Will Trump be Re-elected?

Kbg · Post by **Kbg** » Fri Mar 15, 2019 6:10 pm

Roads are for the most part clearly a public good, as are buses. as is the aviation control system so I don’t have a conceptual problem with government support of necessary rail infrastructure. I think the interstate road system is the way transportation should work...federal does interstate NOT local. Why should I pay for a rail line that benefits a single state or why should another taxpayer support the county road in front of my house? I also don’t have a problem with the feds setting standards where we are pretty sure interstate and international connectivity is required for efficiency. Now it’s no big surprise that entities are going to try their best to give themselvesan advantage on the standards...but perhaps a corrupted standard is better than no standard. The poster child for this latter point is the food fight over internet standards. If you think there is a moral issue here you do not understand anything about it. It’s purely over control and who fobs off costs and profits on who.

Ultimately my criteria is greatest public good for the least dollar but this thread is illustrative of how our public discourse operates now days. Usually the starting point is: here is my political philosophy how does this idea fit or not fit it. Therefore, good or bad. Screw the merits, irrelevant.

WiseOne · Post by **WiseOne** » Sat Mar 16, 2019 8:10 am

Kbg wrote: ↑Fri Mar 15, 2019 6:10 pm Roads are for the most part clearly a public good, as are buses. as is the aviation control system so I don’t have a conceptual problem with government support of necessary rail infrastructure. I think the interstate road system is the way transportation should work...federal does interstate NOT local. Why should I pay for a rail line that benefits a single state or why should another taxpayer support the county road in front of my house?

Fair. I neglected to emphasize that I saw a national rail system as being primarily inter-state. Local rail lines can co-exist independently.

Example: the NYC area commuter rail system. Amtrak's Northeast Corridor runs through here on its way to DC, Philadephia, Boston etc, and it is interconnected with 4 independent local rail networks covering 3 states (plus the NY subway). These commuter lines are pretty extensive and also function as inter-city rail (e.g. NYC to New Haven, Albany, Hartford, Trenton). They're also very well used with frequent service. If they suddenly stopped functioning tomorrow, the metro area would completely freeze up. I realize this isn't how it is in most metro areas....trains in other cities always look to me like a toy setup meant for show, or to give homeless people a place to pee, or for occasional use when you just kinda want to see what it's like to ride a train, as if it's an amusement park attraction. You generally don't see well-dressed people who look like they need to actually get somewhere in a reasonable amount of time taking them (ok there are exceptions like the DC & Chicago subways.) I am guessing that this is why most people (and Congress) don't see rail as a legitimate part of the transit system worthy of serious investment.

Since most of you appear to be from Texas, the analogy would be local lines in & around each city, with state-run lines between them (e.g. Dallas, Fort Worth, Houston), interconnecting with a national rail line that goes to New Orleans & east, north to (say) Oklahoma & Chicago,, and west to Los Angeles. Get the idea?

Also note: we will have to spend money on inter-city travel one way or another. The air traffic control & airport system is at or even beyond capacity. Extending that is going to be super costly too. It makes more sense to develop rail to take the load off the air travel system, because rail, once built, is far more scaleable.

Kbg · Post by **Kbg** » Sat Mar 16, 2019 8:48 am

WiseOne,

I think it’s the total package that matters. I think rail works well in urban areas because there is also good local mass transit. A quick anecdote. If I take the train from DC to NYC and hop off at Grand Central I can get to wherever I want to go in NYC by taxi, subway or bus pretty easily. And, there are multiple departure/arrival times I could choose from. (I used to live in DC and my family loves to visit NY...so done this exact thing). Compare that to where I live now...I drive 90 miles to the airport or nearest train station. It will take me about 8 or 12 hours to get to the next large metropolitan areas and there is exactly one time per day to catch that train. Meanwhile, none of the rail stations have a car rental counter nearby to effect the required transfer to get where I’d actually like to go in either city.

I do have two other options.

