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Yahoo
20-05-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
California's $100bn railway to nowhere exposes the stunning costs of Democrat incompetence
The latest broadside in the seemingly unending war between President Trump and California Governor Newsom came with a presidential attack on the state's long-delayed, over-budget high-speed rail project. Trump, who seems determined to stop federal funding for the project, even suggested that its dire problems will pose a challenge for Newsom as he gets ready for a run for the 2028 Democratic nomination. If Newsom were prone to self-reflection, he'd admit that the line – intended to connect LA and San Francisco – is an embarrassment. The rail authority estimated in 2008, when voters approved $9 billion for the system, that it would cost $33 billion and start running by 2020. The projected cost has since ballooned to over $100 billion. Governing magazine, hardly a voice for less public spending, placed the blame largely on incompetence – 'uncoordinated planning' that ignored basic construction logistics and bent to the need to please political factions. Indeed, the route was in large part sold to people in the state's hard-pressed interior as an economic boon, which ignores the nature of the area, whose economy is largely based on agriculture, manufacturing and oil. Wider truck lines for congested freeways would make far more economic sense. Many projects go over budget, but, as the president has suggested, for once plausibly, the California high-speed train may be 'the worst managed project' he'd ever seen. Even progressives are aware of this failure. The first to jump off the train, so to speak, was Kevin Drum at Mother Jones a decade ago, who called the project 'ridiculous'. He assaulted the cost overruns and absurd ridership projections. More recently, the train was singled out for infamy by the authors of Abundance. This new progressive bible, which embraces all the memes of the Left, for example on urban density and climate, expresses horror at how the train has been delayed and has escalated in cost. Today, even Democrats like former California State Speaker Anthony Rendon admit that there is 'no confidence' in the project and have been far from anxious to pour more good money after bad. Unless there is an unanticipated flow of state funds, the Legislative Analyst's Office suggests that the project could grind to a halt within 15 months. There is now only enough money, and perhaps not even that, for a line from agriculture and oil-dominated Bakersfield to even more rustic Merced. Not exactly the glamorous LA-San Francisco route originally mooted, much less something to rival the lines connecting Tokyo to Osaka or Paris to Lyon. Despite being described by Hoover Institute economist Lee Ohanian as 'the greatest infrastructure failure in the history of the country', the California disaster does admittedly have a great deal of competition. A similar pattern can be seen in the slow pace of repairs to the collapsed Francis Scott Key Bridge in Baltimore's Harbour. Boston's Big Dig (Central Artery/Tunnel Project) was plagued by cost overruns and delays, eventually coming in at nearly $25 billion, $10 billion more than previously reported. In fact, the entire transit industry, a favourite target for investment among progressives and greens, is stymied by what the Marron Institute at New York University found were 'among the highest transit-infrastructure costs in the world' – far higher than not only China, which can ascribe to less cumbersome processes, but the likes of Sweden, Italy, and Turkey as well. Phase one of New York's Second Avenue Subway, Marron notes, clocked in at 8 to 12 times more expensive than what the international analysis suggested should be the baseline cost, reflecting strict overtime rules, local union agreements that limit the available labour pools geographically, and an unwillingness to address staffing and labour agreements. But even in this world of lavish overruns, Newsom's California stands in a league of its own. Back in 2015, UC Berkeley scholar Karen Trapenberg Frick outlined how the cost of replacing the eastern section of the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge rose from an estimated price of $250 million in 1995 