Talgo, one the world's biggest producers of passenger trains, is pulling out of Wisconsin

[Katashi_itto]

shutting down its Milwaukee factory. Guess whose fault it is?

Sad news out of Milwaukee. Spanish train-maker Talgo is vacating its factory in the city, four years after Gov. Scott Walker rejected millions in federal stimulus money to create a Milwaukee-to-Madison commuter line.


The funding, part of the 2009 American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, was meant to create high-speed rail links across the country, which would have modernized America’s industrial infrastructure, creating good jobs in the process.

Soon after taking office in 2010, Walker turned down the $810 million in federal rail funds. The monies, already budgeted for the state, went to Illinois instead.

Talgo set up its North American headquarters in Milwaukee shortly before Walker’s election, with plans to make the city a hub for rail manufacturing in the Midwest.
http://www.ibew.org/articles/14daily/1405/140505_spanish.htm

[postulater]

1. Back to the Triassic for Wisconsin.

[hatrack]

13. Devonian, in Walker's case

Though I may be giving him too much evolutionary credit . . .

[postulater]

22. Yeah, get my assics all messed up.

Maybe even pre-Devonian.

http://www4.uwsp.edu/geo/faculty/hefferan/MosineeFossils.html

They'll find him here in 500 million years.

[hatrack]

24. Ever have a geology professor say that you don't know your assics from a hole in the ground?

Now that's humbling!

[postulater]

25. I didn't think I could be the first to crack that joke.

[Cha]

2. That is bad news for those whose jobs will be gone. Wonder why Talgo is leaving? And,

how the hell would Walker win another term when all he does is depress the economy?

[TBF]

10. Walker is a "family man" -

this is what I am told by family/friends in Wisconsin. They have lost their family farms and factories - and are making do with service jobs. They are heavily invested in their churches and that is how he finagled their support - by appealing to their religion and quite honestly their bigotry in many cases.

It is not the same state it was in the 60s/70s when I was growing up. The unions from Chicago were still strong in the all the rural areas of Wisconsin (lots of manufacturing - from steel mills to knitting factories - all our dads and some of our moms belonged to unions and/or quality circles which negotiated between workers/owners). The owners of the factories lived in the small towns with their workers and obviously had more money but it was not like today with multi-nationals owning everything & businesses closed down overnight when they don't hit the right profit margins. It used to be a more progressive place with all of that union activity.

[pampango]

3. Editorial in Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Talgo, a missed opportunity

The end of Talgo in Milwaukee is a missed opportunity to both provide better service on a highly traveled train line and to provide much-needed jobs in Milwaukee's central city.

Talgo got caught in a political vise when Gov. Scott Walker made stopping a high-speed rail line between Milwaukee and Madison a central pledge of his 2010 gubernatorial campaign. The year before, the company reached a deal with then-Gov. Jim Doyle to build two train sets for the Amtrak line to Chicago. At the same time, Doyle also landed $810 million in federal stimulus dollars for the new Milwaukee-to-Madison line. Talgo hoped to supply trains for that line as well.

The state spent $52 million on the two train sets before Walker canceled a maintenance contract and halted payments. Talgo terminated its contract and kept the trains. The train maker now is suing the state for clear title to the trains and the money it already has received. It also has a $65.9 million claim against the state.

It's a missed opportunity because of the illogical, ideologically anti-rail position taken by Walker and Republicans in the state Legislature.

http://www.jsonline.com/news/opinion/talgo-a-missed-opportunity-b99260367z1-257581291.html

[TxVietVet]

15. The conservanazis hated the high speed rail because it benefited working people.

Not the rich. They hate any municipal transit because they see it as a "entitlement" to move the poor and minorities around on a subsidized service. I moved to Milwaukee in 1990. It was still a pretty good union town at the time. In the last couple of years I was there. many factories closed and then Wanker was elected. His goal is the White House. He has no intention of helping the people of Wisconsin unless they have their own conservanazi hate radio station.
I know lots of UNION folks voted for that prick. Their greed and prejudices were spurred on with assholes like Charles Sikes and butthead belling. Conservanazi propaganda spews it's hatred 24/7 in Milwaukee.

[okaawhatever]

26. They don't want the trains because it means people won't burn gasoline. The Koch brothers (Wakers

primary backers) are all about the oil business.

[riqster]

29. In Ohio, it's also because of the highway construction business lobby.

[Enthusiast]

4. Way to go, Walker! You asshole!

When will the people of Wisconsin wake up and throw this guy out?

[newfie11]

5. That's been my question

How does he keep getting elected?

[theHandpuppet]

6. I can't figure out how he got elected in the first place

I always thought Wisconsin folks had way more common sense than that.

[Enthusiast]

7. I think something bad is going on. Election fraud.

Last edited Wed May 7, 2014, 08:05 AM - Edit history (1)

Republicans have been known to engage in this stuff before and during the recall there were some questionable goings on.