Air: Same 90 mile drive, then an hour or an hour 15mins and convenient rental car access at both locations airports

Car: 8 hours to one of the cities, 7 to the other no need for a rental car. Biggest downside...I have to pay attention while driving instead of reading a good book

My consumer choice preferences

DC - rail, auto, air
Now - air, auto, rail

In reality the third option in both cases wasn’t even a seriously considered option because they sucked so bad compared to the alternatives.

For where I live now my personal transportation fantasy is an electric car with a 500 mile range that is truly autonomous where I could type in the address to a distant location and get back to that book. :-)

WiseOne · Post by **WiseOne** » Sat Mar 16, 2019 10:10 am

Kbg, the scenario you describe is one I'm familiar with (I lived in LA for several years). It's is exactly what I meant by rail not being regarded as a serious form of transportation in most of the US, and why it needs more money - not less. The train is slow and inconvenient because it's trying to ride on a freight line and using ancient technology, and the resulting low ridership is why the schedule is so limited and there are no station services. All that should reverse with some serious infrastructure investment. For starters, the train trip should be twice as fast as a car, run more often, and go more places than you can by air. And with more ridership, ancillary businesses like car rentals, rideshare services, restaurants, and even full-on shopping malls would spring up.

Agree that in large rural areas, like farming regions in the Great Plains or mountainous areas, there won't be a huge role for trains. But there are plenty of small to mid size cities that can benefit.

Kbg · Post by **Kbg** » Sat Mar 16, 2019 10:47 am

I am totally off topic, but it’s related to rail

.

We lived in OH for a while which used to have an amazing rail system connecting any town of size. They have since pulled most of it up and turned it into an incredible bike path system. If you are a cyclist it’s pretty near to heaven, especially in the fall.

jhogue · Post by **jhogue** » Sat Mar 16, 2019 1:03 pm

Ugh. I fear that I am about to help hijack this thread from its original topic. Maybe Xan can figure out how to branch this topic off as another thread?
Oh well, the 2020 election is a long way off….

Let me suggest that we can advance our debate about rail by comparing the US system to the country with cheapest, most convenient, and most connected system in the world: Switzerland. I lived in Europe for 6 years and had a sabbatical in Switzerland several years ago, so I have some basis for this comparison.

I will add a second post later comparing the US to the Swiss system, but first, some observations for Americans about the Swiss rail network and why and how it works for the Swiss.

I. The Swiss rail system is cheap, convenient, connected—for the Swiss

Cost (relatively)
-Driving a car is extremely expensive in Switzerland. The country does not have a single oil well. All oil is 100% imported. As a result, gasoline at the pump costs twice as much as it does in the USA. Because of its mountainous geography, construction of Swiss autoroutes are much more expensive per mile than in the USA. Driving on the Swiss autoroutes (like our interstate highways) also requires a purchase of an expensive annual sticker, which those ingenious Swiss have designed to help transfer the cost of their road network from themselves to foreign drivers and truckers.
-The Swiss federal rail system is 100% electrified and runs on hydroelectric power generated from the country’s plentiful natural glacier-fed rivers.
-Much of the operating cost of Switzerland’s passenger rail system itself is heavily subsidized-- not by Swiss citizens-- but by wealthy foreign tourists headed to Swiss ski resorts and foreign business travelers to the big Swiss banks and insurance companies located in Geneva and Zurich. In addition, Swiss residents can purchase an annual card that gives them 50 % discount on all domestic train tickets. That fact alone should tell you something about who is obliged to subsidize the Swiss rail network.

Convenient (for the majority of the population)
-90% of the Swiss population lives in the Geneva-Lausanne-Bern-Zurich-Basel corridor, which is about 200 miles long. Note that this is also shorter than the Richmond-Washington-New York-Boston corridor (almost 600 miles).

Connected: (internationally and locally)
-Technically speaking, the Swiss have no domestic high speed trains (because of their problematic geography). They do, however, connect seamlessly with the French, German, and Italian high speed international rail networks, making rail travel to Paris, Berlin, and Rome very convenient.
-At the local level, every Swiss village is connected to the Swiss rail system via the Swiss postal bus network. Obviously, this has a profound effect on the domestic politics of rail within Switzerland, which has the highest per capita rail usage in the world.

