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Voters have turned against California bullet train, poll shows
Los Angeles Times ^ | June 2, 2012 | By Ralph Vartabedian

Posted on 06/03/2012 6:40:49 AM PDT by Oldeconomybuyer

A strong majority of voters is against the bullet train project just as Gov. Brown is pressuring the Legislature to green-light the start of construction, a USC Dornsife/Los Angeles Times poll finds.

Across the state, 55% of the voters want the bond issue that was approved in 2008 placed back on the ballot, and 59% say they now would vote against it.

Since voters approved that $9-billion borrowing plan, the state and national economic outlook has dimmed and some of the promises about the bullet train have been compromised.

55% of the respondents said the state has bigger priorities than borrowing money to build a bullet train. And 43% said they would rather spend the money on improvements to rail transportation in their own area. Only 32% said the bullet train is a higher priority.

(Excerpt) Read more at latimes.com ...


TOPICS: Business/Economy; News/Current Events; Politics/Elections; US: California
KEYWORDS: bullettrain; failure; highspeedrail; porkulus; prop1a; rail; socialism; williegreenweeps
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1 posted on 06/03/2012 6:40:58 AM PDT by Oldeconomybuyer
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To: Oldeconomybuyer

Doesn’t matter. The liberal elite want it.


2 posted on 06/03/2012 6:53:18 AM PDT by Brilliant
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To: Oldeconomybuyer

Union handouts.
Prevailing wage jobs.
Huge pots of money to skim.
Gub’mint jobs.

Voter opinion is irrelavent at this point.


3 posted on 06/03/2012 6:54:56 AM PDT by Bronco_Buster_FweetHyagh (I cling to guns and religion.)
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To: Oldeconomybuyer
In the last paragraph of the story, [Bullet train bond debt]...which was approved by 52.7% of voters in 2008, which should have been in the first paragraph for better in context comparison purposes reading the article.
4 posted on 06/03/2012 7:10:25 AM PDT by Calvin Locke
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To: Oldeconomybuyer

Willie Green could not be reached for comment.


5 posted on 06/03/2012 7:29:24 AM PDT by ILS21R (John Locke: When the social contract is broken, the people must revolt.)
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To: ILS21R

Willie Green is running for reelection.


6 posted on 06/03/2012 7:41:03 AM PDT by bray (Power to We the People)
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To: ILS21R

High speed train is a good idea—BUT— California is Broke right now! This should be placed on the Backburner until the state can pay for it! The old train tracks are a mess now and will need to be replaced! California needs to pull her head out of her environmental rear end balance her books before thinking of this thing. How?
1. Open coast line for oil drilling.
2. Make Marijuana legal and sell it by the state.
3. Make Prostitution Legal and tax it.
4. Make gambling Legal—add gambling ships off coast.
5. Break the power of the fat unions.
6. Lower drinking age to 19.
7. Sell off State parks that do not make money.
8. Build more refineries.
9. Enforce a tax on illegal aliens.
10. Reduce taxes on Capital Gains.


7 posted on 06/03/2012 8:02:18 AM PDT by Forward the Light Brigade (Into the Jaws of H*ll)
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To: Oldeconomybuyer

Bullet trains. Drive a car to board at station, wait for next train, take the train, hire a taxi to move about when you get there. Now reverse the process and don’t forget the train ride is not free. Cheaper to just drive the damn trip and will not take much more time and probably cheaper even with the communists inflated cost of gas.


8 posted on 06/03/2012 8:29:53 AM PDT by Logical me
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To: Brilliant

China wants it and they are putting the pressure on Brown to deliver them the contracts promised by Arnold Schwarzenegger on his many trips to China while governor.


9 posted on 06/03/2012 8:37:52 AM PDT by hedgetrimmer
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To: Oldeconomybuyer

Jerry is already building the tunnel for this train. It doesn’t go through a mountain, it goes straight down into the ground. It’s THE JERRY BROWN TUNNEL! It doesn’t go anywhere, but you just keep throwing taxpayer money into it. Get your ticket at the station! Pay your $5,000 and jump into THE JERRY BROWN TUNNEL! Old Jer will even go “Whoo! Whoo!” while he’s giving your money to his buddies.


