In the dystopian novel 1984, George Orwell wrote, “The Party told you to reject the evidence of your eyes and ears. It was their final, most essential command.” The true meaning of that line was never more clear than watching the truly bizarre photo op of California governor Gavin Newsom heralding the success of the greatest boondoggle in history: his high-speed train to nowhere. Without laying a single yard of track after burning $12 billion, Newsom showed a diesel freight train on a conventional track to create the appearance of a working railroad.
I have been writing about this boondoggle for years. Newsom promised years ago that the project would be transformative. It was, but not as he promised.
Voters approved a $9.95 billion bond issue in 2008 after absurdly low estimates of the projected cost. Influential figures and companies stood to make a fortune, and the key was to secure a “buy-in” worth billions, so that it would become increasingly difficult to abandon the project as overruns and delays sent costs soaring.
Now the official estimate of future ridership has dropped by 25% , and it demands billions more to complete a project delayed by decades. Remember that this entire project was meant to create a rail line of only 171 miles. It is projected to exceed $128 billion and could ultimately cost a billion dollars per mile. There are still uncompleted environmental assessments and challenging rail lines through the mountains.
There is still no train and not a yard of track almost 20 years later.
The inspector general, Benjamin Belnap, issued a scathing report on the first phase of the still uncompleted project. That is only the stretch from Merced to Bakersfield which was supposed to be completed by 2033. Belnap wrote:
“With a smaller remaining schedule envelope and the potential for significant uncertainty and risk during subsequent phases of the project, staying within the 2033 schedule envelope is unlikely. In fact, uncertainty about some parts of the project has increased as the authority has recently made decisions that deviated from the procurement and funding strategies that were part of its plans for staying on schedule.”
Rather than deliver on the promise of high-speed rail from Los Angeles to San Francisco, the Merced-Bakersfield line would now cost $35.3 billion, exceeding the 2008 projection for a complete system.
Merced and Bakersfield have a combined population of roughly 500,000. That works out to roughly $22,000 per person, based on state ridership estimates.
However, Newsom still wants to be president even as citizens are fleeing his state in record numbers. The “train to nowhere” is a problem. Even the New York Times is writing editorials on whether Newsom will be the next mistake of the Democratic Party.
Newsom’s response is to arrange for gushing columns like Maya Singer’s embarrassing piece in Vogue:
Let’s get this out of the way: He is embarrassingly handsome, his hair seasoned with silver, at ease with his own eminence as he delivers his final State of the State address…
Newsom’s lanky frame was folded onto a sofa a bit too low-slung for him. This made him lean back—away from me. Or it could be that his body language had nothing to do with ergonomics and is a function of Newsom’s quality of being at once gregarious and aloof.”
It is the type of teenybopper heartthrob coverage that Newsom is counting on from the media. It is not the billions burned on a non-existent railway but his glorious hair and “eminence.”
However, others beyond Vogue readers may be interested in his actual record. Hence, the need to release this absurd photo op that would make a propagandist blush:
“All of the hard work behind us. Now we’re going to see the fruits of that. We’re going to start seeing precisely what you see here. Real tracks, real progress.”
It is like paying for a meal at a restaurant and the Chef charging you ten times what was on the menu, not producing the meal for hours, and then showing you a picture of a different dish as a sign of his progress.
The difference is that Newsom has taken almost two decades to deliver and cut the original dish to a fraction of its original size while increasing the price exponentially.
Californians are now captives on a train to nowhere. The state must continue to burn billions because too much is invested economically and politically. They must ride the train with Gavin Newsom to the very end.
Jonathan Turley is a law professor and the best-selling author of “Rage and the Republic: The Unfinished Story of the American Revolution.”
Why is there anyone who ever beleived this would:
Not cost far more than predicted
Ever be completed
This was predictable from the start
And many many many predicted it.
You’re full of shite. And a predictable liar.
I remember voting against this. I took comfort from the summary list of protections e.g. a promise that private funding would pay for it. The California courts were used to waive away those protections. I now take comfort in the thought that this massive boondoggle was a necessary step towards a better government. It may well be the poster child catalyst for a voter revolt that will restore sensible government to the state. Not today, but maybe tomorrow.
Nevertheless his brain, dead, psycho fans, like lemmings, will follow this soaking wetsack of shit blindly over the cliff
😂 Is there anyone wanting, needing to travel Merced to Bakersfield at bullet speed. 😂. Barney Fife needing to travel from Hayseed to Mayberry comes to mind. Smh.
I’m imagining the huge number of millionaires made by the bullet train via graft.
Yeah, and the California Democrats figure the billionaire’s tax is the way to claw some of that wasted tax money back.
It is not the price tag that gets me. It is the amount of money spent and not one track is laid. 20 years on and not one track is laid. That is plainly mind boggling for any politician, let alone this particular politician. Could one imagine if a Republican has this hanging around their neck how the press would react?
It is not even the fact not one track has been laid that gets me, but the sheer smugness of not getting it done. Newsom just smiles that golden smile as if he is the cat’s pajamas.
This boondoggle as the good Professor calls it is a case of either the ultimate corruption or incompetence on a scale that is truly impressive.
Gavin Newsom will run for President and I truly hope it is a bruising primary and knocks him out (no I am not a fan). I cannot imagine the disaster he will unleash on us all if he wins. To think Biden was bad…
The other elephant (or donkey) in the room is covering the annual operating costs. The cost projections use in selling the original bond measure needed every resident of California to take one round trip from SF to LA or the reverse every year to break even on operating costs. This assumes that the original operating costs estimates had any credibility. The costs of maintenance, any upgrading or replacement of damaged, destroyed or worn out equipment were not included. These estimates were prepared by the same people who generated the original cost estimates. The build costs are off by at least a factor of 15. I submit that the on-going costs of operating and maintaining this fantasy would be a large, permanent drain on an already unmanageable state budget.