WiseOne · Post by **WiseOne** » Sat Mar 16, 2019 9:09 pm

OK I'm the guilty party. We started branching off from the Green New Deal, which recycled some oldie but goodie proposals from the past. OK to keep talking about rail??? We're in good company - Ayn Rand was into rail too, judging by her novel Atlas Shrugged.

Good info on Swiss rail, and yes clever of them to get visitors to pay an extra "rail tax". If they went road rather than rail though, you'd probably be dealing with a similar scheme for maintaining said roads.

Given Switzerland's unique features, it might be better to compare the US to a a country like the UK or France. Bigger, with some far-flung cities and probably no fewer problems with maintaining/running their railroads than we have. There are rail connections in France from Paris to Lyon & Marseilles. That's 300 and 400 mile distances, respectively, with train travel times of 2.5 and 3.5 hours. I'm totally jealous...there are precious few situations in the US (if any) where you can take any mode of transportation covering that distance in that amount of time. Before you claim "air travel", don't forget the part about having to get to the airport 1-2 hours in advance in order to go through your TSA adventure. And with rare exceptions, airports are far away from city centers so there's generally more travel time involved on that end.

I'm about to fly off on a business-related trip tomorrow, so I'm griping more about air travel than usual knowing I'm about to run that gamut again.

boglerdude · Post by **boglerdude** » Sun Mar 17, 2019 11:32 pm

I dont like him but hes right about autopilots

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskTrumpSuppor ... ex_to_fly/

> you can be sure we'd end up with the same security theater on the trains

Probly not, aircraft disasters are a lot more disturbing. No one cares how many die in auto accidents

Post by **dualstow** » Mon Mar 18, 2019 8:54 am

MangoMan wrote: ↑Sun Mar 17, 2019 8:10 am RE the TSA, if rail ever took hold here, you can be sure we'd end up with the same security theater on the trains. How do they not already have that on the East Coast route?
...

I always think that, too, and I try to enjoy the freedom while I can. Lots of cops and sniffer dogs, but so far no hassle. It’s so great.

Post by **dualstow** » Tue Mar 19, 2019 9:18 am

What do you all think of the WALL plan?
I think many (most?) of us here are pro-immigration as long as it is legal and well-vetted, with a better job of vetting than we’re doing right now.

I’m asking about the physical wall, though. I have read that what’s already up is helping to slow mass illegal immigration, but to put up more wall will give diminishing returns. Not to mention the high cost.

Do you agree?

flyingpylon · Post by **flyingpylon** » Tue Mar 19, 2019 11:43 am

If nothing else, good fences make good neighbors. A good fence clarifies things.

stuper1 · Post by **stuper1** » Tue Mar 19, 2019 12:18 pm

Agreed, good fences make good neighbors. As soon as all the rich Democrat politicians don't see the cost-benefit to a big wall around their house, I might be more sympathetic to their arguments.

Not sure about anyone else on this site, but I am definitely not pro-immigration. We have plenty of human capital to work with already and plenty of problems to solve. All humans are created equal right? Why can't some of these not-so-great countries pull themselves up by their bootstraps and solve some of their own problems themselves and become great on their own, rather than sending all their best people to live here?

Post by **dualstow** » Tue Mar 19, 2019 6:40 pm

Two votes for more wall, then.

stuper1 wrote: ↑Tue Mar 19, 2019 12:18 pm ...
Why can't some of these not-so-great countries pull themselves up by their bootstraps and solve some of their own problems themselves and become great on their own, rather than sending all their best people to live here?

It’s more of a case of the people sending themselves, not being sent. I certainly have seen young refugees interviewed on places like reddit. Young privileged people who were able to fly here rather than walk across a desert. There were people who asked them, “Why didn’t you stay and fight so that your country could be better?”

