From the office of U.S. Sen. Barbara Mikulski:
MIKULSKI STATEMENT ON AMTRAK TRAIN DERAILMENT IN PHILADELPHIA
WASHINGTON – U.S. Senator Barbara A. Mikulski (D-Md.) today issued the following statement on this week’s deadly Amtrak train derailment in Philadelphia:
“My thoughts and prayers go out to the families of those lost in the tragic derailment of Amtrak 188. I want to express my condolences to all the families, especially those of Maryland residents, Abid Gilani and Bob Gildersleeve, and U.S Naval Academy Midshipman, Justin Zemzer. This is a particularly sad time for their families, communities, the Naval Academy community and all those affected by this terrible crash.
“My gratitude goes out to the first responders who have worked tirelessly to evacuate passengers and saved many lives following this disaster. And I give thanks to the passengers who helped other passengers in the terrible aftermath.
“Tens of thousands of passengers ride the Amtrak train along the Northeast corridor every day —this is a tragedy that impacts us all. I urge the NTSB to conduct its investigation thoroughly and quickly to ensure the safety of Maryland communities and provide answers for the families grieving today. Amtrak must get to the bottom of what went wrong and outline what steps they are taking to ensure it will never happen again.
“It’s outrageous that less than 24 hours after this terrible crash, the House voted to cut Amtrak funding by almost 20 percent. This is not the time for partisan bickering or nitpicking on the budget. Lives have been lost. Lives have been turned upside down. Commerce has been disrupted.
“This horrible crash is a wake-up call on the need to invest in our transportation infrastructure. I’ve consistently fought for funding of Amtrak infrastructure and rail safety. Now is the time to fund Amtrak. Passengers shouldn’t fear stepping on the train. They should have confidence that their train system is modern, safe and secure.”
Any company that can lose a billion dollars selling food needs some serious changes. The people who use amtrack should fund it.
Please retire faster.
One train out of how many Amtrak trains crashes. They must have enough money to run most of them right. Besides a locomotive traveling twice the posted speed limit in a curve came off because of operator error. No amount of money could have prevented that. It’s a good thing your done representing us.
Could be mechanical error. Seems you have convicted the driver before all the facts came out. I guess that makes you as bad as Babs!
So much outrage, so little common sense. This troll’s time should’ve ended years ago. Too bad we’re stuck with her until 2016.
Maybe we’re too hard on Babs… I mean, she was OK as the freaky little medium in the original Poltergeist…
Let’s check the records. Amtrak’s North East corridor made a profit of over 450 million dollars last year. It was an Amtrak management decision to continue to fund the East West (Chicago to LA) corridor at a major loss. Their management decisions influenced by labor unions continues to employ ticket takers instead of utilizing an automated system which would cost much less,..i.e. higher profits.
The Senator’s outrage is phony. She is the one using a tragedy to further her agenda. You know…Saul Alinsky’s “never let a crisis go to waste”.
What a pathetic article of political propaganda. When will our elected employees, of ALL parties, cut their staffing, cut their salaries/benefit packages, and honestly have concern about the issues they are elected to address? I am so tired of lies, lies, and more lies from ALL elected employees. George Washington was correct with regard to his analysis of the dangers of organized political parties.
It’s outrageous that you and your pathetic party have chose to politicize this before all of the bodies have been recovered. Amtrak loses more than a billion dollars of American Taxpayer Dollars every year. 8 billion in the hole and all you and your pathetic party wants to do is bilk the American taxpayer for more $. Every Chesseburger sold on Amtrak cost $16, $9 of which is funded by ( yes you guessed it ) the American taxpayer. Take a ride over by Coppin State, Senator Troll and take a look around. You and your partys’ policies have really worked out well. Shame on you.
Babs, do you have any other solutions to our problems other than throw money at them? We don’t know yet if the problem was operator or mechanical error so what the hell would more money accomplish? Please leave congress ASAP and don’t let the door hit you in the *ss.
