Whistle Stop

Conservatives don't hate trains, people who play conservatives on TV and talk radio hate trains.

Real conservatives are concerned with the way we pay for trains, just like they're concerned with the way we pay for NPR and a host of other things they think government shouldn't do. That's why I like discussing politics with real conservatives, because reality is refreshing. If real conservatives are cool with subsidies for the airline industry, the auto industry, road construction and oil companies, they can probably be convinced to get behind subsidies for trains and mass transit, too. If they're against subsidies for trains, then they can probably be convinced to abandon the subsidies for the airlines, auto industry, road construction and oil companies (which would make train transport and mass transit more competitive). Furthermore, real conservatives are more likely to be convinced of the need to "diversify" the transportation portfolio while facing the reality of rising gasoline prices.

Because real conservatism is about pragmatism, the bottom line, and facts.

People who play conservatives on TV and talk radio, on the other hand, hate trains because teh ebil libruls who want trains are really Kenyan-anti-colonial Marxist Fascist Nazi Mau-Maus coming to destroy America (with the help of yOu-knOw-whO), and they're going to do it by making you give up your SUV and force you to ride trains (with, umm, those other people) because that's how the Marxists turned Europe and France into teh socialismz! What did Mussolini do? He made the trains run on time! And how did Lawrence destroy the "caliphate" in Arabia? He attacked their trains! Trains are TEH EBIL! Except when America's founders worked tirelessly to free the slaves by using the underground railroad built by well-paid non-union labor back when the EPA still let folks use coal dug out of West-by-God-Virginia by even more well-paid non-union labor. It all comes back to history, as Glenn Beck would say.

So, until the real conservatives can be found, we're stuck with that last group of folks. Which means we won't get trains until gasoline really is $8, and at that point, it will be teh ebil libruls and their environmental studies and labor laws keeping us from building trains and mass transit fast enough...

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