to $6.5 billion by September 2013. This was in part due to political pressures from elected officials, according to a report prepared for a state Senate committee. But nothing quite matches the incompetence and overspending of Newsom's choo-choo. It has likely undermined support for building a national network of high-speed trains, something promoted in Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez's Green New Deal. Despite the green visions, high-speed trains seem a bit of a step back – the St Louis Post-Dispatch labelled them 'a bridge to the 19th century'. In a world where most people drive, and many commute from home, the idea of sinking tens of billions into high-speed projects seems a poor bet, as Britain has already found with the cancellation of large parts of the HS2 project. Even in China, where political opposition is verboten, the choo-choos have been plagued by corruption, rising costs and massive indebtedness. Under Biden, Newsom enjoyed large lumps of gravy for his train, but under Trump, he is now likely to have to choose between funding the money-mad rail network or doing such basic things as balancing his budget and facing California's gargantuan public employee pension costs, as well as paying for healthcare for the state's estimated 2.5 million undocumented immigrants. The overpriced choo-choo reflects the ultimate dilemma for Democrats like Newsom. In the 1930s and 1940, under Democrats, American ingenuity produced the infrastructure that underpinned the world's largest industrial economy – the Hoover Dam, the Tennessee Valley Authority, and countless bridges, roads, and other critical infrastructure. Today's presumed heirs of FDR still talk big about infrastructure, but are loath to offend public unions, green lobby groups and progressive non-profits. Most of the successful case studies on infrastructure come from red states like Florida, which built its new train lines at something approaching original costs and deadlines. If you want to advocate for more government, perhaps it's best to prove that you can do this efficiently. Newsom's high-speed rail line proves that, for now, the progressives are prisoners of their own massive incompetence. Joel Kotkin is presidential fellow in urban futures at Chapman University and senior research fellow at the Civitas Institute at the University of Texas Broaden your horizons with award-winning British journalism. Try The Telegraph free for 1 month with unlimited access to our award-winning website, exclusive app, money-saving offers and more.
New York Times
11-03-2025
- Politics
- New York Times
Corrections: March 11, 2025
An article on Sunday about the 41 hostages who have been killed since being taken captive by Hamas and its allies during their Oct. 7 attack on Israel misstated when Israel's military concluded that an airstrike had killed hostages. It was in March 2024, not March 2023. An article on Saturday about a South Korean court ordering the release from jail of the country's impeached president Yoon Suk Yeol misstated the timing of the indictment. It was in January, not last month. An article on Sunday about the introduction of price controls by Croatia's government to rein in inflation misidentified the name of the research institute where John H. Cochrane works. It is the Hoover Institution, not the Hoover Institute. An article on Saturday about the robotic Athena moon lander spacecraft's inability to charge its batteries after ending up on its side misstated how far the craft was from its targeted landing site. It was about 800 feet, not 150 meters. A column by The Athletic on Sunday about whether Pete Rose should be in the Baseball Hall of Fame referred incorrectly to his World Series history. Rose played on championship teams for the Cincinnati Reds in 1975 and 1976 and for the Philadelphia Phillies in 1980; he did not play on three World Series winners during the days of Cincinnati's Big Red Machine. An article on Monday about the video game designer Josef Fares misspelled the given name of a video game composer. He is Gustaf Grefberg, not Gustav. It also erroneously included a game in his credits; he did not write the score for Wolfenstein: The New Order. Errors are corrected during the press run whenever possible, so some errors noted here may not have appeared in all editions.
