Thousands of Flights in Danger of Cancellation as FAA Announces Major Cuts (theverge.com) 235
The government shutdown-spurred airport chaos is about to get a whole lot worse. From a report: The Federal Aviation Administration said Wednesday it will reduce flight volumes by 10 percent across 40 major airports in response, a move that could threaten 3,000 to 4,500 flights daily. The cuts will affect "high volume" markets, including in Atlanta, Dallas, New York City and Los Angeles, according to CBS. The FAA has not formally announced which airports will have their capacity cut.
"I'm not aware in my 35-year history in the aviation market where we've had a situation where we're taking these kinds of measures," FAA Administrator Bryan Bedford said at a news conference, according to the AP. The government shutdown, which is now the longest in US history, has already been causing thousands of delays each day, as well as long waits at airport security. Some major airports have even been forced to operate without air traffic control for hours at a time.
"I'm not aware in my 35-year history in the aviation market where we've had a situation where we're taking these kinds of measures," FAA Administrator Bryan Bedford said at a news conference, according to the AP. The government shutdown, which is now the longest in US history, has already been causing thousands of delays each day, as well as long waits at airport security. Some major airports have even been forced to operate without air traffic control for hours at a time.
are we winning yet? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:are we winning yet? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: are we winning yet? (Score:5, Insightful)
They also hate people who are them. The GOP is a cesspool of miserable whining children throwing tantrums all the time.
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Is this the American exceptionalism I keep hearing about, the world's finest patriots bragging about the infallible constitution that enables the largest economy on the planet to be held to ransom every couple of years by a group of bums?
Let's see the backlash in a couple of weeks when Thanksgiving is ruined for millions of families because their loved ones are stranded across the other side of the continent.
I saw a news item on a (suspended) federal employee who was surviving by running a hotdog stand. Yes
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Amtrak is hamstrung for one major reason. There is a law saying Amtrak gets priority over freight on rail lines. Now here comes the however. Most freight trains are longer than the outdated spur lines. Meaning they can't go anywhere but the destination which causes delays for Amtrak. I'm sure all the privately owned rail lines will make longer spur lines their top priority.
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Re: are we winning yet? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: are we winning yet? (Score:4, Insightful)
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Perhaps the inevitable conclusion of the FP? Not that I can disagree, but I sure wish I could see solutions to the kind of thinking that believes "Those people deserve to starve to death if they can't buy bread. Being so poor is a capital crime!" No excuses allowed.
And the "Pro-Life" people love this even when innocent children are being starved to death? Mostly Africa first, where the people don't even count as human beings, but now coming to America...
So here's my joke: A fake Tesla logo. But look close a
Re: are we winning yet? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: are we winning yet? (Score:5, Informative)
Except this is a lie.
Most abortions are medical abortions that are carried out less than 12 weeks into a pregnancy. A minority are surgical abortions carried out generally to protect the life of the mother when the fetus is unlikely to survive.
Even then, there's usually a legal limit of 18-22 weeks.
So why do you feel the necessity to lie?
Re: are we winning yet? (Score:5, Insightful)
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There is the chance that you are talking to an idiot.
Or an LLM.
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More to the point, red states get more transfers than blue states. It's literally republicans that are bearing the brunt of SNAP being stopped and other government services being shut down.
Re:are we winning yet? (Score:5, Informative)
GOP is doing this because they hate people who aren't them. Full stop.
It was about tax breaks for billionaires. They needed to offset those tax breaks to make them revenue neutral. The GOP could have offset tax breaks against military spending and probably gotten some bipartisan support, but they chose to offset them against medical insurance for the poor, disabled, children, and the elderly. Then the GOP/Trump expected at least 7 Democrats in the Senate to be corrupt enough to go along with this, so they could call spending reductions on the poor bipartisan. When that didn't work, they lied, falsely claiming the Democrats want "healthcare for illegals". That is untrue, as illegal immigrants are not eligible for healthcare subsidies under the ACA. The GOP created this mess, and they put the Democrats in a no-win hostage situation.
Re:are we winning yet? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:are we winning yet? (Score:4, Insightful)
It's not his fault. It's on congress to draft legislation. So far, nothing has reached Trumps desk, so how precisely is it HIS fault that Congress can't find compromise?
Without additional context, this is the correct interpretation.
The additional context necessary to understand why it's his fault: nobody in this Congress with an (R) next to their name takes a shit without prior permission request and authorization from Trump.
If they refuse to be an independent body of government as designed, then the person they swore fealty to is responsible. If they had any backbone whatsoever, Senate Republicans would be negotiating. But they aren't - because they're so afraid of a shitpost from the Cult Leader that would transform them from promising politicians destined for greatness into beshitted ex-politician talking heads on cable news.
The GOP has no leadership other than Trump - everyone else is an obsequious toadie who can't fall in line fast enough, and can't agree strongly enough.
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Obamacare is for the middle class (Score:5, Insightful)
There are almost certainly some people here who do contract gig work that depend on the Obamacare subsidies. Many of them voted for Trump and are very frightened and confused because they cannot comprehend why the great man that is Donald Trump would do this to them.