Hmm, if I were Syrian or Iraqi and I could get on a plane, I would take that plane.

Kriegsspiel · Post by **Kriegsspiel** » Tue Mar 19, 2019 6:46 pm

stuper1 wrote: ↑Tue Mar 19, 2019 12:18 pm Not sure about anyone else on this site, but I am definitely not pro-immigration. We have plenty of human capital to work with already and plenty of problems to solve. All humans are created equal right? Why can't some of these not-so-great countries pull themselves up by their bootstraps and solve some of their own problems themselves and become great on their own, rather than sending all their best people to live here?

I think you are on the money.

stuper1 · Post by **stuper1** » Tue Mar 19, 2019 8:40 pm

dualstow wrote: ↑Tue Mar 19, 2019 6:40 pm Two votes for more wall, then.

stuper1 wrote: ↑Tue Mar 19, 2019 12:18 pm ...
Why can't some of these not-so-great countries pull themselves up by their bootstraps and solve some of their own problems themselves and become great on their own, rather than sending all their best people to live here?
It’s more of a case of the people sending themselves, not being sent. I certainly have seen young refugees interviewed on places like reddit. Young privileged people who were able to fly here rather than walk across a desert. There were people who asked them, “Why didn’t you stay and fight so that your country could be better?”

Hmm, if I were Syrian or Iraqi and I could get on a plane, I would take that plane.

Yes, I didn't phrase that very well. I should have just send "rather than having all their best people end up here".

I can't blame the immigrants at all. I would do the same in their shoes also.

Actually, I think in some cases they are sent here for university but end up never leaving. In other cases, they come of their own accord.

In any event, the onus is on our politicians to tap the brakes a bit on the immigration rate.

Post by **dualstow** » Wed Mar 20, 2019 2:13 am

I think we should tap the brakes, too, if you mean get more selective.

@kriegsspiel: more WALL or no?

stuper1 · Post by **stuper1** » Wed Mar 20, 2019 3:09 am

dualstow wrote: ↑Wed Mar 20, 2019 2:13 am I think we should tap the brakes, too, if you mean get more selective.

@kriegsspiel: more WALL or no?

Well sure, get more selective about the ones that are let in legally. And enforce border security better to reduce illegal immigration. If that means a wall, fine. And/or other measures. I really don't even care if we spending a bazillion dollars building a wall and it's basically only symbolic. I would consider that less of a waste of taxpayer money than funding another foreign war.

WiseOne · Post by **WiseOne** » Wed Mar 20, 2019 7:57 am

News today was all about the Lordstown GM plant closing and the unanticipated (if you're Trump) effects of steel tariffs. Sounds like the wall and the immigration issues have been forgotten, for the moment anyway.

The narrative says that the steel industry has done well, but tariffs increased costs for the auto industry and as a result they have to close plants and move production to Mexico. They don't say that the move to Mexico is about cheap labor but of course that's implied.

But let's think about it for just a second. Could the increases in minimum wage have something to do with it too? That was never mentioned of course :-). Also, it appears that the Lordstown plant is being closed because people are loving SUV's again, and there is less demand for the Chevy Cruze (which the plant specialized in). Of note, that's a fairly cheap car compared to SUV's. Kind of hard to imagine that price increases due to the tariffs is depressing sales, when people are actually shifting to buying more expensive cars. Why wouldn't GM simply increase car prices to reflect the increased price of steel, and carry on as usual? People don't buy cars often enough to be that aware of price increases. They also tend not to make car purchasing decisions based on price, but rather on monthly cost. The change in that amount due to steel tariffs couldn't be more than a few dollars, which would go basically unnoticed.

If my logic here is correct, then I can safely laugh at the news stories - but how many people will realize all these things?

Post by **dualstow** » Wed Mar 20, 2019 8:22 am

@WiseOne - more (steel) wall? Or would that give diminishing returns?

