not useless in the sense of planning for things that were never intended to be built, but such things as the multiple page analyses for potential habitat of critters nobody ever heard of that are instigated by or for people that really do not care at all about environmental issues, but are simply prostituting the system to achieve their objective of stopping whatever it is they do not want.

George's comment brings up a point that has crossed my mind a few times: If we need HSR to get people out of airplanes that contribute to global climate change, which in turn leads to the extinction of x number of species or subspecies every year, then what purpose in the grand scheme of things is served by delaying an HSR project just to determine its impact on a particular species (or, often, subspecies) of "critter" (frog, fish, insect, whatever)? What good does it do to determine whether or not a new HSR line is going to lead to the extinction of a subspecies of butterfly when every day spent delaying the project causes the extinction of another butterfly somewhere else in the world?

Think of the huge solar collector system that was recently stopped because of its presumed effect on some species of desert turtle (I think it was). What are we supposed to do? Burn more oil/gas/coal instead. Build nuclear? Oh wait, the horrors of radiation.

I think one of the classics examples is the prohibition of putting up clotheslines in many subdivisions loaded with people oh so concerned with the environment. Guess what! A closthesline reduces electricity consumption, or gas consumption because you are using solar power, not fossil fuel to dry your clothes.

I tend to regard many of these on so concerned environmentalists as sanctimonious hypocrites.

 

[Anderson]

Not useless in the sense of planning for things that were never intended to be built, but such things as the multiple page analyses for potential habitat of critters nobody ever heard of that are instigated by or for people that really do not care at all about environmental issues, but are simply prostituting the system to achieve their objective of stopping whatever it is they do not want.

George's comment brings up a point that has crossed my mind a few times: If we need HSR to get people out of airplanes that contribute to global climate change, which in turn leads to the extinction of x number of species or subspecies every year, then what purpose in the grand scheme of things is served by delaying an HSR project just to determine its impact on a particular species (or, often, subspecies) of "critter" (frog, fish, insect, whatever)? What good does it do to determine whether or not a new HSR line is going to lead to the extinction of a subspecies of butterfly when every day spent delaying the project causes the extinction of another butterfly somewhere else in the world?

Think of the huge solar collector system that was recently stopped because of its presumed effect on some species of desert turtle (I think it was). What are we supposed to do? Burn more oil/gas/coal instead. Build nuclear? Oh wait, the horrors of radiation.

I think one of the classics examples is the prohibition of putting up clotheslines in many subdivisions loaded with people oh so concerned with the environment. Guess what! A closthesline reduces electricity consumption, or gas consumption because you are using solar power, not fossil fuel to dry your clothes.

I tend to regard many of these on so concerned environmentalists as sanctimonious hypocrites.

I think I said something to this effect elsewhere, but I would love a demand for more study to determine whether a project will have X impact to be met with a statement that "We do not care whether this is the case or not. If this happens, it happens, and knowledge of this fact will have no impact on our decision." I'm reminded of the frustrated comment that there would be no way we could build I-95 today, with all of the regulations...not only that, but I'd be shocked if the Rio Grande Main would have gone in...or the Lackawanna Cutoff, the C&O Peninsula Division, or even the NEC Main Line.

Of course, the short answer to all of this (having the appropriate official just waiver all of the HSR proposals out of TIer II EIS-es...Tier I, I get. Tier II seems to more often than not end up being a detailed waste of taxpayer dollars.) would cause those folks to have a coronary.

 

[Green Maned Lion]

I tend to regard many of these on so concerned environmentalists as sanctimonious hypocrites.

sanctimonious idiots. You need a brain to be a hypocrite.

 

[George Harris]

I tend to regard many of these on so concerned environmentalists as sanctimonious hypocrites.

sanctimonious idiots. You need a brain to be a hypocrite.

Absolutely correct, GML. AT b est, you could say that these positions are stupid. As I heard it once, ignorance is curable. Stupidity is forever. And, I could add not curable by either education or economic conditions.

 

[Ryan]

That's a hell of a broad brush that you're painting with there. Don't let reality get in the way of those stereotypes!

 

[Devil's Advocate]

Think of the huge solar collector system that was recently stopped because of its presumed effect on some species of desert turtle (I think it was). What are we supposed to do? Burn more oil/gas/coal instead. Build nuclear? Oh wait, the horrors of radiation. I think one of the classics examples is the prohibition of putting up clotheslines in many subdivisions loaded with people oh so concerned with the environment. Guess what! A closthesline reduces electricity consumption, or gas consumption because you are using solar power, not fossil fuel to dry your clothes. I tend to regard many of these on so concerned environmentalists as sanctimonious hypocrites.

George, you remind me of a man I saw on television complaining about environmentalists flipping him off in his Hummer from the windows of their Chevy Suburbans and Ford Expeditions. The only problem was that he couldn't explain WHY he was so convinced that these angry drivers must be card-carrying environmentalists. He just assumed that anyone who was upset with him must be an environmentalist and that all environmentalists must be tank-driving hypocrites. It never occurred to him that maybe his assumptions had become so convoluted over the years that they ceased to make any sense.

 

[George Harris]

Think of the huge solar collector system that was recently stopped because of its presumed effect on some species of desert turtle (I think it was). What are we supposed to do? Burn more oil/gas/coal instead. Build nuclear? Oh wait, the horrors of radiation. I think one of the classics examples is the prohibition of putting up clotheslines in many subdivisions loaded with people oh so concerned with the environment. Guess what! A closthesline reduces electricity consumption, or gas consumption because you are using solar power, not fossil fuel to dry your clothes. I tend to regard many of these on so concerned environmentalists as sanctimonious hypocrites.

George, you remind me of a man I saw on television complaining about environmentalists flipping him off in his Hummer from the windows of their Chevy Suburbans and Ford Expeditions. The only problem was that he couldn't explain WHY he was so convinced that these angry drivers must be card-carrying environmentalists. He just assumed that anyone who was upset with him must be an environmentalist and that all environmentalists must be tank-driving hypocrites. It never occurred to him that maybe his assumptions had become so convoluted over the years that they ceased to make any sense.

Dear Texas Sunset, It appears that by now if I said the sky was blue you would find something wrong with it. Most of what you just said that I said was putting words in my mouth, and not at all either what I said or what I meant.