If you go to the Reddit forum leopards eating faces you will find reams and reams of Republican voters who are about to lose access to healthcare that they need to live doing social media posts directly to Trump expecting a direct response from Trump himself as if he's reading their social media posts.
It goes Way beyond parasocial into the realm of madness. It's not just that they think Trump thinks about them is a group they think Trump knows and cares about them personally and individually. And they are so confused and frightened right now because they are being betrayed by someone who loves them.
Re:Obamacare is for the middle class (Score:5, Insightful)
It goes Way beyond parasocial into the realm of madness.
GOP/"MAGA" is a cult. A white-supremacist, bigoted, horrific, dangerous cult.
They think that if they just idolize their "glorious leader" hard enough, somehow all their misogynistic, racist, bigoted wishes will come true. Remember what they were saying the last time Trump and his America-hating GOP flunkies shut the government down [vox.com]: "He's not hurting the people he's supposed to be hurting."
They literally voted for him in hopes of harming others. Every member of the dangerous MAGA cult is a malevolent sociopath.
Re:Obamacare is for the middle class (Score:4, Insightful)
If you have family I guess yeah chip away at it but you need to get them away from right wing media which is almost impossible because the billionaires have bought everything. Last year I watched dozens of journalists some of who had been in the industry for decades fired for daring the question Trump's competency and brilliance.
What bugs me isn't those twats since I'm fortunate not to have any in my family, what bothers me is the vast swath of independent voters who for some inexplicable reason believe the Republican party is better for the economy even though every time they get in charge they immediately crash it and the Democrats have to try to clean up the mess.
I would really like my party to point that out more but they have a rough time because again those voters for some inexplicable reason believe nonsensical things and in this case they think Democrats have to reach across the aisle but Republicans can stab everyone in the back and it's somehow okay. So Democrats that aren't viewed as being sufficiently bipartisan are relentlessly punished by those voters...
It's like the old joke, I don't belong to an organized political party I'm a Democrat.
The Republican party is basically made up of corporate fascists and Christian fascists.
The Democrat party is the big tent for literally everybody else so it's a huge mess.
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It's literally a life-or-death situation because people will die without the ACA subsidies. I don't know how the GOP expects to win against people who are motivated to save lives. They've cornered the tiger but now what?
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It was about tax breaks for billionaires. They needed to offset those tax breaks to make them revenue neutral.
*Revenue neutral means adding trillions to the debt anyway even after fucking over everyone else.
https://www.npr.org/2025/06/04... [npr.org]
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Clearly. This is deeply malicious and society-destroying.
Re: are we winning yet? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: are we winning yet? (Score:5, Insightful)
It needs just one. This is why Ku Klux Klan Member Mike Johnson is holding the House out of session and refusing to seat Adelita Grijalva (for over 40 days now!) despite her election being fully certified. She will be signature #218.
Keep in mind that when there were GOP members available (Jimmy Patronis and Randy Fine) after special elections he RUSHED to get them sworn in even before the full vote counting had finished.
Klan Member Mike Johnson needs to be removed from office and prosecuted for all of his corruption.
Re: are we winning yet? (Score:2)
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Don't forget the discharge petition. How many more signatures does it need again?
Just Adelita Grijalva's.
Re: are we winning yet? (Score:2)
Are we winning yet?
If you ask a Maga, they will probably tell you the democrats are holding them back. If course, it is all their fault. They can't think beyond black and white. Such a shame. So many pretty colors out there.
Re:are we winning yet? (Score:5, Insightful)
In addition, if Mike Johnson were to call the House back in session, they'd have to seat the new Representative from N. Mexico, and she's said she'll support the discharge petition to put a vote to the whole House on whether to compel the Justice Dept. to release the Epstein files. They only need one vote for the petition. la Presidenta does not want that. This has the effect of protecting the pedophiles reported in those documents, and his name appears in them.
I think by now the Justice Dept. has had enough time to think of a cover story for all the redactions they will have, and to get rid of whatever they can without anyone noticing.
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[...] the new Representative from N. Mexico[...]
Arizona
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[...] the new Representative from N. Mexico[...]
Arizona
Same thing. Like North and South Dakota. ::ducks::
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they'd have to seat the new Representative from N. Mexico
She's from Arizona.
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Dear Retarded MAGA Fuckwit and Likely Pedophile:
Why aren't the victims naming the people who victimized them? Because they are scared for their safety [bbc.com] since many of the offenders are in powerful positions, like Treasonous Pedophilic Sack of Criminal Shit Donald Judas Trump.
Oh, and BTW, was Epstein accused of pedophilia? The official charges were: sex trafficking of minors and conspiracy to commit sex trafficking of minors. Read that again and again until you understand it, you Dishonest Fucking Lying
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The goal of the Democrats should be to win as many seats as possible in the election in fall 2026. If they want to win, the people need to see and experience the true impact of the laws passed by the Republicans. Shutting down the government, in an effort to ease the pain that the Republicans caused by their policies...I'm not sure it gets the Democrats closer to their goal of winning in 2026, especially if the Democrats get the sub
Re:are we winning yet? (Score:5, Insightful)
If they want to win, the people need to see and experience the true impact of the laws passed by the Republicans.
