Commuter train

[Bret Callentine]

Justine, et al...

How would you feel if I walked up to you on the street, took your purse then offered to give you back some of your money but only if you used it to buy a cow. Keep in mind your original argument... the money is already there for the purchase of the animal. And if you don't spend it I'll just give it to someone else. And if everybody had their own cow then we would all save money on milk.

Then take a long look at Amtrak and tell me this is a good idea.

[Justine Cooper]

Bret,
You are comparing allocated funds from the government that varying states wrote up plans for, ,fought for, to stealing? I guess there can be many cases stated then that you would call stealing? Like money for No Child Left Behind? Or any federal money that goes to schools? Or any money from teh goverment that goes to roads or development? What about the pork Palin tried to get for Alaska? Is that OK?

Ohio won an amount of money for a rail service that our governor has decided in his infinatate wisdom to hand over to another state. After a team of republicans and democrats worked on getting it for the entire state. The whole martyr stance is not that becoming. The whole political thing even less becoming that one governor elected by some of the people can make decisions that affect the whole state without any input. I can't wait to sit back and see how he turns Ohio around wiht his promise to cut taxes AND add jobs. He is no Peter Pan. He is more the Grinch but I can't wait to see what else he destoys.

[Bret Callentine]

okay, if you don't like the term steal. what would you call it? They took the money from you and are now setting guidelines on how you can use it. If the Federal government wants to pitch us on a national rail system, they they should go ahead and do it the same way they put together the interstate highway. But they won't do it, because they know there's no support for it. This is their way of getting around that whole pesky issue.

I also find it interesting that while you have a problem with me calling it stealing, you seem fine in saying that we "WON" our own tax money back. If that's your definition of winning, I'm not sure I like the game.

As for your other questions. My answer is; NO! No to NCLB, No to Federal mandates on Schools and NO to all earmarks allocated to non-federally controlled projects.

State projects should be paid for by State taxes.

Straight up, would you rather your tax money go to a commuter rail from Cleveland to Cincinnati or to repair roads and bridges across the state? The problem is that we don't even get the choice because the Federal Government doesn't give the State government the ability to decide.

I've read through the Federalist Papers many times, and I've yet to see anything that intends to give the Federal Government this kind of lorded authority over the States.

[Justine Cooper]

Well the states did get to decide and apply for the money and Ohio decided to do that, through many people in fact. I use the word "won" because in the non-profit world I often heard the word "won" when given a grant that they wrote. It is just semantics to me. I would have loved teh rail system. I am posting as an individual, not as a group, just a person stating my opinion that this would have been nice for Ohio and that one governor elect sending back the money and deciding "no" for all of us seems unfair.

If schools don't rely on federal money for school like some want, and don't rely on property taxes like some want, how will public schools stay open? As far as NCLB grant money, there is a ton of money being misspent with that money so I would prefer some regulation there rather than taking away our rail system.

On a side note, I interviewed with a man from the east side last spring for tutoring kids thorugh the NCLB grant money in Lakewood. In a nutshell, if a family made a certain amount of money (or lack of) his/her child qualified for this tutoring up to FIVE days a week since it was lat in the season. Families that just moved here in the last few years where mom didn't work and dad didn't work on the books qualified for five days of tutoring, but families that lived here their whole life but both parents were out working qualified for nothing, EVEN IF their child needed tutoring. So the family I was assigned to had a son who did not need tutoirng (not behind and no learning disability) but because they were "low income" mom wanted it given to him five days a week, because she said "it is free so I am taking it". With our tax dollars. And the man setting up the company gets paid too. I declined. There are a lot of scams out there with our tax dollars and serious non-equity for the middle (WORKING) class that I would start reform with.

I still say "builld the rail!"

[Roy Pitchford]

Bret, if I may expand on something you said...

They took the money from you and are now setting guidelines on how you can use it.

Truth be told, it's not just Justine's money. For that matter, neither is it just Bret's money or just my money. It is the co-mingled dollars from all 50 states. A mother in California. A businessman in Florida. A city-level politician in Nebraska.
Why do their tax dollars get used to benefit us?
Likewise, why should our tax dollars go to a turtle tunnel in Florida or a bridge in Alaska?

Our state. Our money. Our "problem" (if it is really one). Our solution.

[Justine Cooper]

So the solution is to let other states use the money and build their rail system and feel like we took the higher road?

There is a ton of pork and waste and b-shit with tax dollars. I still say this rail system is the least of it and would have been an asset to Ohio and many travelling on it. And an asset to businesses that would get frequented more if travel was more accessible to other areas for everybody, from college students to seniors to families. Hotels, restaurants, retail, all of it would see an increase with this type of system.

