Transportation Secretary Norman Mineta to Resign

Trains Magazine General Discussion
1

From the NYT:

"WASHINGTON (AP) – Transportation Secretary Norman Mineta, the only Democrat in President Bush’s Cabinet, will step down next month.

"Mineta’s resignation is effective July 17, White House press secretary Tony Snow said Friday.

“Mineta, 74, was plagued with back problems during his tenure as transportation secretary and spent months working from home and the hospital. But he has since recovered, and Snow offered no explanation for why he has decided to leave now.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/23/washington/23wire-mineta.html?

Dave

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Smart move Norm.

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I suppose that that Little W [:o)] [D)] is going to replace the Normster with a Democrat who supports Amtrak. [(-D]

And the sun will rise in the west tomorrow morning…
CC

4

…A surprise to me…My opinion of his tenure is not possitive. Seems to have been pretty much a yes man to his boss and no push for any improvement of our transportation system. Just cut, cut, cut…to make it more “lean” and better…{rail trans system}, and doubt if that was the result. Sorry he has serious back problems.

5

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Maybe we can find an independent with lots of rail experience that would just love to step into that job? Maybe take it out of the political football arena?

GW are you listening?

Moo

7

He may have developed his back condition from the number of times he had to bend over to kiss his bosses …[8]? To say he was a yes man is rather understated. [%-)]

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[:I] [(-D]

9

Let’s see…under Norm’s watch, we got a TSA that was confiscating nail clippers (“Take this plane to Havana or the stewardess gets a really bad manicure!”) or refusing to search any more than five middle-eastern looking young males but being sure to completely frisk all 80-year-old grandmothers who can barely walk; a highway bill with more pork in it than all the farms in Missouri; Amtrak management who don’t really want Amtrak to walk without massive crutches, walkers and other life support; and a vastly unimproved air transportation system.

Oh, and just an afterthought: one of the worst airports to have to fly into or out of is Mineta SJC. You can plan for either ten minutes or two hours to get through security there, and the departure lounge seats are without a doubt the worst, even worse than UAL at O’Hare.

Of course, that’s just my opinion; I could be wrong. (Sorry Dennis.)

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GW & Norm

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…Jen: It would be wonderful if it could be removed from the political football…and I suppose there are some independent qualified thinkers and rail experts that would love to give it a shot but we’ll never see any happening such as that…Would be refreshing, wouldn’t it…

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…Chad…So funny…[:D]

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Good riddence, but…I have to wonder, who’s lined up to take over. It only seams to get worse…

Transportation Secretary Mineta Resigning

WASHINGTON (AP) - Transportation Secretary Norman Mineta, the only Democrat in President Bush’s Cabinet, will step down next month.

Mineta’s resignation is effective July 7, White House press secretary Tony Snow said Friday.

Mineta, 74, was plagued with back problems during his tenure as transportation secretary and spent months working from home and the hospital. But he has since recovered.

Asked why Mineta resigned, Snow said: ``Because he wanted to.‘’

He was not being pushed out,'' he said. As a matter of fact, the president and the vice president and others were happy with him. He put in five and half years - that’s enough time.‘’

Mineta spokesman Robert Johnson said he is ``moving on to pursue other challenges.‘’

Mineta’s tenure included a major security buildup in response to the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks by terrorist hijackers. Snow credited Mineta with establishing the Transportation Security Agency, cutting regulations and red tape to liberalize the commercial aviation market, helping shape the legislation that finances the nation’s highways, and injecting ``sound economic principles’’ into the nation’s passenger rail system.

Snow paid tribute to Mineta’s long history in public life: his service in the Army, his elections to local positions in California, his 20 years representing California in the U.S. House, and his tours in two Cabinet positions, as Commerce secretary under former President Clinton and now under Bush.

Mineta is one of only three people who have served in Bush’s Cabinet from the beginning of his presidency. The others are Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld and Labor Secretary Elaine Chao.

There had been speculation for years that Mineta was on the verge of resigning,

14

FIrst John Snow and now Mineta! Gee, whose left who knows anything about railroading!

Uh, never mind…

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Who is say either of them knew anything about railroading…their performaces demonstrate they knew politics…not railroading.

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OH NO THE HUMANATIY [:D][}:)][D)][#wstupid]

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Why bash GW over this, other than for the usual gratuitous and blind reasons?

Did you stone-casters not know Mineta was a Democrat, a holdover in the cabinet from the Slick Willie administration?

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Pardon my cynical lack of concern. Who cares? There’s no a tinker’s difference between so called political parties or for that matter, between interchangeable bureaucrats within the beltway these days. Appearance above substance, rhetoric above dialog, blah, blah, blah…the whole juggernaut of transportation has been on auto-pilot for quite awhile. He may be an admirable character but all of us who toil in the boiler room know that -this is not a personality contest.

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Mineta being a transportation secretary was just a stupid if I was the Surgeon-General. Just because I know SOME first aid, doesn’t make me qualified to be a sugeon-general. Well, all I can say to Mineta is, good-bye; enjoy retirement.

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I find it kind a interesting that it is only going to “get worse”. How would we know this WITHOUT A REPLACEMENT BEING CHOSEN YET?! Oh well. I can only assume then that everything sucks and it is only going to suck more. Hopefully this next guy will just cut Amtrak all together and then everyones nightmares will come true. 1% of America will loose rail passenger service.