Newly elected Governor Rick Scott of Florida isn’t just a Medicare-cheat, he’s also a moronic ideologue. The federal government was offering to give his state two billion dollars to build a high-speed rail line from Orlando to Tampa, and the governor just simply rejected it.
“I’m not comfortable this is a project we should be doing,” Scott said at a hastily called news conference in Tallahassee after a phone conversation with U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood.
Scott said he was not sure high-speed rail would bring taxpayers a return on their investment and he felt money would be better spent on state highway and seaport improvements.
Let’s say for the sake of argument that Floridians would not get a good return on their federal income tax investment by getting two billion dollars pumped back into their state. What Gov. Scott is missing is that the money will not now be spent on Florida’s highways or ports. Want proof? State Sen. Jack Latvala is a Republican representing the St. Petersburg area (across the Bay from Tampa). Sen. Latvala is also the chairman of the Florida Senate Committee on Transportation. Here’s what he had to say about Gov. Scott’s decision:
“Making this decision, at this point, on a project that could mean 12,000 to 14,000 jobs is very premature,’’ said Latvala, R-St. Petersburg. “I have been consistent in saying we ought to at least let the private companies go to bid and let it play out.
“It’s in his court and I’m very disappointed he made this decision without consulting the Legislative branch. I visited with him yesterday and I had no inkling that they were heading in this direction. It shows kind of a lack of understanding and respect for the legislative process. It’s supposed to be a collaborative process — where the governor and Legislature work together — and this is not an example of working together.” …
… “We’ve cut off our nose to spite our face,’’ Latvala said. “To think that this money is going to go back into the federal treasury is ridiculous. The money will be going straight to California” and its proposed rail project.
This was basically confirmed by Secretary of Transportation Ray LaHood in a press release this afternoon.
U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood: “We are extremely disappointed by Governor Rick Scott’s decision to walk away from the job creating and economic development benefits of high speed rail in Florida. We worked with the governor to make sure we eliminated all financial risk for the state, instead requiring private businesses competing for the project to assume cost overruns and operating expenses. It is projects like these that will help America out-build our global competitors and lay the foundation needed to win the future.
This project could have supported thousands of good-paying jobs for Floridians and helped grow Florida businesses, all while alleviating congestion on Florida’s highways. Nevertheless, there is overwhelming demand for high speed rail in other states that are enthusiastic to receive Florida’s funding and the economic benefits it can deliver, such as manufacturing and construction jobs, as well as private development along its corridors.”
The governor has pissed off scores of politicians in both parties who can’t understand why he is such a fool. Look, this is what happened last November. Ohio and Wisconsin also elected ideological dolts to run their states and both of them similarly rejected money for high-speed rail. Apparently, there’s something un-American about moving from one place to another in a car that can seat more than seven people.
If you turn down two billion dollars and that money goes to another state, how have your improved your constituents’ return on investment? If you have an answer, you probably voted Republican last fall. You got what you deserve.
I just read that the Spanish company Talgo that was in WI to build that rail project will likely be moving to IL, the state that just raised taxes, to take advantage of the fact that they’re building high speed rail.
Those are WI jobs that just went to the Democratic state of IL; I bet we hear similar stories from OH and FL soon enough. I think people assumed NJ getting over Christie’s refusal of funds and his mistake w/the race to the top money coupled with his apparent high ratings make this good politics.
Yeah, Christie is being cushioned by DEMS who are fighting back to keep the money in their state. I know Brown and Nelson in OH and FL are going to do their best in the senate; but there’s only so much they can do.
If Nelson is fighting so much, why hasn’t he helped the Florida Democratic party get its head out of its ass?
The only reason that company was going to open a plant up there was because of that rail project. Now they’re contemplating moving to Illinois because we’re likely to get money for high speed rail here–and will need the equipment to go with the project–and because of our low tax rates. Despite what that moron from New Jersey and the equally stupid moron from Wisconsin say, Illinois’ total state and local tax burden per capita is lower than either Wisconsin OR New Jersey, including the recent 2 percent increase in our state income tax rate. And in two or three years, Illinois will have paid down some of its debt and Wisconsin and New Jersey (which has the highest state and local tax burden per capita in the nation) will still be economic basket cases. Especially with the GOP in control of their finances.
What’s the problem? Florida, Ohio, and Wisconsin voted these asshats in to power. First, and foremost, I blame the TV stations and newspapers. I bet most were cheering these idiots on. They didn’t inform their readers one bit despite most of us DFH’s knowing this would happen. Second, I blame the Democratic parties in these states. They did a crappy job of campaigning against these jerks. I just hope Wisconsin is readying the recall petitions as we speak. Given the crowds that are turning out, they just might gather the signatures needed if they have a plan together.
seriously!
he’s not a wanker, he’s just giving his base what they think they want.
