A Tale of Two Coasts

During the President’s State of the Union he touted job creations and announced a plan to build a high speed train from Orlando to Tampa. To further emphasize this initiative, he arrived in Tampa the very next day to announce it again. Now if you’re not a Floridian then you may not know that the idea of high speed trains is not new to this state… In 2002 there was an amendment to build a similar high speed train which was passed. Just one problem. There was no mention of how Florida was supposed to pay for this thing. Two years later, after everyone came to their senses and realized how much it would cost the state, we voted it down. I guess that citizens’ wishes are now irrelevant as the President has just forced it back on us again.

Obama said that he was “giving” us $1.25 billion to build this, except that is only half of the full cost of $2.6 billion. Who is going to pay for the rest? If it is up to Floridians, forget it, we don’t have that money. So we may end up with a high speed train from the Orlando International Airport to Disney, which is Phase 1 of the project - a great boondoggle for Disney World but useless for Florida’s citizens.

But what about all the jobs it would create? It was stated that there would be 23,000 construction jobs and 1,000 professional jobs needed for this project. Let’s take the professional jobs, first. We would need to look to Europe or Japan for the expertise and professionals to oversee this project. The trains themselves, would also most likely be primarily built overseas, too. But there would still be the 23,000 construction jobs which would help Florida’s employment, right? I don’t think so.

Everybody jokes about seeing a group of construction workers standing around and watching one guy work but what about 229 men watching one guy? You see, there are approximately 80 miles between the Orlando International Airport and Ybor City, the proposed final destination. Let’s even say there is another 20 miles to go over to Disney and other tracks needed at the airport and Lakeland, another destination point. The proposed 23,000 jobs works out to 230 men per mile! I don’t’ know about you, but the 23,000 projected jobs seems as out of whack as most government projections.

Even if they found the money to complete it to Tampa, there is still the question of who would ride it. I just don’t see that there is enough demand for people going between Orlando and Tampa to support the $2.6 billion cost. I’ve driven this route frequently and it simply is not a bad drive.

They say the train will halve the current trip of about 90 minutes to roughly 40 minutes. But that omits the added time to get to the train station and find a parking space. Nor does it resolve the practicalities of getting where you need to go without a car if you arrive by train. Then add in our Florida weather. I read that they are thinking of powering it with electricity. Hmmm. I am not sure if I would want to get on a metal train attached to an electric line during the daily summer lightening storms. Not to mention how often we lose power which would mean the train could frequently be stranded somewhere in the middle of orange groves… Driving straight over would make more sense and would probably be quicker in the long run, all things considered.

In the shadow of the “excitement” for the Orlando to Tampa high speed train there was another quieter announcement this week about the other coast of Florida. Obama has proposed that NASA use its budget to maintain the International Space Station and keep it viable to 2020 and abandon the effort to return to the moon. In one stroke Obama will effectively destroy NASA’s future. This change in focus will cancel NASA’s Project Constellation which was working on replacing our aging space shuttles with new capsule based systems. This simply does not make sense and is not only detrimental to my state but to the whole country.

This new change in the focus of NASA is expected to result in the loss of 7000 jobs in Florida, on top of the 900 people let go last fall. And these are skilled engineers and scientists with high paying jobs who will be now removed from Florida’s tax base. There would be comparable losses in Houston, California and other states which have facilities that support NASA.

Obama’s budget would destroy our space program as we would no longer have any shuttles and nothing in the works to replace them. Even worse, it means that we would end up funding Russia’s space program as they would have the only remaining transportation to the ISS and our astronauts would have to hitch a ride with the Russians, for a price, of course. Thus Obama would destroy our space program while supporting Russia’s.

Last week, on the west coast Obama proposed a high speed train at a cost of at least $2.6 billion, which nobody wants or will use. He is giving us only half the cost so this state, which had already voted down a similar project, will now be saddled for the other half. On the east coast, NASA has been told to abandon our space programs which will loose 7,000 high paying jobs. We need to tell the President he has it backwards (again). Abandon the ridiculous and unwanted high speed train and instead support our future space programs. For in the long run, probably more men and women will fly into space then will ever ride that train.

Game, Set and Match

My neck hurts more than usual. It is a good thing I am scheduled for some treatment later this week because it sure had a work-out over the weekend. On one hand I was swiveling my head back and forth watching the French Open tennis tournament. At the same time I was flipping channels Saturday to watch the verbal battle in the DNC meeting as they debated what to do with Michigan and Florida.

As the men and women of the tennis matches returned volley after volley with speed, determination and skill so did the two sides at the DNC Committee meeting. Although there was no “scoreboard” in the jam packed board room, everyone was keeping track of the ebb and flow of the delegate count.

Ironically, neither the tennis match nor the committee’s finding were beneficial to American women. The most famous current women tennis players were defeated early on in the French Open. As both Serena and Venus Williams were beaten in the third round so was Hillary in Saturday’s rulings. The biggest blow was in the Michigan ruling where Clinton hoped to walk away with more delegates than what was given to her.

What next? Hilary’s supporters hinted that they might take it to the convention as the small crowd of middle aged white women cheered in the background. But no matter what they do, the odds are slim and none that she will eventually win.

Perhaps the greatest result of the meeting is it marked the beginning of the end for the Clinton dominance and control of the DNC. By nearly a 2-1 vote the committee members showed that it is now an Obama party. You could say that Obama and his supporters kept serving ace after ace which Hillary could never return.

How will an Obama controlled DNC act during the upcoming national election? That is the biggest unknown out there. Barack is an untested, inexperienced politician who so far is playing this game brilliantly. He continuously has beaten anyone who goes up against him in spite of being an “unranked” newcomer. How has he done this against some of the biggest names in the Democratic party? Maybe he is just that good at the game and yet….

Newsmakers are just now beginning to come out of their trance over this young man to dig into his history. On Saturedy he left his controversial church but who knows what else may be out there about him? Hillary’s complaint that Obama is unvetted may prove to be prophetic. All we can do now is watch the game unfold between Obama and McCain and see what happens over the next six months.

As for my aching neck, it got one more workout on Saturday. Late in the afternoon I finally got up off my couch and walked outside. And in the beautiful sun drenched Florida afternoon I lifted my head up to the blue sky. Looking to the east I saw the familiar sign of a large white puffy spiral climbing towards the heavens. Another successful space shuttle launched. No matter how many times I have seen this, it is still an awesome sight. And maybe in the political games we all could use an occasional time-out not only to rest but to remind us of what they are fighting for and the high stakes that will go to the winner.