>I recall in 2005 watching a seasoned Amtrak Engineer continously riddle his student (an earlier co-worker who since hired on with Amtrak) with superficial questions about items found in the Classified Ads section of the Modesto Bee. He did this almost non-stop from Merced to Fresno, where I departed, and probably all the way to Bakersfield. I called my buddy later that day to rattle his cage about it, and I was left with the impression that the idea behind this practice was to beat it into the student that the ability to stay focused over a long period of clear blocks without being genuinely distract was really quite PARAMOUNT to his training.

I do this sort of thing too, "distract" the student and then rattle his cage. Another trick is to tell him/her when he/she is speeding or going too slow without my looking at the speedometer ("how the hell can he tell that??"). In many ways, learning the ability to keep half your brain tuned into what your doing in the midst of a lot of distractions, essentially "unconsciously" keeping track of what's going on, is very important. It's a question of learning to react automatically when the situation calls for it and then thinking about it later.

However, this camera idea for monitoring the engineer is completely over the top. Just who is going to watch videos? Pretty soon half the country will be watching the other half, just like in East Germany (the DDR). It's my opinion that the conecpt of equal protection of the laws means that everyone who participates in the Nation's transportation system should be subject to this sort of treatment. If you drive on the freeways, you are participating because they've been funded by the Interstate Highway Act, passed by Congress and signed by Eisenhower. The carnage on the freeways is thousands of times worse every year than on the passenger railroads (commuter and Amtrak). If I as a locomotive engineer can lose my license permanently after about three major infractions, then you should lose your driver's license, permanetly, after three moving violations.