No tears for Florida. Not after 2000, not after 2010.
Morons get what morons deserve.
In all these states, Dems lost on turnout, near as I can tell. They, and we, failed to make a case. There are no good guys in this rolling national disaster.
Except that in each of these states, there are plenty of folks who didn’t vote for these idiots, but who will have to suffer through their idiocy anyway.
By this logic, all of America deserved eight years of Dubya, because, at minimum, enough people voted for him that those elections were close enough that they could then be stolen. In a midyear election, probably about 25-30% of eligible voters voted these clowns in. For everyone else, you’re blaming the victims.
Victims? 70 percent couldn’t be bothers to get off their asses and vote, and that makes them victims??? Not in my book. Morons get what morons deserve.
and by the way, I don’t exempt my own state from the Moron Brigade: we elected Pat fucking Toomey and Tom Corbett. It’s gonna be an interesting could of years, with a lot of buyer’s remorse. Count on it.
Agreed- no tears. Rick Scott’s base wants him to piss off liberals. This does that, increases his street cred with his base, helps him raise money, etc. So the only relevant question is what people in FL who aren’t his base, and aren’t liberals, think about this. My guess is they don’t think much about it. Most of the people who use the cruddy excuse for public transport in places other than NYC, Boston, Philly, DC, Chicago, are the underclassm, which means they don’t or can’t vote. Scott does this because he can- no one screams about it except liberals – and when we do scream, its on cue so the wingnuts know their plan is working.
Unfortunately the morons that now run WI don’t give a shit about what public employees in Madison do. The teachers, firefighters and others did a “blue flu” thing, but the governor and legislators don’t care if Madison burns down. There seems to be some talk of recall, but outside Madison, Milwaukee, and a few other civilized remnants, the moron brigade is celebrating that the cities are going down.
You’re absolutely right about the media and the Dem party. There’s no real information to be had anywhere. Which is why America will continue its slide into third-world status unimpeded.
There’s a one-year waiting period before a recall. Walker just took office six weeks ago. Even if a recall is successful, he will have done incredible and irreparable damage by the time it happens.
I think people should just leave Wisconsin. It’s a failed state. Illinois and Minnesota are better places to live.
Leave the state?
By that logic, there should be no progressives left in California.
It’s inconvenient to stay and fight. It’s difficult, but if there is to be change, it has to be done.
The South has been abandoned; the Great Plains have been abandoned; Texas and Florida have been abandoned. What other states are we going to cede?
Right now, there is positive energy which needs to be harnassed and controlled.
I understood, and tried to tell people last fall, that 2010 was the crucial election of my lifetime. It was the election that was for all the marbles.
Well, the bad guys won. They won big. And they are very bad. Wisconsin is now a failed state. There is no future here. Anybody under 40 should get up and leave.
Now people are angry. Now people are going out and demonstrating. It’s too late. It could have accomplished something last fall. Now, it’s just a waste of time. The Tea Party owns the state now, and I don’t see any way of changing that. In our farce of a democracy, they get to draw the lines and write the rules under which all future elections are held. They will set it up so that they can never lose.
Any direction you go from Wisconsin, the next state you enter is blue or blue-ish. It makes no sense to stay here and suffer.
Your emotions are understandable, but you’re thinking too short term. Just imagine what humans felt like after the Dred Scott decision http://www.historyplace.com/lincoln/dred.htm – there’s an election in 2 years that is more important than 2010
I’m not comforted by the thought of future elections. The elections of at least the next decade in Wisconsin are going to be on a playing field that tilts strongly toward the GOP. But, maybe I am wrong, and the disgust with the Tea Party will be so widespread that even on the tilted playing field, the Democrats come back to power in 2014. That would be nice, I suppose, but it will amount to shutting the barn door after the barn has burned down.
State employees are being reduced to the level of Walmart employees. Do you think anybody who has the competence and experience to get a decent job will stick at their Wisconsin state jobs? In four years, they will all be gone. Even if you restore the labor conditions of 2010, you can’t bring back the competent State employees. That will take decades.
The Governor is about to gut the university system. UW-Madison is, and has long been, considered among the top state universities in the land. That’s about to end. Do you think any professor with a national reputation will still be around in four years? Do you think out-of-state students will still be applying to Wisconsin? It takes a moment for Scott Walker to eliminate entire departments and programs. Wisconsin will be a third-tier university system by 2014. And it won’t be rebounding any time soon.
And then there is the environment. Once that’s broken, you can maybe fix it in a glacial cycle, but not an election cycle.