[Roy Pitchford]

So the solution is to let other states use the money and build their rail system and feel like we took the higher road?

Isn't it about time someone did?

There is a ton of pork and waste and b-shit with tax dollars. I still say this rail system is the least of it and would have been an asset to Ohio and many travelling on it. And an asset to businesses that would get frequented more if travel was more accessible to other areas for everybody, from college students to seniors to families. Hotels, restaurants, retail, all of it would see an increase with this type of system.

I don't disagree with you about rail. I think it would be an asset, if done properly. I feel the current rail proposal did not provide enough incentive compared to car travel to make it worthwhile.

[Justine Cooper]

Taking the higher road, which is an opinion really, not a fact that this decision is morally high, gives other states money that could have been used here. I disagree it was a right or moral act. We will never know if it would have been done right because we won't have one.
Where would money come from now to do it any way?
Since we are building a casino someday here in Cleveland it may have brought a lot of money into Cleveland with people hopping onto a nice rail service in groups. I think we really are losing out here.

[Roy Pitchford]

Taking the higher road, which is an opinion really, not a fact that this decision is morally high, gives other states money that could have been used here. I disagree it was a right or moral act.

Maybe I'm missing something, but how exactly would this not be the moral thing to do?

When the government takes more from us than it needs to secure our freedoms, so it can have money to give away, that's not charity, that's theft.

Where would money come from now to do it any way?

The people of Ohio??

[Justine Cooper]

Morality to me is more about politicians making decisions that affect all the people in their "territory" or in this country while cheating on their wives and destroying families, or waging a brutal and expensive war on false pretenses (nuclear weapons that were not there). Morality in politics to me is more about preaching about things such as banning same sex marriage and not allowing military to be openly gay, while having secret boyfriends or having gay family members hidden in their closet. Morality as an issue in poltics is using a religious fear tactic to brainwash people into voting for them or allowing loose gun control to gain votes from an entire group of people.

I just don't agree that building a rail in Ohio with tax dollars alloted for that is immoral or that Ohio is taking a moral high ground for giving that money to another state. We pay a lot of taxes in our family too and I would prefer to see them used in the state that I live, for something that could benefit many and help out our local economy with more travellers eating and shopping in Cleveland. In fact I much prefer that to destroying and rebuilding another country and taking our people from their families to do it. If that is selfish then I am ready to be selfish.

[sharon kinsella]

So I guess with Bret and Roy it is moral to let people go homeless and hungry because jobs are being sent to other states. If we turn down tax money that will then be sent to another state who is the fool.

Justine don't you know that it is moral and christian to let people die from lack of health insurance, hypothermia from having no home and starvation from having no food. All those churches that are tax exempt are moral when they use police to direct traffic, take up parking lots and create road wear and tear on streets that are maintained with tax dollars.

Isn't it nice that Bret and Roy magically levitate instead of using our roads and highways because it would be immoral to drive on tax subsidized roads. And hopefully neither of them went to or use public schools or state colleges. Hopefully they have never called the police of fire depts. because they are paid for with those pesky entitlement programs. And they would never work for a company that has tax deductions because that would be the equivalent of an entitlement program, like tax deductions.

So proud they serve as an example to us all. Bah hamburger. Merry Solstice, Blessed Be.

[ryan costa]

America had way more easy oil than Europe.
Even at the height of Nazi dominance of Europe, 50 percent of Nazi freight was moved by draft animals. they couldn't build and fuel trucks fast enough.
America will dig itself into a deeper rut with any additional find of easy oil.

Our big chain stores and shopping malls and franchise restaurants owe themselves to the biggest public works project in history: our highways. So the goal is to feed the addiction, not contemplate it. interests pop up. first you gotta support the coup of a secular democracy in Iran in the 1950s. make sure the right plutocrats are running Mexico. invade Iraq a few times.

The U.S. dollar is backed by ever increasing sales of Coca-Cola, cable tv channels, and new strip malls. The patterns of urban decay are pretty consistent. Why is Detroit in such worse shape than Cleveland? they made more money faster and built more suburban sprawl faster. Los Angeles has been one big sprawl since the 40s: it is the cultural foundation of America's contribution to modern culture: gangsta rap.

Last wednesday or so Downtown was gridlocked with traffic. The snow overwhelmed drivers ability to employ rational self-interest, or something. the smart folks didn't try. Every bar and restaurant I walked by on east 6th through Euclid to public square was full of people. Downtown may not have been so busy since the interstate highway got rolling. Las Vegas will never be able to compete with sudden snow traffic gridlock once our guy builds his state licensed casino monopoly.

