“What we need, then, is a smart transportation system equal to the needs of the 21st century,” he said, “a system that reduces travel times and increases mobility, a system that reduces congestion and boosts productivity, a system that reduces destructive emissions and creates jobs.”

And he added, “There’s no reason why we can’t do this.”

Mr. Obama said the $8 billion included for high-speed rail projects in his stimulus package — to be spent over two years — and an additional $1 billion a year being budgeted over the next five years, would provide a “jump start” toward achieving that vision.

The transportation department has already identified 10 corridors that would benefit from high-speed rail projects.  From the article:

They are: a northern New England line; an Empire line running east to west in New York State; a Keystone corridor running laterally through Pennsylvania; a southeast network connecting the District of Columbia to Florida and the Gulf Coast; a Gulf Coast line extending from eastern Texas to western Alabama; a corridor in central and southern Florida; a Texas-to-Oklahoma line; a California corridor where voters have already approved a line that will allow travel from San Francisco to Los Angeles in two and a half hours; and a corridor in the Pacific Northwest.

Each of these projects would inject much-needed infrastructure investment into the local and national economy, create jobs, and be generally beneficial to the environment.

The United States used to be the leading railroad nation, but over the last 60 years, that lead was eroded and surpassed by European nations and Japan.  Heck, even China is doing major investments in high-speed rail projects.

Just imagine hopping on a train in San Francisco and being in Los Angeles a short time later, without the hassles of getting to the airport, passing through “security,” and sitting in comfort and being able to actually enjoy the scenery.  Personally, I enjoy taking the train to Sacramento on the Capitol Corridor when I go to visit family and friends there.  It’s much better than driving.

“Gov. Jindal should know better than anyone that funding for studying and monitoring natural disasters is vital to public safety, ” Louisiana Democratic Party spokesman Scott Jordan said.

Others noted that only a fraction of the $140 million Jindal mentioned was actually being spent on volcano monitoring. The rest was going to other projects, including upgrades to the U.S. Geological Survey stream gauges in Louisiana and other states that will provide emergency planners with better real-time information about storm surge heights as hurricanes hit the coast.

Hasquet said only $7.5 million of the $140 million going to the Geological Survey will be spent on upgrading the equipment used to monitor Mount Redoubt and 32 other active volcanoes in Alaska.

So, yeah, a good chunk of that money is going to help Louisiana monitor water levels in the event of flooding and storm surges from hurricanes.

But wait, it gets better.  Jinda’s spokeman, Kyle Plotkin, tried to defend the governor’s comments in an email.

“Governor Jindal referenced the money spent on volcano monitoring to highlight the fact that a bill that was supposed to be about creating jobs ended up being a package that seemed to spend just for the sake of spending, ” Plotkin said in an e-mail response to questions.

Except that that’s not what he said in his address last month:

“While some of the projects in the bill make sense, their legislation is larded with wasteful spending. It includes … $140 million for something called “volcano monitoring.” Instead of monitoring volcanoes, what Congress should be monitoring is the eruption of spending in Washington, D.C.”

The governor and his people seem to forget that we can look up exactly what he said and when he said it.   Keep on truckin’, Bobby!  Someday you might actually say something that makes sense!

Alaska’s Mount Redoubt, which has erupted five times since Sunday, is likely among the sites to benefit from the U.S. stimulus package, with the money going toward monitoring volcanoes, repairing facilities and mapping.

In his official Republican response to President Barack Obama’s speech to the nation last month, Mr. Jindal called volcano monitoring an unnecessary frill in the government’s stimulus package.

“While some of the projects in the bill make sense, their legislation is larded with wasteful spending and includes $300-million to buy new cars for the government, $8-billion for high speed rail projects, such as a magnetic levitation line from Las Vegas to Disneyland, and $140-million for something called volcano monitoring,” Governor Jindal said. “Instead of monitoring volcanoes, what Congress should be monitoring is the eruption of spending in Washington, D.C.”

As the scientists who monitor volcanos in Alaska said:

“Without instruments in the ground, we would not have been able to tell you this was coming,” said John Power, a geophysicist with the U.S. Geological Survey at the Alaska Volcano Observatory.

Bobby Jindal is yet another pathetic Reaganite who thinks that government is the problem.  Well, as we can see, in this case, government was the solution.  Volcano monitoring isn’t a profit-making enterprise, and I have an incredibly difficult time imagining that a for-profit corporation would be engaging in it without government grant.

Current Mood:  amused

The plan:

1. Makes a $634 billion down payment on fixing health care that will go a long way toward paying for a more efficient, more affordable health care system that covers every single American.³
2. Reduces taxes for 95% of working Americans. And if your family makes less than $250,000, your taxes won’t go up one dime.⁴
3. Invests more than $100 billion in clean energy technology, creating millions of green jobs that can never be outsourced.⁵
4. Brings our troops home from Iraq on a firm timetable, finally bringing the war to a close—and freeing up almost ten billion dollars a month for domestic priorities.⁶
5. Reverses growing income inequality. The plan lets the Bush tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans expire and focuses on strengthening the middle class.⁷
6. Closes multi-billion-dollar tax loopholes for big oil companies. ⁸
7. Increases grants to help families pay for college—the largest increase ever.⁹
8. Halves the deficit by 2013. President Obama inherited a legacy of huge deficits and an economy in shambles, but his plan brings the deficit under control as soon as the economy begins to recover.¹⁰
9. Dramatically increases funding for the SEC and the CFTC—the agencies that police Wall Street.¹¹
10. Tells it straight. For years, budgets have used accounting tricks to hide the real costs of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the Bush tax cuts, and too many other programs. Obama’s budget gets rid of the smokescreens and lays out what America’s priorities are, what they cost, and how we’re going to pay for them.¹²

This is the change we voted for. President Obama has done his part, now we need to do ours.

