OldPoleBurner Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------

>
> There has never been any really viable inter-city
> bus service (none at all now),


I don't know to which markets your referring but that is simply not true for my travel. While I would never argue that riding buses is more pleasant than traveling by train, I have used buses for intercity travel all of my life. My favorite bus company was Badger Buses linking Madison and Milwaukee which I used while a grad student at the University of Wisconsin. I didn't have a car at the time, there was no train linking the two cities (and thanks to REPUBLICAN Governor Scott Walker, there will be no such train in the near future).

I have traveled twice across the country by Greyhound, up and down the California Coast by Greyhound and from western Pennsylvania to New York and Washington by Greyhound and Megabus. Megabus to Washington, DC is much cheaper than flying (and hardly any more time), safer than driving and faster (sadly) than riding Amtrak.

But with well known
> longtime Airline-Industry-Whores, such a Norm
> Minetta, and his successor running the show (both
> are democrats by the way), there is little hope
> of change.

Mineta's successor was Mary Peters, a REPUBLICAN biker chick from Arizona. The current secretary of transportation, Ray LaHood is also a REPUBLICAN.

>
> And no modern American politician (of any party)
> is likely to ever spend a public dime to fix that

Ed Rendell, the former DEMOCRATIC Pennsylvania Governor was and is one politician willing to spend big bucks to address the state's (and now the nation's) transportation infrastructure problems.

> But the worst is still yet to come. With our gov't
> now printing so much funny-money (several
> trillions now), just as the Germans did before the
> collapse of their economy (and democracy) prior to
> WWII; to expect that we will somehow magically
> escape the same consequence is shear insanity!
> Perhaps, American educators "forgot" to mention to
> the latest generations, that little tidbit of
> history, that we are now dooming ourselves to
> repeat!
>
> NOPE! No hope at all - as long as too many
> Americans, rather than voting for the greater
> good, such as the "GENERAL welfare" or "securing
> the blessings of liberty for ourselves and our
> POSTERITY"; instead just keep on narrowly voting
> for their own personal pocket books, like little
> money grubbing whores!
>
I'm willing to have my taxes increased to support increased spending to repair deficient roads and bridges as well as improve public transportation and Amtrak. I view this as stewardship of the nation's transportation infrastructure, not being a whore.

The real whores are the politicians who cater to the Tea Baggers and Grover Norquist by refusing to raise sufficient revenues to address infrastructure needs, but at the same time too spineless to go to the public an advocate for abanoning roads and bridges that will be the long-term result of their foolishness.