The tragedy of John Mica

I would never call John Mica stupid. The Republican congressman from Florida, representing the northern suburbs of Orlando, has been active in politics for almost four decades, first in the Florida House of Representatives, then as chief of staff to a U.S. senator and, starting in 1992, as a member of the U.S. House of Representatives. Last November he trounced his Democratic opponent by a margin of 59-41 percent. So Mica is good at connecting with voters in his district, and as I said, he’s not at all stupid. The tragedy of John Mica is that he is determined to act stupid, and because of that his effectiveness just flies out the window.

There are a lot of things wrong with Amtrak, some of them of its own doing. It’s almost impossible to get anything done, so hidebound (and scared) are its managers. The reorganization that President Joe Boardman wants is almost two years in the making and still not finished. Onboard employees are unsupervised and bad habits are proliferating, particularly on the long distance trains. And yes, as Mica says, food service on Amtrak trains loses too much money.

Amtrak needs critics, is what I’m trying to say. It has lots of critics, like Mica, who would put it out of business. What it needs are critics, particularly in Congress, who want to make it better and are willing to pick nits or even pick fights with Amtrak to make it better. At the moment, I can think of no such person, of either political party, who fits that description. So in the absence of intelligent critiques, you get John Mica filling the atmosphere with his boviations.

Everything I find grating about the man was on full display on July 9 at a hearing of the House Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure (which Mica chaired until this year). The subject was passenger rail finance, and several panels of witnesses held forth and then were questioned by committee members. Pretty boring stuff, until the very end.

One of the last witnesses was John Robert Smith, a person John Mica evidently does not like and will not invite to his birthday. You see, Smith is a Republican who served four terms as mayor of Meridian, Miss., and he has sinned, in Mica’s view, by disagreeing with Mica, by heading an advocacy group dedicated to improving and broadening Amtrak service and — get this — for having the gall to write the mayor of Mica’s home town of Winter Park, Fla., asking for that mayor’s support.

When Smith finished his testimony, Mica’s turn came for questions. You don’t have to take my word for what happened; go here for the full exchange between the two men and see for yourself who is acting smart and who is acting stupid, who is in control of himself and who is being the bully. Here is my lightly edited (for clarity) transcript of that exchange:

Mica: Mr. Smith, are you aware of what the federal debt is approaching? Sixteen trillion going on 17 trillion.

Smith: If you say so, sir.

Mica:  I say so. Right now the deficit spending under this administration . . . we’ve been borrowing 40 cents on every dollar that we are spending. Are you aware of that?

Smith: Yes sir. We are financing lots of choices with that.

Mica: I had a mother contact me, and they are cutting out hot meals and warm breakfasts for our troops serving overseas. Are you aware of that?

Smith: No sir. My focus is transportation.

Mica: And have you heard of the chef conclave to cook up exotic dishes to serve on those money losing routes?

Smith: I actually ride those trains, and the dishes are not exotic aboard that service.

Mica: Are you aware the Crescent loses $48 million and we had to borrow because of that?

Smith: Ridership is up on all those long distance routes. . . .

Mica: On the top three ridership is down and losses have actually increased. I have to make a choice: hot meals for my soldiers or gourmet meals on Amtrak. Particularly, let me ask you about your little memo you sent to my mayor and other mayors, as a former mayor. You said this to my mayor: “House of Representatives may slash Amtrak funding, putting the future of the national rail system in jeopardy.” I think we went [in appropriations by the House] from $1.4 billion to $950 million, and that is going to put us in jeopardy? This is your memo?

Smith: Yes sir, that’s my statement.

Mica: Did you coordinate this with anyone at Amtrak?

Smith: No sir, that’s our letter.

Mica: You basically said that our passenger rail is under threat. Don’t you think the U.S. is under threat when you are in debt up to your eyeballs, when you are borrowing 40 cents on the dollar to underwrite your service? You’re aware that every ticket on Amtrak is underwritten by more than $40, and on some of these long distance trains, by more than $400?

Smith: I’m aware that Amtrak is recovering 88 cents on every dollar spent.

Mica: And we can’t cut back, sir?

Smith: We subsidize every form of transportation, every transportation system in the country, whether highway, air, or rail. There is no passenger system in the world that pays for itself out of the fare box.

Mica: I beg to differ. I can cite one line [Britain’s Virgin Rail] that doubled the passenger ridership and went from a deficit of $300 million to $100 million in profit.

Smith: That ignores the capital spending.

Mica: Don’t tell me that. I’ve been there and met with the people. They put 10 million pounds into that route. If Amtrak continues its Soviet-style operation, whether to Meridian or to New York and Boston and Washington, you’ll continue to lose money. Are you aware of how much Amtrak loses in food service? Well, it’s going to approach over the past 12 years over a billion dollars. Last year according to testimony a few weeks ago the loss was $72 million. So we should not make choices and go back and tell that mother we need to put this money into Amtrak? Can you name any positions they have eliminated? These are choices I have to make. I am not happy with Amtrak’s performance and I’m not happy with your communications with my mayor. Thank you.

Smith: Thankfully, as a former mayor I have the ability to contact my colleagues across the nation. Most respond favorably because they live in the same environment I lived in for 16 years. And I would just say on the subject of the long distance trains, when my senator, Trent Lott, got to see the Mississippians who used Amtrak—the retired couples, the single mothers, the disabled veterans—he understood the importance of those trains.

Well, I felt like taking a shower to clean myself after that exchange. There was the bullying (“Are you aware . . .”). There was Mica’s anger that he had to justify his positions to the mayor of Winter Park. There was the false choice between financing Amtrak or financing food for soldiers, the U.S. military being the most wasteful spender on the face of the earth (I support the military despite the waste; my youngest son is a Navy officer). There were the falsifications about Virgin Rail, which according to the National Association of Railroad Passenger has gotten both capital and operational subsidies for years and years. By the way, after this hearing, Mica introduced an amendment to pending legislation that would abolish food and beverage service on Amtrak trains; alas, he couldn’t find enough support to even get it to a vote. What did I tell you about being ineffective? By contrast, whichever members of Congress inserted Section 210 into the Passenger Rail Investment & Improvement Act in 2008 deserves a salute from all of us. It instructed Amtrak to examine each of its 15 long distance routes and come up with ways to shrink the deficits. Many good ideas came forth, but very few were adopted; like I said, it's very hard to accomplish anything at Amtrak today. If anything begs for an Inspector General's report, it is Amtrak's refusal to take Section 210 seriously. 

Anyway, the July 9 hearing is what passes for criticism of Amtrak these days on Capitol Hill. It is on an intellectual level that would insult a first grader. It could be that the country club set in central Florida who keeps sending John Mica back to Washington simply doesn’t want to listen to him back in Winter Park, and therefore inflicts him on the rest of us. Well, that’s one way to get elected. Like I said at the start, the man is not stupid. He just wants us to think he is. — Fred W. Frailey