The dwindling number of people who still subscribe to the Washington Post plummeted even further on Thursday after owner Jeff Bezos named Melania Trump as the paper’s new editor-in-chief.
Calling the hiring of the First Lady “not a bribe,” Bezos said, “We wanted to find someone who wouldn’t be tainted by any experience in journalism, and Bari Weiss was already taken.”
Mrs. Trump will make history as the first editor of a major US paper with a 5% rating on Rotten Tomatoes film reviews, industry experts said.
In her first official act, Melania changed the Post’s slogan to “Democracy in Darkness Be Best.”
If only you were actually funny.
If only you were actually sane.
If only you would expire.
Turls checks in with some Friday rage and hatred directed at Newsom (who will promptly lambast him in a hilarious way online).
^ DNC paid troll. Ignore. ^
It is not rage or hatred directed at Newsom. It is, “What the heck is Newsom thinking?” “Throwing more money down a hole?” “Will Newsome or CA voters wise up and cut their losses?”
Your point?
“To nowhere,” Professor? It’s the ghost train to Hotel California 😉
Governor Nuisance is bringing up the high-speed train to change the subject from the Palisades, so I guess one could say he’s already taken his voters for a ride.
Rabble:
I’d say the Palisades (which has deliciously been shunted back to the forefront), any involvement of the high and mighty in the Epstien files, plus the upcoming (likely in-progress in the more rural and acquiescing parts of Cali) fraud and ICE dog and pony show.
Also, has anyone found anything on where the billions towards the Homelessness (sorry, “unhoused”) problem have gone? Billions in, and the only increase is in the amount of homeless in Cali.
Good question. We might wait a long time for answers.
Until you learn to read, you mean?
Gavin Newsom has racked the streets of L.A., San Francisco, Sacramento, Bakersfield and Other towns with Homeless Indigents that under his Democratic party administration had stolen the promise of economic prosperity the “Golden State” once had to offer. No One wants’ to do business in Cities where the Homeless defecate on the sidewalks, drugs & street crime are rampant and theft (shoplifting) is not a prosecutable crime. Add to that, astronomical Taxes and Litigation Cost, Employment Cost, … Businesses had to move out or call it quits. California has become the land of un-survivable conditions.
Instead of spending (burning) $12 billion on a Train Ride, He could have revamped closed military bases to get the Homeless off the Streets. Gavin is a political-narcissist that only thinks about how he can look in the mirror of Office.
WE do not need him for President in the run for Election 2028. He living proof that DEMs are only look for a free ride without: anything to offer, having nothing to gain, and cannot be trusted.
AI: ( List of closed military bases in California )
Former U.S. Military Bases Remain a Toxic Menace – The New … California has seen numerous military base closures, particularly after the Cold War, with major sites like Fort Ord, Castle Air Force Base, **Mather Air Force Base, George Air Force Base, El Toro MCAS, Mare Island Naval Shipyard, and Alameda Naval Air Station being prominent examples closed under the Base Realignment and Closure (BRAC) process, significantly impacting communities across the state.
Major Bases Closed (1990s BRAC Rounds)
Fort Ord: (Army Post, Monterey County) – Closed 1994.
Castle Air Force Base: (Merced County) – Closed 1995.
George Air Force Base: (San Bernardino County) – Closed 1992.
Mather Air Force Base: (Sacramento) – Closed.
McClellan Air Force Base: (Sacramento) – Closed.
Fort Presidio of San Francisco – Closed.
Mare Island Naval Shipyard: (Vallejo) – Closed.
Naval Air Station (NAS) Alameda – Closed.
Naval Station Treasure Island: (San Francisco) – Closed.
Marine Corps Air Station (MCAS) El Toro: (Santa Ana) – Closed.
Naval Training Center: (San Diego) – Closed.
Moffett Field Naval Air Station – Closed.
Tustin Marine Corps Air Station – Closed.
Long Beach Naval Station & Shipyard – Closed 1997.
Norton Air Force Base: (San Bernardino) – Closed.
Other Notable Closures/Reductions:
Concord Naval Weapons Station: Parts of this large facility were closed.
Oakland Army Base: Closed.
Alameda Naval Aviation Depot: Closed.
Impact:
These closures, part of larger BRAC rounds, resulted in significant economic shifts, transforming former bases into housing, business parks, educational campuses (like Cal State Monterey Bay on Fort Ord), and environmental remediation sites.
Mr. Fiat Plastic Fantastic
-VOTE NO- on Newsom 2028
Full disclosure: I have lived in Southern California for 47 years and have opposed every ballot measure that increased taxpayer burdens without clear necessity or accountability.
This is not just a failed rail project. It reflects a breakdown in civic capacity. Self-government requires citizens willing to evaluate evidence and withdraw consent when promises are not kept. When a $100+ billion project with no deliverable persists through sunk costs, staged optics, and media narrative, accountability has failed.
California is not ideologically uniform. Conservatives occupy most of the state geographically, but political power is concentrated in dense urban areas. That imbalance, combined with ballot initiatives sold on aspiration rather than outcomes, insulates failure from correction.
California’s electoral map is not unique. It is a preview.
They do not need to keep paying! The fishing is a failure, cut bait!
Before the “Bullet Train to nowhere” was even started, there was already a very fast way to get from LA to SF. It is known as Southwest Airlines
To get to SF from LA the bullet train would have to get thru the Transverse Ranges such as the San Gabriel Mtns. These are among the most geologically active mountains in the world. Think San Andreas Fault. Imagine being on the BT going 100mph in a tunnel thru the San Gabes when a big earthquake hits.