I briefly read Trump’s tweet about George Conway, Mr of Kellyanne, and some responses in the news. It certainly won’t harm his chances of being re-elected. At this point, we’re all used to a personal attack a day. But, man it’s unbecoming that our leader does this.

Post by **dualstow** » Wed Mar 20, 2019 9:29 am

Simonjester wrote: its also unbecoming that the media has managed to achieve a negative reporting rate of 92% regarding the president compared to a 0.7% rate of reporting on the economy (which seems to be doing well)... trump may be the least presidential president with the how and why of his twitter postings, but the profession of journalism is even deader then presidential decorum...

It's taken a while, but this forum has convinced me to feel somewhat the same. Trump's approval rating is close to Obama's for the same length of time elapsed in the White House- at least that's what they said yesterday. The press are not the enemy of the people, but I do wish they would take the high road instead of reacting to his antics they way they do.

moda0306 · Post by **moda0306** » Wed Mar 20, 2019 9:49 am

dualstow wrote: ↑Wed Mar 20, 2019 9:29 am
Simonjester wrote: its also unbecoming that the media has managed to achieve a negative reporting rate of 92% regarding the president compared to a 0.7% rate of reporting on the economy (which seems to be doing well)... trump may be the least presidential president with the how and why of his twitter postings, but the profession of journalism is even deader then presidential decorum...
It's taken a while, but this forum has convinced me to feel somewhat the same. Trump's approval rating is close to Obama's for the same length of time elapsed in the White House- at least that's what they said yesterday. The press are not the enemy of the people, but I do wish they would take the high road instead of reacting to his antics they way they do.

https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/tr ... l-ratings/

Seems to me his approval rating is 7 points behind Obama (I like 538's methodology of combining polls and giving them grades for the quality of their methodologies), which while not massive is pretty significant, especially considering unemployment is much lower than where Obama was at at this point in his first term, and right or wrong that tends to much-more-positively affect the approval of meandering centrists that have a tendency to give too much credit or blame to the current president for the current economic scenario.

If Trump would have been elected in the midst of a financial crisis and oversaw the middle stages of skyrocketing unemployment with a similar "recovery" to Obama's, I'd imagine it'd be at least a few points worse. But that's just me.

stuper1 · Post by **stuper1** » Wed Mar 20, 2019 10:30 am

dualstow wrote: ↑Wed Mar 20, 2019 9:29 am
Simonjester wrote: its also unbecoming that the media has managed to achieve a negative reporting rate of 92% regarding the president compared to a 0.7% rate of reporting on the economy (which seems to be doing well)... trump may be the least presidential president with the how and why of his twitter postings, but the profession of journalism is even deader then presidential decorum...
It's taken a while, but this forum has convinced me to feel somewhat the same. Trump's approval rating is close to Obama's for the same length of time elapsed in the White House- at least that's what they said yesterday. The press are not the enemy of the people, but I do wish they would take the high road instead of reacting to his antics they way they do.

The press are the tools of big business. I really don't understand how you can't see that the press are the enemy of the people. If force-feeding us propaganda lies doesn't make them our enemy, then I don't know what would. I am not speaking sarcastically, ironically, metaphorically, or anything other than just purely seriously.

Post by **dualstow** » Wed Mar 20, 2019 12:33 pm

stuper1 wrote: ↑Wed Mar 20, 2019 10:30 am The press are the tools of big business. I really don't understand how you can't see that the press are the enemy of the people. If force-feeding us propaganda lies doesn't make them our enemy, then I don't know what would. I am not speaking sarcastically, ironically, metaphorically, or anything other than just purely seriously.

Are you saying other people can't see through it the way you can?

It's not as cut and dried as you're making it out to be.
The press comes in many different forms. Without it, we are screwed. Look at nations that don't have a free press. Sure there's an influence from big business. The most glaring example is The Washington Post being wholly owned by Bezos. (I like the WP, though). In Italy, much of the press is controlled by Berlusconi. Some of the corruption charges you may have heard about Netanyahu include his trying to bribe the press to give him favorable coverage. The world is not perfect, but the press is vital. Vital I say!

