No matter how “not as bad as we feared” President Donald Trump may be appearing, as we close out the year let’s remember why some of us did not trust him in the first place: his knee-jerk reactions are too often witlessly statist.
The speeding Amtrak train that derailed over I‑5 in Washington State on Monday was a horror show, sure. And we have come to expect the President — any President, either party, all administrations — to provide words of comfort after such events. Trump conformed to expectations.
And, admittedly, his initial Tweet was all very proper. But his verbal response was … very … Old School. After mentioning the federal government’s role in handling the tragedy — “monitoring” and “coordinating with local authorities” — he used the event as an excuse to expound upon the idea that the event provides “all the more reason why we must start immediately fixing the infrastructure of the United States.”
This is bad, old-fashioned policy opportunism. The worst time to cook up “solutions” is right after a tragedy. That’s when emotions are highest and reason is lowest.
More importantly, the train was going through its initial run over newly upgraded infrastructure!
One could more reasonably surmise that the recent infrastructure upgrade was the cause of the derailment — though, let us be honest, it looks like the train was way above the stretch’s speed limit.
Note to Donald Trump: just because there’s a microphone in front of you doesn’t mean you are required to “make a point.” That’s not the President’s job.
Mister, we could use a man like … Calvin Coolidge again.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
2 replies on “A Good Tragedy Not Wasted”
It was not infrastructure, but most probably operator error which was the cause of this accudent. My prayers and condolences to those killed and injured by it.
As the immediate news reports tough at the heart strings they fail to note the reality that this was a two engine, four or more passenger car train carrying 82, who could have been served as well, perhaps better, by two highway buses without any or at least a much lower public subsidy.
It is time to free mass transit from the shackles of public ownership and the waste that entails. This is infrastructure and service appears to be without an adaquate return on investment. The reform and solution this should spur after the clean up and payment for the damages is an economic analysis and rational determination of whether this service should be continued.
According to the picture the train was moving from our lower right to our upper left. If speed was the issue, centrifugal force would have thrown the RR cars to the upper side of the RR bridge, not the lower. I don’t get it.