[WinkyDink]

9. Privatized voting machines and vote-counting.

[TBF]

11. That and see my post above -

my family (old union members) report that he appealed to their religion/bigotry. Plays the "family man" and goes around behind their backs looking for opportunities for himself. He has been an absolute nightmare for that state.

[TxVietVet]

16. "Guns, God and Gays"

The pulpit pimps spread the propaganda. Many of the blue collar workers love that conservanazi propaganda, like Sikes and Belling.

[TBF]

17. Unfortunately they really have

been brainwashed by shows like FAUX news.

My dad is a Vietnam Vet - he was in early (early-mid 60s). He did 4 years and then returned to his small town and worked until his military injuries were too much & he retired. During his factory time he belonged to a union. When I initially asked him about the new governor a few years ago he immediately said "oh - that guy - he just wants to break the unions". He may be unsophisticated but he's not dumb. But he's almost 70 now and sadly those generations that made the unions so strong are dying off.

[Katashi_itto]

20. Exactly, the blue collars decided they liked his message and they continue to like his message

it all will simply continue. All across the country. The country in general is fucked.

[WinkyDink]

8. Does he know Chris Christie?

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/04/13/opinion/gov-chris-christie-and-the-tunnel-project.html?_r=0

In his drive to become the darling of the cut-costs-at-all-costs Republican crowd, Gov. Chris Christie of New Jersey ignored real economic analysis and relied on exaggerated worst-case scenarios to kill the largest public transit project in the nation in 2010.

The project, two new rail passages under the Hudson River, would have vastly improved the region’s economy, the environment and the lives of millions of commuters. The federal government and the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey were providing most of the $10 billion needed to build the tunnels. But Mr. Christie said they were going to cost a lot more than that and that New Jersey would be on “a never-ending hook.”

Now, a report from the Government Accountability Office makes it clear that the cost-cutting talk was political bluster.

[JHB]

12. Probably, but the main thing is they cater to the same crowd...

...the nuts who think trains are "socialist."

Consider conservative pundit George Will on the subject (Newsweek, 2/27/11):

So why is America’s “win the future” administration so fixated on railroads, a technology that was the future two centuries ago? Because progressivism’s aim is the modification of (other people’s) behavior.

Forever seeking Archimedean levers for prying the world in directions they prefer, progressives say they embrace high-speed rail for many reasons—to improve the climate, increase competitiveness, enhance national security, reduce congestion, and rationalize land use. The length of the list of reasons, and the flimsiness of each, points to this conclusion: the real reason for progressives’ passion for trains is their goal of diminishing Americans’ individualism in order to make them more amenable to collectivism.

To progressives, the best thing about railroads is that people riding them are not in automobiles, which are subversive of the deference on which progressivism depends. Automobiles go hither and yon, wherever and whenever the driver desires, without timetables. Automobiles encourage people to think they—unsupervised, untutored, and unscripted—are masters of their fates. The automobile encourages people in delusions of adequacy, which make them resistant to government by experts who know what choices people should make.

Time was, the progressive cry was “Workers of the world unite!” or “Power to the people!” Now it is less resonant: “All aboard!”

http://www.newsweek.com/will-why-liberals-love-trains-68597

[WinkyDink]

14. That is a truly insane essay. I guess to Right-Wingers, Democrats are both Socialists AND Nazis.

[JHB]

18. It's also hypoctical, but that's par for the course

Forever seeking Archimedean levers for prying the world in directions they prefer, progressives say they embrace high-speed rail for many reasons—to improve the climate, increase competitiveness, enhance national security, reduce congestion, and rationalize land use.

As if conservatives seek levers to pry the world in directions they prefer... and also saw down or snap off levers that oppose them.

The fact that they regard trains as one of those levers is ridiculous, but they're so far gone they don't think it's much of a jump.

[okaawhatever]

27. The people who own Newsweek now are highly suspect. They are tied to a right wing cult from

Korea. Real creepy stuff.

[blackspade]

19. Will is an idiot.

[Katashi_itto]

21. No, the majority that keeps him in is.

[Katashi_itto]

28. Frankly I see WI as a template for the rest of the country. RWers have to much money backing them

combined with low information/cretins that want to believe Fox news or Alex Jones. The country will continue to vote these scumbags in, even as the country goes right off the cliff.

[Hulk]

30. This scuz-ball needs to be thoroughly exposed.

I watched his "state of the state address" sometime back, and he needs to be exposed for the slick, used car salesman that he is; because if you would have listened to him address his legislative body, you would think he was the second coming of Jesus Christ.

Not a hint at what he has done to the public employees, nor the unions in general; nor the middle class and programs to the low income families that are struggling to survive.

This pig is pretending to be a miracle worker, and it's never too early to expose theses austerity slime balls for what they are, and what they've done to their citizens.

[LeftinOH]

31. So, where is Talgo going? Are they going to move their

US headquarters somewhere else? ...or just leave the country altogether?

[Blue Owl]

32. Fucking asswipe

Rot in hell, Focker.

[marmar]

33. The High Price of Being an Asshole.