So Biden announced a $53 billion plan to build high speed rail. He said this is about “seizing the future.” So, I guess we already gave up on winning the future and are going to do a snatch and grab on it.
Of course, how are we going to get to the future using a strategy from the second half of the 19th century?
BIDEN: “Let’s build trains!”
AMERICA: “No one uses trains anymore.”
BIDEN: “But these are really fast trains?”
AMERICA: “Faster than planes?”
BIDEN: “No.”
Yeah, let’s definitely spend those billions we don’t have to make choo choos, ’cause if one thing is holding back our economy it’s not enough choo choos. And after we use our advanced technology to build a better train, let’s then focus science on inventing a better horseshoe.
Of course, if we all want to be about saving money and being green and what not, shouldn’t we focus more on not going places since we have like our internet and stuff now. I mean, physically going places seems so last century. You didn’t have to go any place to get IMAO; why even go outside at all, I say.
They need the train rails for when they ban all the vehicles we drive, and/or they tax us so much during the onslaught of totalitarian socialism and/or communism that we ordinary citizens can no longer afford to own a vehicle. Look at old Russia and North Korea and China, all commies that have mainly govt. run public transit systems for the people. The average commie citizen cannot afford privately owned transportation unless it has two wheels, a chain, and pedals. Building railways is a stepping stone for the democrats to impliment their “progressive” communist agenda and if it takes them 150 years, they will fight for 150 years. 2012 will be crucial to the future of this country.
I figure that after the Tea Party Beat Down of 2010, a conversation in the White House went something like this:
BHO: What’s got these people all wee-weed up?
Aid: We’ve heard a lot of them talking about some “Atlas Shrugged” book some woman wrote.
BHO: A woman? Why would a book about shoes, chocolate, and feelings cause all this trouble?
Aid: Well… I don’t think that’s what the book is about, really…
BHO: Then someone who can read, figure this out and report back to me
6 months later (it’s a really, really long book)…
BHO: Well… What’s this all about?
Aid: The central character is a woman who works for a railroad and she’s trying to expand, but the government keeps getting in the…
BHO: THAT’S IT!!! These people want more trains! I can do that! Hell, we’ll even make them some of those bullet trains like those Japanese and Europeans have… Everyone thinks European trains are great, right? Joe! Write me some trains into the State of the Union Speech!
A difference between conservatives and liberals is that liberals support trains that are still too slow and run on government subsidies whereas conservatives support trains that do not try to be as fast as other modern forms of transporation but rather try to look look cool and sound cool while burning coal ripped from the bosom of Mother Earth by giant steam shovels.
This is going to be even cooler than all those empty buses that we pay to drive around cities in the name of “public transportation.”
is this high speed rail for passenger trains or for high volume cargo shipment trains?
I think the real problem is: there are no businessmen with handlebar mustaches or lamb chop sideburns anymore. All the bestest robber barrons had some serious facial hair. THAT’s what built America!
Maybe if the trains were pulled by dinosaurs…..
I might go along with the idea of building really fast trains if they put the tracks along the border. That way, when somebody tries to sneak into the US, they will get run over by a train.
Don’t miss Iowahawk’s take on this…
Lets give the $53 billion to these guys: http://www.cartercopters.com/
Al Czervik, 2011: “Golf Courses, cemetaries, and Railroad Property are the biggest waste of prime real estate in America.”
#3 MarkoMancuso says:
…but rather try to look look cool and sound cool while burning coal ripped from the bosom of Mother Earth by giant steam shovels and all the while gloriously spewing out the smokestack a mighty river of the richest, blackest hydrocarbons known to man.
So, Amtrak is doing so well that they need more high speed trains? Seriously? Amtrak doesn’t just bleed money, they hemorrhage it. My daughter went to Florida (from NY) last year. It was $50 cheaper to FLY there than to take the train. (Even after adding in luggage fees) And the plane got her closer to where she needed to go. (Amtrak still hasn’t opened several routes that were closed after Katrina) And she didn’t have to spend a day and a half flying…
We have a common bond, Burma. I’m glad.
Actually, they have come up with better horseshoes. If the price of oil keeps going up, that may prove to be a good thing.
I think we’d be better off if Congress
were only allowed to travel
between home and Washington DC
by stagecoach.
Amhoof.
Biden still can’t say it beats dealing with the airline-companies!
http://www.southparkstudios.com/clips/153058/it-beats-dealing-with-the-airline-companies
Warning: sort of gross.
Soon they’ll be trying to make us jealous that high speed rail is a Shelbyville type of idea.
First Moron (Wetback); I knew a guy that was killed by a weasel.
Second Moron (Biden); A weasel? How could he be killed by a weasel?
First Moron; Well he was walking down the tracks and he didn’t hear the weasel!
My dad told me that many years ago and I wondered why he was telling me such a stupid story. Now I know. It was so that I could repeat this stupid story at IMAO and remember him. Thanks Dad.
If these trains go like 2,000 miles per hour that would be cool. I’d ride on one of those bad boys! But a government train must be a safe train, so I doubt that they will exceed 55 mph with every passenger belted in with a 3 point harness and helmets will be mandatory!
now see, those subsidies for the buggy-whip industry were necessary after all.
Seizing the future.
In the same sense, I assume, as seizing an engine.
They’ll need new trains to haul all those boxcars with shackles installed that FEMA ordered.