Tag Archives: amtrak
Ben Carson Burned a Ton of Cash on Live Music and Private Jets
Mother Jones
Republican presidential candidate Ben Carson’s latest fundraising report with the Federal Election Commission shows that his campaign brought in an impressive $8.5 million over the last three months—four times as much as Mike Huckabee, a politician with comparable appeal among Sean Hannity-watching conservative activists. Yet during that same period—a time in which Carson was sporadically campaigning while giving paid speeches, struggling to retain staff, and not running any television ads—Carson managed to spend a whopping $5.4 million. Much of that money went toward more fundraising, because his campaign depends heavily on third-party direct-mail firms. But, in stark contrast to Carson’s fiscal conservative message, his campaign spent big money on private jets, luxury hotels, and slickly produced events.
Carson’s campaign kickoff, for instance, came with a hefty price tag. While other candidates, such as Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, have taken advantage of cheap outdoor public spaces and free media, Carson dropped $25,448 to rent the Detroit Music Hall. The campaign also spent $64,521 on “musical entertainment” over the last quarter, much of it on the kickoff event. That included $20,000 paid to Alexi von Guggenberg, the producer of the song that plays in the background of this Carson campaign video, which has less than 30,000 views on YouTube; $15,500 to the Selected of God choir, which performed at his Detroit event; $10,271 to the contemporary classical vocal group Veritas, which also performed a few songs at his kickoff; and $18,750 to producer Kevin Cates.
Originally posted here –
Ben Carson Burned a Ton of Cash on Live Music and Private Jets
Grainspotting: Farmers get desperate as coal and oil take over the rails
Grainspotting: Farmers get desperate as coal and oil take over the rails
Shutterstock
The U.S. agriculture and energy sectors might be facing a Jets and Sharks situation: Our railroad system just ain’t big enough for the two of them! Unfortunately, this scenario is unlikely to involve a highly choreographed mambo dance-off, not that we wouldn’t love to see Rex Tillerson’s moves. He’d make a great Bernardo.
American farmers are becoming concerned that coal and oil companies’ increased use of railroad shipping will crowd out grain trains. The Western Organization of Resource Councils warns in a recent report that railway congestion will only increase in coming years, especially as coal export facilities are built up in the Pacific Northwest. The report largely focuses on traffic between the coal-rich Powder River Basin region of southeastern Montana and northeastern Wyoming, and port cities such as Seattle, Portland, and Vancouver, Wash.
Compounding the coal issue, oil transport by train has exponentially increased in recent years. There were more than 40 times as many oil shipments by rail last year as there were just five years prior.
From the WORC report:
The voluminous and very profitable [Powder River Basin] to PNW [Pacific Northwest] export coal traffic and profitable Bakken oil traffic to the PNW would consume most of the existing rail capacity, which would displace traffic and result in higher freight rates for other rail shippers.
Grain farmers in Montana, who largely grow for export, are starting to get worried. The Daily Climate reports:
Kremlin, Mont. wheat farmer Ryan McCormick says he hasn’t yet had any problems moving his crop from the state’s remote northern border. But he senses trouble on the horizon. BNSF, he said, “has been well in front of telling us there are going to be some issues in the next couple years.”
Farmers like McCormick don’t have other options for moving large quantities of grain for export. It would take about 400 truckloads to move the same amount of grain carried by the typical 110-car train.
Railroad traffic jams won’t just affect industrial shippers, either. According to the WORC report, Amtrak romantics can expect significant congestion on the Empire Builder line, which runs between Chicago and Seattle.
What could be more American than a gang rivalry between nonrenewable energy and wheat, our nation’s two great loves? Time to pick sides!
Source
Energy industry to hog the rails, shutting out farmers, The Daily Climate
Eve Andrews is a Grist fellow and new Seattle transplant via the mean streets of Chicago, Poughkeepsie, and Pittsburgh, respectively and in order of meanness. Follow her on Twitter.
Find this article interesting? Donate now to support our work.Read more: Business & Technology
,
,
Source:
Grainspotting: Farmers get desperate as coal and oil take over the rails
Posted in Anchor, FF, G & F, GE, LG, Northeastern, ONA, Uncategorized
Tagged american, amtrak, climate & energy, daily, montana, organization, railroad, vancouver, western
Comments Off on Grainspotting: Farmers get desperate as coal and oil take over the rails
Caught on video: Mudslide from rain-soaked hill derails freight train
Caught on video: Mudslide from rain-soaked hill derails freight train
It’s a normal, unremarkable scene: A freight train runs along the edge of a parking lot next to a hillside. The sort of thing you see all the time.
Until the hillside gives way.
This happened yesterday in Everett, Wash., just north of Seattle. The Seattle Times describes how it happened:
The surface slide came off an oversaturated 100-foot cliff that geotechnical engineers had been scheduled to check right after the 66-car train passed, according to [Burlington Northern Santa Fe] spokesman Gus Melonas.
A BNSF-led crew of at least 50 people are cleaning up some of the general grocery store merchandise that spilled — products including soap, lemon juice, solvents and disinfectants. The Seattle-bound train came from Chicago carrying a wide variety of general merchandise including meat, ovens and other things.
Here’s what the rainfall totals in Everett have looked like over the past 10 days, in inches per hour. Sunday and Monday were deluged. And Tuesday, the hillside slipped.
It wasn’t the only mudslide in the area. In addition to providing bus service around this slide, Amtrak is re-routing passengers around another stretch of track between Olympia and Tacoma.
Luckily, the contents of the train were fairly inert; initial reports that it was a chemical train seem a bit overblown. But it’s nonetheless disconcerting, as more and more oil and other toxics are shipped by train and as we learn that one of the ways in which the climate has been destabilized by warming is a huge increase in storm size and precipitation.
Could have been much worse, like a tar-sands-oil train knocked off the rails by a climate superstorm. It wasn’t that. Yet.
Philip Bump writes about the news for Gristmill. He also uses Twitter a whole lot.
Read more:
,
,
Also in Grist
Please enable JavaScript to see recommended stories
Source:
Caught on video: Mudslide from rain-soaked hill derails freight train
Posted in GE, oven, Uncategorized
Tagged also-in-grist, amtrak, area, climate, news, northern, philip-bump, seattle
Comments Off on Caught on video: Mudslide from rain-soaked hill derails freight train
