World's Worst Person
"GOP's 'Disneyland to Las Vegas' lie has deeper consequences" by Chad Rubel, BuzzFlash 2/26/2009
Bobby Jindal said it Tuesday night. Keith Olbermann gave Sean Hannity the Worst Person in the World last night for saying it. And those words have come from countless other Republicans.
To use Jindal's exact words from Tuesday, "a magnetic levitation line from Las Vegas to Disneyland." In other words, it's a high-speed rail line from Los Angeles to Las Vegas.
Now we know that the GOP loves taking a lie and saying it so many times, it "becomes true." But there is a method to their mendacity.
There is $8 billion for high-speed rail projects. And the Los Angeles-Las Vegas could be one of those lines, but so could Chicago-Madison-Minneapolis; Chicago-Detroit; Charlotte-Atlanta; Houston-New Orleans, and countless others.
As Olbermann pointed out again last night, there is a likelihood that one of the routes would go through the district of House Minority Leader John Boehner.
But on the high-speed rail corridors designations map from 2002 provided by the Department of Transportation, there is no Los Angeles-Las Vegas route.
Why does the GOP keep repeating the lie and embellishing it even further? Harry Reid.
Reid is up for re-election in 2010. The Republicans are worried that Reid's chance of re-election will improve if he can bring a magnetic levitation line from Los Angeles to his home state.
Even though the line isn't in the top 10 of possibilities, if the GOP talks about it now, and if somehow there is a proposal to do such a line, they will cry and scream, "Told you it was in the bill."
We know it's not in the bill. None of the routes are in the bill. But the GOP is almost guaranteeing that Los Angeles to Las Vegas will either a) never be done or b) if it is done, use that to prove their lie was true (even if it never goes to Disneyland).
Paul Krugman has gone on record as saying that route is a good idea, particularly using a magnetic levitation line. It wouldn't be my first choice (the proposed routes from Chicago are my first priority), but it might be viable for a corridor where travel alternatives are more difficult.
The GOP spreads its lies with few objections from the MSN. Then if something might happen, use the lies to cry foul and claim it was true all along. If the Los Angeles to Las Vegas line should be built, the prospect shouldn't be wrecked because the Republicans use lies to make political points.
Reducing car traffic and airline travel in crowded regions benefits us all, whether we travel by car, plane, or high-speed rail. Building and maintaining the rails provides jobs. Smarter travel choices allow us to reduce fuel consumption and traffic and actually increase business productivity.
By and large, Republicans hate trains. And they hate high-speed rail, even if it could bring jobs to their areas. There are a lot of routes in the South. They are using a possible high-speed rail route to hurt the Senate Majority Leader, and damage smarter travel ideas. Just refuting their lies isn't enough. The voices of those who support high-speed rail should be heard. Then maybe the bullies won't be as loud or as wrong.
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