GOP wants to cut $260 million. Just eliminate the Chicago to California route that has relatively few riders and loses $600 million per year. Problem solved!
Babs, please crawl back into your hole, it isn’t election time yet. If the Federal and State govenments would quit raiding the Highway Trust Fund to covber their little pet projects, there would be plenty of money there. Seems to me, that if you take money allocated for one thing and spend it on another, that would be considered misappropriation of funds. If I did that in my business, I would be in jail.
Didn’t OWE’Bama and “clan” already invest in America’s infrastructure with stimulus money years ago? “Shovel Ready Jobs” I believe was the slogan. But as usual, the Dem’s want to throw more tax payer money at a problem before the issue has been investigated and all the facts are in. And we all know that the US Government and Unions make bad business partners.(Amtrack and the GM bailout come to mind)
No there wasn’t much infrastructure investment in the recovery act. There should have been much more but people didn’t have an appetite for high levels of spending even though the money was essentially free because of low and negative interest rates. You characterize dems as big spenders even though bush increased the debt greatly with handouts to the wealthy through tax cuts and medicare part d. Maybe instead of talking in big generalities you should educate yourself and not be such an ignorant person.
It turns out there were actually only two shovel ready jobs when the money was released; Senators Byrd and Kennedy. and they were both overdue.
Bush may have increased the debt some, but OWE’Bama and clan have been on the biggest spending spree to date. And no such thing as “free money” unless your on the EBT plan. In the end, where did OWE’Bama’s stimulus money go? Detroit, Baltimore, unions, politicians …….. OWE’Bama stated there were shovel jobs ready and people who needed jobs ready to sign up. The “appetite” or lack of from the AMERICAN working people had absolutely nothing to do with the investment. OWE’Bama and clan spent it anyway. The “wealthy” are those who create the jobs, not government. May I recommend that you stay in touch with whom spends and the results that follow. Baltimore’s stimulus, $1.8B. Where did that go? Who spent it?
The wealthy don’t create jobs as they have sent a majority of the jobs overseas. The wealthy wish to create or maintain an aristocracy based on money. They want their sons and daughters to be the lords of the next generation as they continue on their mission to keep lower class Americans in their place, so to speak. If you truly believe that the wealthy are the creators of jobs then you are living in a world devoid of reality……..
The Walton family is the largest private employer in the country.
How can you actually refer to Walmart as a job creator? They don’t offer jobs that actually allow someone to provide for their families. Unless of course you are a manager or something. The wage is too low to support a family. Jobs, real jobs, are at least in the $18.00 per hour range and in all reality it takes an earner at least $25.00 per hour to support your average family without some sort of assistance. Small businesses and manufacturing are the real job creators. The wealthy hate small businesses and don’t want to manufacture items in the US because of the salaries American workers require to exist. The only logical fix is to not allow imports from countries (China) that manufacture goods that are of low quality and the workers are paid pennies to perform the manufacturing. Just my take on this situation…….
http://www.forbes.com/largest-private-companies/list/
And your point being what? It doesn’t change the fact that the salaries don’t equal to the cost of living. People can make $18 – $25 per hour easily on an assembly line. Manufacturing is the only way…….
The wealthy don’t create jobs. You’re just another ignorant tea partier.
Then Mr. Jenkins, who does create jobs? The government “allows” jobs as long they comply with the regulations set forth/imposed upon them by locally, state and Fed. laws and compliance. Mr. Soul, why have the wealthiest transferred their money elsewhere or “out sourced?” Because of the governments, locally, state and Federal mandates. I would suggest to both Mr. Jenkins and Mr. Soul, if you are employed, to trace the chain-of-command up and find out who/whom you truly work for. If you are a government employee, your employer(s) are elected officials elected by “we the people.” If you are employed in private industry, unless you are the owner, you are employed by a private investor who once had a dream and probably without the governments involvement or assistance.