America's hundreds of years of great redistribution of abundance, isolation, protectionism, progressive income taxes, and labor rights have set the stage for folks to be comfortable enough to be conservatives with impunity. At least Eisenhower was honest about it: if that's what folks want we gotta have progressive income taxes.
trains are slow: I need to get to the mall.

[Bret Callentine]

As usual Sharon, you hit the nail right on the thumb.

At no point did I make the argument against taxes or social programs or roads or police, fire, schools, etc. but I guess that's your only hope, to engage me in a straw man argument.

Heck, I didn't even try to make this a "moral" argument. that's all on you and Justine.

But if you want to go there, is it moral to spend money on a train while people "die from lack of health insurance, hypothermia from having no home and starvation from having no food."?

My argument is this: there is a limited number of tax dollars to spread around, and I don't want it wasted on a project that doesn't even make the list of things we still need.

What I really don't understand is how people that were screaming at the top of their lungs over the closure of the Commity Circulator and the constant mismanagement of RTA now seem all too willing to hand over hundreds of millions of dollars for more magic beans.

[Charlie Page]

California's planned high speed rail is reported to cost 45 billion for 800 miles. Ohio's is 200 miles. It's not hard to do the math and figure that it would cost us Ohio taxpayers over 11.25 billion dollars. But that would be for a true high speed rail system. Not some lame 39 mph average speed system (I used to have a moped that went just as fast). Supporters say the train would pay for itself or break even while providing jobs. Detractors say the system would have cost over a billion dollars to build and maintain. The truth probably lies somewhere in the middle. Wherever the middle is, Ohio doesn't have that kind of cash to subsidize a 'nice to have'.

Stipulations of taking the federal funds is the train would be expected to reach speeds of 110 mph. To get to that speed, new expensive tracks have to be laid, which is where the cost would get into the 11 billion dollar range. That's about 11 billion more than Ohio has.

Ohio's plan was to start out small or slow and then speed up. Why start out slow? Europe is planning systems with speeds of up to 200+ mph. High speed rail systems are not something new where years of research is needed. We don't need training wheels. The research is already done. You either do it right or don't do it.

I don't believe that Ohio's plan to get a high speed rail system was genuine. It was a cash grab, pure and simple. Ohio's 400 million will probably end up in California, a state that is in financial ruin.

To Roy's point of being immoral to accept that money, I would prefer to call it irresponsible. With 41 cents of every dollar in last years federal budget borrowed or printed, it's irresponsible to accept fed money when you know damn well that it would be wasted. Yes, it would create jobs and put food on the table. But those jobs would be short-lived and unsustainable. Those aren’t the kind of jobs we need.

We'd be better off not spending 700k on studying the methane output of cows and put that towards feeding the poor. We'd be better off not spending 900k to instruct men in Africa on how to wash their parts after sex and put that towards extending unemployment benefits. We'd be better off not spending millions on government cell phone programs for the poor (is it a higher priority the poor eat or talk on a cell phone?). We'd be better off keeping the unemployed in their houses than paying for yoga classes for the unemployed. The Fed pays over $500,000,000,000 in interest every year on the national debt (that's 500 billion in case you got lost in the zeros). Think of what that cash could be used for. The recently released Fed spending bill has over 10% in earmarks. How about we turn this pork into something worthwhile?

I believe our government should prioritize all the services provided to the constituents. Every line item in every department of the federal budget should be numbered from 1 to 1000 with the highest priorities given a 1000 and the lowest a 1. When it comes time to cut the budget, you start cutting at the 1's and work your way up till it’s balanced. (Maybe this is something our City can do but that’s a whole other topic) $500 hammers for our military would be a 1. Helping the men of Africa wash their parts would be maybe a 2. Moped speed rail systems would be a 3.

[Justine Cooper]

Taking the higher road, which is an opinion really, not a fact that this decision is morally high, gives other states money that could have been used here. I disagree it was a right or moral act.

Maybe I'm missing something, but how exactly would this not be the moral thing to do?

When the government takes more from us than it needs to secure our freedoms, so it can have money to give away, that's not charity, that's theft.

Where would money come from now to do it any way?

The people of Ohio??

Actually Bret,
You missed the whole hand completly with your hammer. Roy said it was the moral thing to do to give back the money and my argument was that morality had nothing to do with it. But there is a lack of morality in the way our politicians do business for sure.

I actually agree with much of Charlie's post, except I never read where it would be those low speeds that are quoted and in fact you just said the money was contingent on having higher speeds. There should be more research and studies from a "governor elect" before making that big decision for all of Ohio. And yes I do think Ohio needs something like this. But that is why America is so great. I am allowed a different opinion and freedom of speech.

Ryan,
I always enjoy your posts.