10 posted on 06/03/2012 8:48:56 AM PDT by blueunicorn6 ("A crack shot and a good dancer")
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To: Logical me
Bullet trains. Drive a car to board at station, wait for next train, take the train, hire a taxi to move about when you get there. Now reverse the process and don’t forget the train ride is not free. Cheaper to just drive the damn trip and will not take much more time and probably cheaper even with the communists inflated cost of gas.

Yepper - unless a place is more than a 10-hour drive, flying doesn't save enough time to make it worthwhile either.

11 posted on 06/03/2012 8:56:18 AM PDT by trebb ("If a man will not work, he should not eat" From 2 Thes 3)
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To: Forward the Light Brigade

6. Lower drinking age to 19

Very bad idea when the drinking age was set to 18 the teenage death rate went sky high in the 80’s.
It was repealed for that reason.


12 posted on 06/03/2012 9:01:49 AM PDT by Vaduz
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To: Oldeconomybuyer

It looks like the “bond issue” (funding for the entire project) may again go before the voters in November through the initiative process.

If California’s voters vote to kill the bonds (and the funding), how will Brown counteract them?


13 posted on 06/03/2012 9:20:34 AM PDT by Road Glide
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To: Forward the Light Brigade

High speed train is NOT a good idea.

I can fly from three convenient bay area airports to three convenient So. Cal airports, plus San Diego in an hour for $58 with proper planning. Why would I waste my time on high priced rail? It is stupid.


14 posted on 06/03/2012 9:49:12 AM PDT by super7man
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To: Vaduz

Breaking news! Underage college freshmen drink!


15 posted on 06/03/2012 10:00:56 AM PDT by MinorityRepublican
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To: super7man
High speed train is NOT a good idea.

If it made economic sense, we would already have high speed trains. That said, sipping wine on a bullet train in France going 200 mph is pretty cool.

16 posted on 06/03/2012 4:56:39 PM PDT by EVO X
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To: Forward the Light Brigade; ILS21R
High speed train is a good idea

No it's not, not now, not when the economy improves...Not ever.. It's not needed. We don't need no train...We got cars, roads, trains, airplanes etc.

This is just more government corruption, so they can line their fat pockets and get kickbacks from illegal alien hiring contractors.

The only choochoo I want to see is a freight train full of pissed off taxpayers, blowing through the doors of the capital, demanding government be cut to the core along with mass prosecutions for the state government corruption.

Sell the GD capital building and fire 70 percent of these these bloated tax parasites, what left of them, put them in double wide trailers in a field outside Fresno. Build a chicken licken in the middle of their new capital trailer complex, and give them 10 percent meal coupons.

Pay these AHs minimum wage for the privilege of serving the people, and 2 terms and their fat asses are out...No more government welfare jobs for them, no more government unionized mobsters.

If these lying corrupt lazy SOBs don't like it, they can go find legitimate work in the private sector, real world.

Enough of these corrupt controlling freaks, their lottery style government retirement pensions, insider perks, tax paid cars, bloated obscene wages and their gold plated benefits, etc.

I want to spit in their fat faces.

17 posted on 06/03/2012 5:30:27 PM PDT by dragnet2 (Diversion and evasion are tools of deceit)
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To: hedgetrimmer

I wonder if anyone has done research to see what happens when you’re going 290 mph, and there is a 4 magnitude earthquake? Or 5? Or 6?


18 posted on 06/03/2012 5:48:18 PM PDT by Brilliant
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To: EVO X

Still pretty expensive just to do something cool.

And you are right. If somebody could make money at it, it would have already been done. Oh, like airplanes.


19 posted on 06/03/2012 9:07:04 PM PDT by super7man
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To: Oldeconomybuyer

The voters should have thought it was a rotten idea before they voted to fund it!!!

It’s the stupidest thing anyone ever thought up.


20 posted on 06/03/2012 9:21:44 PM PDT by dalereed
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