@moda: yep.

jhogue · Post by **jhogue** » Wed Mar 20, 2019 1:04 pm

So here is my 2nd post on "public" transportation in the USA:
(Hopefully then we can get back on topic!)

I. Unlike the Swiss, the American rail system (Amtrak) is expensive, inconvenient, and not well-connected.

The USA will never be connected by a European-style rail network. The geographical distances are much greater than Europe. The population density is much lower. Laying aside the absurdity of connecting Hawaii and Alaska to the lower 48 by rail, taking the train from New York to Los Angeles, (the USA’s two largest cities), is strictly for tourists and retirees.

Outside of the Northeast corridor, most of the US cannot be locally connected by a Swiss-style intermodal system of trains and buses.
Much of the country (think Trump’s red state America) is better connected and more conveniently accessible by pickup trucks and SUVs than it is by light-rail—which I regard as little more than a costly subsidy for a tiny fraction of the middle class. Even with anti-fossil fuel politicians like Obama in office, this country has managed to re-invent its petroleum extraction methods and keep the price of gasoline far lower than it is in Europe and Japan—to say nothing of the national security implications of being energy sufficient in ways that Europe is not.

II. Let me suggest some alternatives for the future of transportation:
-Stop investing in 19th century technology like trains. Invest/subsidize/ work on 21st century technology such as longer-distance electric cars and artificial intelligence. Invest in long-term upgrades to our existing aviation network, including the next generation of software for air traffic control, redundant safety networks, and fuel efficiency.

-Give Amtrak’s northeast corridor back to the states that actually operate Acela electrified and in the black. If Atlanta and Charlotte want to be connected to Acela, let the states of Georgia and North Carolina provide the subsidy rather than freeloading off the other states via federal grants. Lease the rest of the long-distance network to cruise lines, who specialize in slow travel for masses of wealthy tourists, foreign and domestic.

-One more even more radical solution:
Let New York City secede from New York state. Put it to a people’s referendum. NYC’s “public” transportation has long been a terrible mess and AOC’s Green New Deal posing is doing nothing to actually change anything. The evident antagonism between the current state governor and the city mayor is driven by institutional structures that significantly contributes to the continuing poor state of infrastructure in both the city and state.

stuper1 · Post by **stuper1** » Wed Mar 20, 2019 1:23 pm

dualstow wrote: ↑Wed Mar 20, 2019 12:33 pm
stuper1 wrote: ↑Wed Mar 20, 2019 10:30 am The press are the tools of big business. I really don't understand how you can't see that the press are the enemy of the people. If force-feeding us propaganda lies doesn't make them our enemy, then I don't know what would. I am not speaking sarcastically, ironically, metaphorically, or anything other than just purely seriously.
Are you saying other people can't see through it the way you can?

It's not as cut and dried as you're making it out to be.
The press comes in many different forms. Without it, we are screwed. Look at nations that don't have a free press. Sure there's an influence from big business. The most glaring example is The Washington Post being wholly owned by Bezos. (I like the WP, though). In Italy, much of the press is controlled by Berlusconi. Some of the corruption charges you may have heard about Netanyahu include his trying to bribe the press to give him favorable coverage. The world is not perfect, but the press is vital. Vital I say!

@moda: yep.

And I would say that you are naive. Do you think the press is performing this vital function just from the goodness of their heart? You must be a much better person than I if you have that much faith in human nature. I know what human nature is like just by looking at myself.

To be fair, I think a lot of the press propaganda is not done deliberately by the actual writer but is the result of psychological manipulation upon the journalist. For example, a young journalist writes a sob story about children being held in cages at the border, because they truly feel bad for those children. The publisher chooses to prominently use the story because he/she knows it will please his/her corporate masters who want open borders. This is a very simplistic example. Of course, they never tell us that those "cages" are just regular chain-link fencing, that Obama did substantially the same thing, and that the real blame lies with the illegal immigrant parents for bringing their children into that situation in the first place.

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