Amrican conservative supports Amtrak.

[tomikawaTT]

The social conservatives support Amtrak - and everything else that would drag American culture to the dreamland of the 1950's.

(For an eyes wide open view of that dreamland, find and read a copy of Un-American Activities, by Sally Belfrage.)

The fiscal conservatives would kill Amtrak in a heartbeat.

Chuck (interested observer)

[Dakguy201]

V.Payne

Now here is an interesting quote from reading the article "an old colleague of ours, the late Paul Weyrich, served on a high-level commission examining the future of transportation, several railroad presidents told him privately that if they could bid for part of Amtrak’s subsidy, they would consider again running their own passenger trains. " 

That might very well still be true, but we should consider Amtrak's subsidy is not only the $1 billion or so to in yearly operating funds, but also substantially all of their rolling stock and facilities were paid for by the taxpayers.  

If we want a level the playing field, then private operators, such as in the recent Hoosier deal, should have the equipment donated by the Feds. Additionally, their operations should be exempt from taxation the same as Amtrak.   Can you imagine the howl that would cause both in Washington (and I suspect) in this forum?

 

[V.Payne]

Hmmm, the sentence right before the quote was "preserving good things from the past..." I don't particularly understand the reason for the off topic editorial, neglecting the historic prevalence over many regions of the problems mentioned, as the main topic was past travel. American Conservative in their New Urbanist  section, regularly argues that our democracy is substantially weaker due to lost social interaction from isolated residential patterns post 1950, which are just as divisive if not ultimately more destructive.

Now here is an interesting quote from reading the article "an old colleague of ours, the late Paul Weyrich, served on a high-level commission examining the future of transportation, several railroad presidents told him privately that if they could bid for part of Amtrak’s subsidy, they would consider again running their own passenger trains. " 

 

This did come to be partially in the PRIIA bill, but I would argue the legislation lacked a subscription based, large loss liability pool, similar to the oil-spill liability pool the Federal government runs. Around that time there was also the PTC initiating accident.

 

[Phoebe Vet]

"Conservatives know that life in the past was in many ways better than life at present; morals and manners both come to mind."

Humans have an interesting ability to remember what they liked  and forget what they didn't.  Life in the past was not really Ozzie and Harriet and Leave it to Beaver.  We had the KKK, the bizarre way that people in the Bible Belt treated people of color, Duck and cover drills in schools, 3 TV stations, and air conditioning for cars that cost as much extra as the car itself.  Then we had Polio and Thalydimide and beating your children with a belt or a stick was considered apropriate discipline.  Tell me again about the superior morality of the past.

Both trains and aircraft have improved greatly with time.  All we need to bring trains into the 21st century is to speed them up.  To make them useful   transportation they need to run frequently and on time.

[blue streak 1]

This is being considered as hersay in conservative circles.  Maybe a lot of the conservative opposition to Amtrak is an effort to embarass the opposition ?

http://www.theamericanconservative.com/articles/dont-railroad-amtrak/