Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Politics : Formerly About Advanced Micro Devices -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: TimF who wrote (858046)	5/18/2015 11:33:56 AM
From: tejek	Read Replies (4) \| Respond to of 1573203

Amtrak hasn't been starved, it should get a lot less. Many of the lines that get minimal traffic should be closed and they could use that money on upgrading the North East corridor and any other line that might actually make sense to run. Many of the lines that got minimal traffic in the 90s are some of their more successful lines today. When you starve an entity, it tends to start falling apart and pulls back to its strongest links. However, despite its starvation diet, Amtrak is finding ways to grow again..............and many lines that were thought to be long gone are coming back to life. Some people prefer taking trains. Surprise, surprise! Why don't Rs understand this shit? Why don't Rs care enough to find out?

To: TimF who wrote (858046)	5/18/2015 12:16:17 PM
From: tejek	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 1573203

When Rs finally do get around to infrastructure concerns, its only to instill more fear rather than doing anything about the problem. Carson echoes Huckabee on EMP ‘threat’ 05/18/15 11:20 AM—Updated 05/18/15 11:32 AM By Steve Benen At his official presidential campaign kickoff two weeks ago, former Gov. Mike Huckabee (R) said Americans face “threats of an electromagnetic pulse from an exploded device that could fry the entire electrical grid and take this country back to the Stone Age in a matter of minutes.” On the campaign trail over the weekend, Republican presidential hopeful Ben Carson said largely the same thing. “The other thing that worries me significantly is EMP – electro-magnetic pulse…. [T]here have been mentions by North Korea, China, and Russia about using such techniques, so it’s not out of the question. And what could happen? Particularly with an electric grid that is outdated?” The retired right-wing neurosurgeon did not, for the record, endorse President Obama’s call for infrastructure investments in improved, smart-grid technology. Maybe that’ll come later. It’s often difficult to know which issues will be deemed important by Republican presidential candidates, but this EMP talk is a little unexpected. As we talked about after Huckabee’s reference, fears of weapons with electromagnetic pulses are often a very big deal in right-wing circles. WorldNetDaily, the fringe conspiracy-theory website, has published “dozens of articles over the years warning its readers of an impending attack on the U.S. – possibly by Iran, North Korea, or Cuba – with an Electromagnetic Pulse (EMP) weapon that could leave ‘9 out of 10 Americans dead.’” Salon’s Simon Maloy had a good piece on this recently,: The “exploded device” Huckabee mentioned is a nuclear weapon that some nefarious actor – Iran, North Korea, al-Qaida, ISIS, [insert other international villain] – has managed to detonate in the atmosphere high above the United States. The nuclear blast sends gamma rays flying in all directions, which produce high-energy electrons, which create an electromagnetic pulse that will damage electronic systems. According to the Federation of American Scientists, to create an EMP that would affect the entire country, the malefactor in question would have to detonate a “large device” some 400-500 kilometers over Wichita – roughly the altitude at which the International Space Station orbits earth. This isn’t what you’d call a “likely” event, but it’s nonetheless on Huckabee’s mind. And, evidently, Ben Carson’s. As Maloy’s piece added, the point isn’t that the U.S. power grid is invulnerable. On the contrary, its weaknesses have been well documented, and when the White House makes the case for infrastructure improvements, this is routinely part of the pitch congressional Republicans ignore. But such an attack is “not likely to happen because getting a nuclear weapon into the atmosphere above the United States is an insanely complicated and sophisticated task with a low probability of success.” It’s something to keep in mind as the presidential campaign proceeds.

To: TimF who wrote (858046)	5/18/2015 12:18:08 PM
From: i-node	1 Recommendation Recommended By TimF Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 1573203

>> Many of the lines that get minimal traffic should be closed and they could use that money on upgrading the North East corridor and any other line that might actually make sense to run. I heard some commentator on TV yesterday suggest that the profitable NE corridor be privatized then allow the others to be shut down, which probably makes sense. But the better alternative would be to privatize NY-Washington and then see if any private operators are willing to buy any of the other routes. The Sunset Limited that runs from LA to Orlando loses nearly $300/passenger. This is stupid. No one is going to ride trains this distance other than maybe retired people who want to see the country. The one way fare is roughly the same as a flight, then you have the loss on top of it. I don't know that the one route (NY-DC) is the ONLY one that could work; but it is self evident that a lot of routes are total wastes and need to go.

To: TimF who wrote (858046)	5/20/2015 8:50:17 AM
From: TimF	Respond to of 1573203

Federal Funding Received by Amtrak Veronique de Rugy \| May 19, 2015 The cause of last week’s tragic crash of Amtrak train 188 in Philadelphia remains unknown. Some policymakers and pundits immediately pinned the blame on a lack of federal funding for the government-owned and -managed passenger rail operator. This week’s chart shows the annual amount of federal operating and capital funding that Amtrak has received since it was created by the Rail Passenger Service Act of 1970, including a generous allocation in 2009, as part of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA). Amtrak has received almost $44 billion—almost $70 billion in inflation-adjusted 2015 dollars—from federal taxpayers since its creation. That amount is considerable, since Amtrak was intended to subsist on its own profits. However, Amtrak has lost money every year of its existence despite repeated claims from government officials through the years that profitability was on the horizon. A fundamental problem remains: because Amtrak is managed by the government, operational decisions are often made on the basis of political concerns rather than sound economic and financial reasoning. For example, all of Amtrak’s long-distance routes lose money and make little economic sense, but they continue to exist because a national network of rail lines engenders more political support. Even in the northeast corridor, where the population density might be sufficient to operate a profitable rail line, government management has led to financial mismanagement. A 2014 report on Amtrak’s management challenges produced by the Amtrak inspector general’s office makes that clear: The company has not consistently used sound business practices in each phase of the capital planning process, including developing sound project proposals with performance measures, learning from the execution and outcome of projects, and controlling unauthorized expenditures. Although technology apparently exists that would help prevent crashes such as the most recent tragedy, Amtrak and its bosses in Washington have repeatedly chosen to allocate money elsewhere. That includes $8 billion in the 2009 ARRA “stimulus” package for a dubious system of high-speed rail. It’s worth noting that the “stimulus” package also included an additional $1.3 billion in capital grants to Amtrak, which is reflected in the chart. While we do not know as yet what specifically caused the crash of Amtrak 188, it is not clear that giving Amtrak more taxpayer dollars would have prevented it. mercatus.org