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Brown Asks California to Cheer Rail Project


January 18, 2012

By ADAM NAGOURNEY

Read More: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/19/us...imes&seid=auto

Gov. Jerry Brown on Wednesday threw his unequivocal support behind a $100 billion high-speed rail line that has come under fire here in California and across the country, embracing it in a strikingly optimistic State of the State speech in which he asserted that government should pursue ambitious ventures even during times of economic strife. With his speech, Mr. Brown firmly linked his political fortunes to the proposed 520-mile bullet train connecting San Francisco and Los Angeles as he urged lawmakers to release the $9 billion in state bonds needed to begin the project this year.

- “Critics of the high-speed rail project abound, as they often do when something of this magnitude is proposed,” he said in his speech, adding: “The Panama Canal was for years thought to be impractical, and Benjamin Disraeli himself said of the Suez Canal, ‘Totally impossible to be carried out.’ The critics were wrong then, and they’re wrong now.” State Senator Ted W. Lieu, a Democrat, called the train “a symbol of what California can do,” but suggested that the project was as much about Mr. Brown as anything else. “He is a much more practical governor now than maybe 30 years ago,” Mr. Lieu said. “But he is still a dreamer. High-speed rail is very evocative and is one of those things that I think he would like to be part of his legacy.”

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