Bloomberg
09-03-2025
- Business
- Bloomberg
China's Economic Challenges With Lawrence H. Summers
Former US Treasury Secretary and Wall Street Week contributor Lawrence H. Summers breaks down China's economic future as it faces challenges including consumer confidence, tariffs imposed by President Donald Trump, a weak housing market and foreign investment outflows. Elizabeth Economy from the Hoover Institute also tells us what priorities China will focus on at its National People's Congress meeting that began this week. (Source: Bloomberg)
Voice of America
29-01-2025
- Politics
- Voice of America
Debate rages over Trump's push to end birthright citizenship
President Donald Trump's executive order to end birthright citizenship in the U.S. has ignited a legal and political debate, raising questions about the 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution and the extent of presidential power. The amendment guarantees citizenship to anyone born on U.S. soil. 'We're the only country in the world that does this with birthright, as you know. And it's just absolutely ridiculous. But, you know, we'll see. We think we have very good grounds and certain people have wanted to do this for decades,' Trump said while signing the executive order on his first day in office. The United States is one of about 30 countries that grant automatic citizenship to individuals born on their soil, including Brazil, Mexico, and Canada, among others. The practice is known as jus soli (Latin for "right of the soil"). But the U.S. remains notable for its broad application of unconditional jus soli, as enshrined in the 14th Amendment. Are there limits to 14th Amendment? The amendment, ratified in 1868, was designed to address citizenship questions following the U.S. Civil War and to overrule the Supreme Court's 1857 Dred Scott decision, which denied African Americans citizenship. The text reads: 'All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside.' 'This language ratifies the traditional understanding that anyone born in the United States is automatically a citizen,' John Yoo, a professor at University of California Berkeley Law School and visiting fellow at the Hoover Institute, told VOA in a phone intervie However, critics argue that the phrase "subject to the jurisdiction thereof" implies that at least one parent must be a U.S. citizen for a child to be granted citizenship. According to Yoo, this interpretation aligns more closely with the European jus sanguinis, or 'law of blood' approach, which ties citizenship to parentage rather than birthplace. 'To me, that just doesn't make sense of the language of the 14th Amendment and historical practice,' Yoo said. 'The Supreme Court, in cases like United States v. Wong Kim Ark, has consistently interpreted the amendment to mean birthright citizenship.' Critics of Trump's executive order say the 14th Amendment is a cornerstone of civil rights in the United States. 'The 14th amendment, it was created to give birthright citizenship. … Constitutional rights cannot be taken away by a president. They can only be taken away by Congress, and thus the executive order is illegal,' said Tuyet Duong, an immigration lawyer and policy expert with the National Asian Pacific American Women's Forum. However, supporters of the executive order argue a more limited interpretation of the amendment is warranted. "President Trump has made it clear that restoring fairness to our immigration system and defending the true intent of the 14th Amendment are central to his vision of making America great again,' Republican Congressman Brian Babin of Texas, told reporters during a press conference last Thursday. Amy Swearer, a senior legal fellow at The Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank, wrote in a report in 2019 that there is good reason for the United States to reconsider its long-standing policy of automatically granting citizenship to everyone born on U.S. soil. Swearer argued that the 14th Amendment was intended to give birthright citizenship only to those U.S.-born children whose parents were 'like the freed slaves, subject to the complete jurisdiction of the United States. In a modern immigration context, this would mean that the Constitution only mandates birthright citizenship for the U.S.-born children of citizens, nationals, and lawful permanent residents.' Legal challenges Trump's executive order is facing significant legal challenges, with multiple lawsuits in progress. Twenty-two Democratic-led states have filed a lawsuit arguing the order violates the 14th Amendment. A federal judge in Seattle has temporarily stopped the birthright citizenship order from taking effect. Last Thursday, U.S. District Judge John C. Coughenour of Seattle temporarily blocked it, describing it as "blatantly unconstitutional." But if the case reaches the Supreme Court, the outcome could reshape the nation's understanding of citizenship. If the court were to side with Trump, the most immediate impact will be on newborns and those yet to receive birth certificates and Social Security numbers. And questions about retroactive application would arise. 'Figuring out how this rule would operate retroactively is extremely complex. Would it deny citizenship to people born here historically without citizen parents? How far back would it go? These are precisely the issues the 14th Amendment was designed to avoid,' Yoo told VOA. While much of the focus is on judicial challenges, Yoo pointed out that Congress could settle the issue legislatively. 'Congress could extend birthright citizenship by statute, reaffirming the traditional understanding. But it's unclear what Congress might do in this politically charged environment,' Yoo said. Still, he believes the Supreme Court would uphold birthright citizenship. 'The text of the 14th Amendment, its history, and consistent Supreme Court rulings all point to birthright citizenship,' he said.