I believe your take on jobs and job creators is flawed. The corporate companies moved jobs overseas to see their profits soar, that’s it, nothing else. The main problem is these job creators have acted completely un-American. The government can only sustain a very small fraction of the jobs that exist in this country. Private investors are usually part of a corporation, please refer to sentence 2 of this paragraph. One last thing, most of those job creators you refer to have absolutely no idea what it means to work for a living as they have never had their hands dirty at any point of their lives. Yet, you believe that they are the salvation of low income employees even when their agendas are to keep the poor in poverty. Get real. Stop watching FoxNews and stop allowing yourself to be brainwashed. Manufacturing is the only thing that will save this country and none of these job creators are interested in that. That’s the bottom line, because the SoulCrusher says so……..
F.L.
The US is a consumer oriented economy. Investment doesn’t provide jobs in and of itself. Consumer demand creates the need for jobs. Private investment allows someone to fulfill that demand for a profit. Investment is merely a tool, not a goal.
As Soulcrusher (and Henry Ford) alluded to, workers must earn enough to consumer the goods created. If they do not, no amount of private investment will change that. The economy will simply limp along or collapse. This is why supply side economics has yet to achieve anything without massive deficit spending.
The stimulus and omnibus spending bills of 2009 allocated almost a billion dollars to infrastructure. The states took the money and used it to prevent government employee layoffs.
This current train wreck was caused by the engineer running the train at 108 while the speed limit was only 50. He has lawyered up and claims to not remember anything. The guy is also an activist with political connections – so you figure out where this is going.
Between spending and the wreck itself, truth will have nothing to do with what we will do about it.
This had nothing to do with any infrastructure issues. Human error, plain and simple. So what happened. Three trains in a 30 minute period including 188 were hit by projectiles thrown by the local thugs. Philly tv stations reported that the brick throwing had been going on for weeks. All three trains had smashed front windsheilds. The engineer of 188 was on the radio before the crash with the septa engineer whose southbound train had just been hit. A theory is that 188 intentionally sped up to avoid the brick throwing but the 188 engineer quickly realized the turn was coming, but too late, hit the brakes. That would explain the rapid acceleration before the brakes. Sorry folks, you can throw all the money you want, you can’t regulate stupid.
Agreed, on all points. This was operator error. Plain and simple.
Instead of blaming the operator why do you blame the people throwing the rocks? I am sure none of them are on public assistance.
I believe “truth” already covered your question. He intentionally broke safety guidelines regarding the train’s speed. Whether he was doing so to try and fly by rock throwers or did so because he fell asleep, it doesn’t matter. His intentional increase in the recommended speed for that area put the train at risk. His risk derailed the train, end of discussion…..
Please disregard “fell asleep” and insert “was not paying attention”.
@really—I don’t blame the rock throwers for wrecking a train because a “rock” or “brick” has never stopped a train. They should be charged with whatever charge is relevant depending on where the investigation goes.. The bottom line is that the engineer was travelling at a speed far exceeding what is mandated for that area. Whether he did it to avoid rocks, he fell asleep, was still on the radio with another train, it doesn’t matter. He didn’t follow the posted speed limit for that area and the train wrecked. Unless some bizarre mechanical issue pops up in the investigation that the train accelerated on its own, unfortunately, the accident is on him.
Having said all of that, if this brick throwing has been going on for weeks as reported, then the police need to do a sting and lock these thugs up. They are no different then the little thugs pointing laser pointers at pilots of commercial planes.
Thank you Keith (!) for weighing in. I was trying to convey the basic same message but failed to do so. Thanks again. To me, less government and let the “consumer’s” decide who succeeds and fails. And I also believe if the US government owns or subsidizes it, the intended purpose was doomed from the start. Once a hand out, always wanting/needing more.
Ah, how about you get your facts straight before your mouth off. What an idiot!
Dear Jerry. When the government has control over who succeeds and who fails, it’s called “socialism.”