Can you pass this on to your personal network and then click here to let us know how many people you told, so we can track our impact together:

http://pol.moveon.org/budget10/?id=15687-495491-ShbEoZx&t=1

Thanks for all you do.

–Daniel, Tanya, Peter, Justin and the rest of the team

P.S. Turns out there are way more than 10 amazing things in Obama’s budget and we couldn’t resist sharing just a few more.

1. Stops unnecessary government subsidies to big banks, health insurance companies and big agribusinesses.^13,14,15
2. Expands access to early childhood education and improves schools by investing in programs that make sure every child has a qualified, strong teacher.¹⁶
3. Negotiates for better prescription drug prices using Medicaid’s tremendous bargaining power.¹⁷
4. Expands access to family planning for low-income women.¹⁸
5. Caps the pollution that causes global warming, and makes polluters pay to support clean energy innovation.¹⁹

Sources:

1. “Climate of Change,” The New York Times, February 27, 2009
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/27/opinion/27krugman.html?em

2. “Obama Calls His Budget Sweeping, Needed Change,” The New York Times, February 28, 2009
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=51201&id=15687-495491-ShbEoZx&t=2

3. “Obama Offers Broad Plan to Revamp Health Care,” The New York Times, February 26, 2009
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=51202&id=15687-495491-ShbEoZx&t=3

4. “Obama Expects Fight Over $3.55 Trillion Budget Plan,” Bloomberg News, February 28, 2009
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=51203&id=15687-495491-ShbEoZx&t=4

5. “Energy Budget Is Sunlight After Eight Years of Darkness,” Center for American Progress, February 26, 2009
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=51204&id=15687-495491-ShbEoZx&t=5

6. “The Economic Cost of War in Iraq and Afghanistan,” The New York Times, March 1, 2009
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/01/weekinreview/01glanz.html

7. “Tax Cuts,” The New York Times, February 26, 2009
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/27/washington/27web-tax.html

8. “Energy Budget Is Sunlight After Eight Years of Darkness,” Center for American Progress, February 26, 2009
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=51204&id=15687-495491-ShbEoZx&t=6

9. “Student Loans,” The New York Times, February 26, 2009
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/27/washington/27web-edu.html

10. “Obama unveils budget blueprint,” CNN, February 26, 2009
http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/02/26/budget/

11. “Obama budget would boost SEC, CFTC, FBI,” Reuters, February 26, 2009
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=51205&id=15687-495491-ShbEoZx&t=7

12. “Obama’s budget,” Los Angeles Times, February 27, 2009
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=51206&id=15687-495491-ShbEoZx&t=8

13. “Student Loans,” The New York Times, February 26, 2009
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/27/washington/27web-edu.html

14. “Health Insurance Stocks Dive on Medicare Advantage Cuts,” The Wall Street Journal, February 26, 2009
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=51207&id=15687-495491-ShbEoZx&t=9

15. “Agriculture,” The New York Times, February 26, 2009
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/27/washington/27web-agri.html

16. “Investing Wisely in Our Children,” Center for American Progress, February 26, 2009
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=51208&id=15687-495491-ShbEoZx&t=10

17. “Obama Offers Broad Plan to Revamp Health Care,” The New York Times, February 26, 2009
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=51202&id=15687-495491-ShbEoZx&t=11

18. “Obama Offers Broad Plan to Revamp Health Care,” The New York Times, February 26, 2009
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=51202&id=15687-495491-ShbEoZx&t=12

19. “Setting ‘Green’ Goals,” The New York Times, February 26, 2009
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=51209&id=15687-495491-ShbEoZx&t=13

Mr. Obama directed the Environmental Protection Agency to reconsider the Bush administration’s past rejection of the California application. While he stopped short of flatly ordering the reversal of the Bush decision, the agency’s regulators are now widely expected to do so after completing a formal review process.

The president also directed the Transportation Department to draw up rules to implement a 2007 law requiring a 40 percent improvement in gas mileage for autos and light trucks by 2020. The Bush administration failed to write any regulations to enforce the new law.

Once the agencies act, automobile manufacturers will quickly have to retool to begin producing and selling cars and trucks that are cleaner and get better gas mileage on an accelerated schedule. The auto companies have lobbied hard against the regulations and have challenged them in court.

via Obama’s Order Is Likely to Tighten Auto Standards – NYTimes.com.

That last sentence is part of why U.S. automakers are lame: they fight innovation and technological advancement as hard as they can.   The non-American automakers have outpaced the Detroit industry with their commitment to cleaner and more efficient autos.