George Will comments on the Obama administration's fixation on high-speed rail, a "disorder" that "illuminates the progressive mind."
. . .progressives say they embrace high-speed rail for many reasons—to improve the climate, increase competitiveness, enhance national security, reduce congestion, and rationalize land use. The length of the list of reasons, and the flimsiness of each, points to this conclusion: the real reason for progressives' passion for trains is their goal of diminishing Americans' individualism in order to make them more amenable to collectivism.
To progressives, the best thing about railroads is that people riding them are not in automobiles, which are subversive of the deference on which progressivism depends. Automobiles go hither and yon, wherever and whenever the driver desires, without timetables. Automobiles encourage people to think they—unsupervised, untutored, and unscripted—are masters of their fates. The automobile encourages people in delusions of adequacy, which make them resistant to government by experts who know what choices people should make.
He also criticizes the administration's "damn the arithmetic, full speed ahead" approach. The essence of the one-track mind, isn't it?
Comments
Rail fans here are ready to pitch all of the I&M windfall into the "high-speed rail" project that would affect Fort Wayne according to the poll at Feedback Fort Wayne. Doh!
The idea finished as #2 overall.
All Aboard for BROKEVILLE!
(don't think so)
And I've been a big railfan for ages.
Common sense trumps progressivism any day.
And the common sense you say trumps progressivism is more cars and more dependence on oil to drive yourself around, both short and long trips?
AJ
I presume the proposed train would run (indirectly - via electricity) on coal. That's a mixed blessing.
We don't have to import coal, but the stuff is filthy. "Clean coal" is nonsense. There is no such thing.
With the network of highways already in place, I assume a high-speed rail would have to run on elevated tracks. That sounds very expensive for something people may well not use. We Americans love our cars.
I love trains, but there's a lot to be said for going directly from your own house to your destination. With trains, you have to park at one depot and rent a car at the next. No thanks.
Yes Andrew, that sums it up pretty well, common sense IS anathema to progressives.
Drill here, drill now!
Except when they drill off your coast and the crude from an uncapped well (sound familiar?) threatens the ocean front condo I own.
AJ
Yeah. Drill in the Gulf of Mexico. What could go wrong?
Coal isn't as filthy as petroleum.
Fluidized bed combustion of coal can give you 85% efficiency. The best you can hope for with an internal combustion engine is about 50%, and in order to get even that level of efficiency level, you need an engine that's under constant load (such as a fixed-speed engine running a generator in a hybrid electric car.)
But have you seen any hybrid electric airliners?
Existing passenger rail service in the US is too slow for long distance travel, where you'd replace air travel. It's used for commuting, where you replace cars - and if you are going back and forth every day, shouldn't you just live closer to work?
The only way high speed rail makes sense if is it keeps those incredibly filthy and incredibly noisy airliners on the ground.
Andrew, How's your beach look today?
Harl sez: "shouldn
Thank God the spill didn't make it that far south; my friends northern Florida were not so lucky.
But you know, even if the crude lapped my dock you would still say, "Oh well, shit happens. Sorry for what happened but drill away."
Hey, Indiana lacks a nuclear power plant; there's movement afoot to attract one in the state. How about siting it on Lafayette Center Road, or where the Adams Center landfill use to sit or any other of the huge vacant farmland tracks in Allen County. Let's see what that does for your peace of mind, let alone your property values.
Yeah, all you landlocked Midwesterners, who gives two hoots for oil spewing in the Gulf. It's a world away.
AJ
Andrew, sounds like it didn't really threaten your condo then afterall, huh? Anyway...
The world didn't stop making nuclear reactors & power plants after Chernobyl, they simply made them better. I wouldn't be so crass as to simply say "well shit happens" but I would say some accidents will happen. We don't ground all planes when one crashes (and a few do every year) either.
I honestly don't think you'd see that much resistance to a nuclear power plant in Indiana or anywhere else from citizens, only from the environutz. I certainly have no problem with it, put it in Steuben County I welcome the energy and the jobs.
Much as our government would like to insulate (by regulation) everyone and everything, there simply is nothing on this planet that doesn't come without some risk.
You wouldn't see nearly as many drills in your neck of the woods either if the enviro fascists would open up the Dakota's, Kansas, Montana shale, texas, alaska etc...
The whole world runs on fossil fuels, and quite efficiently when left the hell alone by meddling goovernments contrary to what Algore and progressives would have you believe.
Harl sez:
Well, a Canadian friend of mine once explained to me the reason that their dollar coins were actually used (unlike ours). The government there simply stopped printing dollar bills.
I suppose if we really want high-speed rail to succeed, we'll have to start by outlawing the automobile.