So 2010 was the crucial election. The elections of the future just won’t matter much. The damage will have been done, and you can’t get back to where you were before.
All four of them.
I am discouraged beyond telling by the events in Wisconsin. I am at the point where I have come to regard it as a blessing that the Voter Suppression Act that the Wisconsin GOP is about to pass will relieve me of ever having to vote again. It’s a stupid process and I’m just as happy not having to participate in it anymore.
Here is why it’s stupid: The GOP essentially won permanent control over the state of Wisconsin. Because it was a census year, they get to draw the districts for the Legislature. This makes it impossible for Democrats to ever again win control of either house of the legislature. There may still be a Democratic governor someday (that’s an office they can’t gerrymander), but by wiping thousands of Democrats off the voter rolls, that also becomes a lot less likely.
I very much blame the Democrats for what has happened. The Tea Party landslide in November was directly because the Democrats spent a year or more pushing through a wildly unpopular health care bill. The governor’s race here and elsewhere was not about the candidates who were on the ballot. It was a referendum on Obamacare, and Obamacare lost. The Wisconsin AG has in effect nullified the bill anyway, saying that its provisions will not be enforced in Wisconsin. And many other states are doing the same.
Also, the trains were yesterday’s news in Wisconsin. At least Governor Walker made his position on the railroads clear during the campaign. Now, today, the state legislature is pulling the plug on the unions of state employees. The budget will be balanced by canceling the benefits of state employees. (Actually, that doesn’t nearly balance the budget. There will have to be deep cuts in services as well, especially since tax cuts for the wealthy and corporations will have to be financed.) Any competent state employee, from the clerks who process driver’s license renewals to the professors at UW-Madison, will be gone in a few years, to states where they will not be exploited.
Public employees are not allowed to strike. But tomorrow a not so mysterious virus is going to hit an awful lot of Wisconsin state workers.
They didn’t hate Obamacare. They hated a caricature of Obamacare pushed by right wing media that many were stupid enough to believe and the MS media was too compliant to dispel.
The health care bill is not wildly unpopular. It is actually popular with voters and becoming more so every day.
Try not to be such a fucking ninny, eh?
They’re getting not only what they deserve, they’re getting precisely what they asked for.
All that matters is that he pissed off liberals. So a few Republicans got angry too — they’ll be back to normal as soon as Scott does some more of his performance art.
Better to sit in the stands hungry with your hungry family and watch your team win, than have a job, and food, and a house, and watch your team lose.
Go team Red! We’re #1!
Rick Scott, the new governor of Wisconsin and the new governor from Ohio should be impeached. John Boner probably spoke for those idiots when he said, if we loose 20,000 or more jobs at the Federal level , so be it. NO big deal.
Thanks booman
Ray LaHood should contact Bev Perdue, governor of North Carolina and offer NC that $2 billion. I’d love to see how our newly Republican legislature would respond to her acceptance of the funding.
Even though I’m an Illinoisian I’d rather see the money go to California for a direct HSR line to Disneyland. I hate all things Disney, but it would be sweet to see Disney world slowly fade away because of the traffic congestion while Anaheim takes up the slack.
I keep banging the drum trying to wake up the American public to the ideology of Libertarian politicians and the FANATICAL behavior we can expect from them. Maybe someday people will actually wake up to the harsh reality when it comes to Libertarian politicians. (Please read my current post titled “Libertarians in Republican cloths”)
Rick Scott is just another Libertarian reacting to what he views as an unacceptable overture from the enemy government. Rick Scott’s Libertarian ideology will only be pacified when the entire U.S. government is COMPLETELY dismantled. Therefore he obviously finds it against his “principles” to accept money from the U.S.government regardless how much money is involved and what that money is for, or how it may help alleviate the unemployment situation in his State.
We need to STOP defining Libertarians as crazies, nuts, idiots or buffoons. Libertarians normally are intelligent rational people, but they are resolute uncompromising FANATICS when it comes to the Federal Government. They want to turn the clock back to the days when no Federal Government existed in America. Until that happens they remain the dedicated fanatical enemy of the ENTIRE FEDERAL government including all of its programs, domestic , military, and foreign.
Which makes them subversives in the truest sense. The federal government IS the United States. It’s what defines it as a country. The governments of the US, Canada, and Mexico (for example) are the one and only reason those countries exist. The inescapable conclusion is that the Rick Scotts and their supporters are dedicated to destroying America.
Asshats:
Breathalyzers don’t measure the degree to which someone is a selfish asshole.
WHY THE FUCK DID THIS NOT COME OUT DURING THE ELECTION? WHERE WAS STRICKLAND’S INTELLIGENCE SERVICE?
What do you wanna bet the police unions endorsed Kasich, like they did in Wisconsin?