I’m only stating facts, not name calling or anything, its about facts!
Jim
Glenn,
I understand what you are saying, but “Neo-Facist”? Don’t you think that was stepping over the line?
Peace!
My dad always told me that the best way to start an argument was to discuss either religion or politics; and in this thread we have both!
Ought to get even more interesting until Bergie pulls it, due to the slandering of each other.
If this thread proceeds in a civil manner, Bergie might not yank it.
A few times on the MRR forum temperatures rose, but cooled quickly and topics continued.
Now this is just silly. I’ve never been in a church that didn’t support charities or missionaries that help millions of impo
I find your whole premise laughable, never seen a christian turndown a money deal. Christ, right here in this country, in the bible belt, we have third world poverty.
And somehow the voice of your christianity is alive and well, but does not do a thing to lift the poor. It only seems to justify the haves.
And I can document this with facts.
Jim
Guys,
We’re going nowhere very fast!
Looks like topic may wind up being deleted.[V][V][V]
H’mm how did religion ever enter a thread about A/trak[?][?][?][?]
I think the last time Bergie posted the rules of this forum, he mentioned not talking about religion or politics. I hope he pulls this one.
m
I start a topic about Amtrak a they start a war about Politics&Christianty.[V]
Have you noticed how many times it starts with AMTRAK and ends up something like this?
m
you can’t talk about Amtrak without talking about the Political aspect, but sure as heck don’t know how Christianity falls into all this mess.
Agreed it was the religion that baffled me. [:p]
Do you consider sinking money into something that’s not profitable is misguided? I don’t. When was the last time Amtrak was profitable? Amtrak needs to stop relying on government handouts and make it or break it on it’s own.
If you leave the training wheels on a bike the kid will never learn to ride. It’s long overdue for the training wheels to be taken off Amtrak!
Yeah, the thread devolved. But it’s kind of hard to talk about funding Amtrak without politics popping up. Then somehow a connection to religion is made. I guess some people think it’s immoral to live without passenger rail.
Left wing perspective:
We need Amtrak because there are people who depend on the service who would be otherwise stranded.
We need Amtrak because there are a lot of Amtrak employees who need jobs.
Therefore it is immoral to cut off Amtrak funding.
Right wing perspective:
We need Amtrak because there are a lot of people willing to buy tickets at a price that will pay for the expense of operating the train.
But, if this were the case, it would not be run by the government.
Therefore it is immoral to waste taxpayer dollers on an expensive, lightly used service, and might be cheaper to buy bus tickes for people who are stranded if we have to help them.
Certainly these arguments do not apply unversally to the entire Amtrak system. We all know that the NEC and some other corridors could easily support their own operating expenses.
And I don’t suggest that only right-wingers in government think it’s immoral to waste tax dollars. After all, many right-wingers in government support pork projects. That’s how all polititians stay in office; buying votes by bringing home the pork.
I don’t think Amtrak should be viewed from a moral perspective, but rather from an econom
bbrant-
We sink money into unprofitable things all the time. The military is just one of those things. They preform a valuable function, but they don’t return any hard cash for the investment we make. Perhaps we should require our military to fund themselves by starting wars and taking booty?
Schools? Roads? Parks? Libraries? Police? Not one thin hard dime ever returned for the investment. All I do is pay for these things.
The real question you want to ask is, “Are we getting good value from what we spend?”
We think it’s OK to fund the interstate highways totally with a fuel tax and then use them for free. The fuel tax is not truly a “user fee” since states like NJ and DE subsidize highways in South Dakota and Montana.
What would be fundamentally different if we decided to fund all transportation from tax revenue and then provide it’s use for free - where all the user had to do is provide for the vehicle and driver?
Common good and most bang for the buck should be the standard we hold gov’t to, not where’d the money come from versus where is it going.
oltmannd -
The difference is the military, schools, roads, police aren’t expected to make a profit. Amtrak is. We don’t charge kids to go to school, we don’t pay a fee for each time we need police service, etc… If Amtrak wasn’t to make a profit they wouldn’t charge for tickets like airlines, Greyhound or other forms of private businesses.
he’s also fighting to get some of the flights out of O’Hare into our city and add a High Speed rail link between the two as well as a high speed link between this disgusting city (reffering to our local political system, which thinks corrupt bussiness’s and a Pork processing plant are improvements) and Springfield and St. Louis.
I pulled out a pocket copy of the constitution, and the preamble mentions “promote the general welfare”. Isn’t that where schools, roads, policemen and such fit in?
mike
All of have to say is this:
Maybe soon to be available: former 26 year Amtrak employee with HBD, RTU, FSO, ORJ, F2 experience, electronic designing experience, patent granted for design work, experienced with a multitude of electronic test instruments, and working about high speed trains, can even cook, and mow grass. Doesn’t complain much, since I’ve come to realize it doesn’t get you anywhere, but, I’m a darn good Backgammon player and will discuss over a beer when off duty, and the 1st round is on me. Oh, and I’ve never seen the west, will consider all offers!