That has been happening. More importantly, people need to see that Democrats are willing to stand up and fight rather than just rolling over for every nasty thing the Republicans are doing.
The Democrats are just terrible at strategy. Really, really bad.
In the sense that the elder Democratic Party leadership kept trying to play by the rules while the Republicans proved they are dishonest sociopathic fucks incapable of fair and honest behavior, you are correct. What we are seeing right now is that the younger Democratic leadership are taking charge and not playing along with Republican dishonesty any more. And again, part of the Democratic Party regaining support is proving by action that they are willing to fight.
Add to that, government shutdowns are just stupid, stupid, stupid, stupid. The laws have already been passed, and now we just have to write the check to pay for what was already done. And trying to use it as a tool to force Republicans - many of whom would be happy if the government were shutdown forever - to negotiate? Not going to work.
Democrats negotiated and the party consensus is that Schumer "caved" last March during the prior budget negotiations. And what happened right after March? Republicans promptly RENEGED ON THE AGREEMENTS anyways, first canceling many promised policy votes and then using "rescission" to remove approved funding from various programs. The Republicans proved that they cannot be trusted.
So now the Democrats are actually fighting. And they're making it clear that this time, they're not just going to cave. And the proof that it's actually working? Look at Tuesday's election results.
EVERY open governor's race went Democrat, and not only that, all three beat the polling predictions by a pretty big margin.
California voted to redistrict and say "Fuck Texas" by an almost 2/3 majority.
Pennsylvania retained all 3 Democratic supreme court members by double-digit margins.
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people need to see that Democrats are willing to stand up and fight
WTF have the Democrats been for the last 7 months? But all of a sudden, now, in October, when the next Congressional election is still a year away, they decide to not pay our governments' bills, all while enabling the Republicans to yank SNAP benefits (which many conservatives don't want to pay anyway), layoff additional federal workers (especially at the IRS), and disrupt key federal responsibilities (such as reporting the likely horrible job numbers and tanking economy)? "willing to fight..." BS...if that
Re: are we winning yet? (Score:3)
The other option is to allow the GOP to wait until after the insurance subsidies end, explain that itâ(TM)s Obamaâ(TM)s fault, and try to use that damage against them in the midterms.
You know he doesnâ(TM)t have a plan to either fix or replace ACA. They broke two major portions that would keep prices low, and now are happy to cash in.
Re: are we winning yet? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: are we winning yet? (Score:5, Insightful)
Republicans end individual mandate.
Republicans let the subsidies expire.
"Why would the Democrats do this to the American people??"
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Re: are we winning yet? (Score:4, Funny)
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Don't like the current plan, come up with a better one. You may not like the ACA, I don't either, but it was a step in the right direction. What's the next step? GOP has had, what, 15+ years to figure out an answer. They have capital-N-NOTHING to offer on the subject.
Re:are we winning yet? (Score:5, Informative)
Schumer can end his shutdown anytime he wants, but he won't.
So can the party currently holding a majority in 3/3 branches of the government. Mike Johnson sent everyone home early so they couldn't vote on the Epstein files.
Re: are we winning yet? (Score:2)
Re: are we winning yet? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: are we winning yet? (Score:4, Informative)
No but the Senate makes its own rules, and one of those rules is a tradition of unlimited debate. Until there are no objectors or a super majority agree the discussion should be terminated, legislation cannot be voted on.
For decades now minority parities have leveraged this to block the bodies business when it is doing something they don't like.
It is possible for the majority to simple 'change the rules' but nobody really wants to do that because they know the shoe will be on the other foot in another election cycle or two and don't want be railroaded when its there turn.
So the 60 vote majority requirement persists, as removing it is basically a mutually assured destruction situation, that will hold until one party feels they are certain to have a sustained comfortable majority going forward - I expect. The moment that happens and if said party has anything hovering right around that 60 mark which could become 59 or whatever the rule will be eliminated so fast your head will spin - I also expect.
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Re:are we winning yet? (Score:4, Insightful)
Schumer can end his shutdown anytime he wants
So can Johnson.
dismiss both chambers until the minority party decides they want to be serious.
Fuck that noise. If the Rs had ANY recent history of compromise, and any semblance of an inkling of an idea of a concept for a plan to fix the ACA, I'd agree with you. But they will not compromise, and they have no plan. So here we are.
Re:are we winning yet? (Score:5, Insightful)
Funny you should bring up DOGE. Musk, love him or hate him, you have to admit is effective. Moves fast and breaks things. Gets. Stuff. Done. Turned loose with a chainsaw (literally) to find and root out government fraud, waste, and abuse. With a team of unpaid (??) minions and unfettered access to quite literally everything, he spent weeks on end tearing everything apart to find inefficiencies.
And published his results. Many of which are debatable, a few maybe outright fabrication, some legit. BUT - giving him the benefit of the doubt - taking EVERY SINGLE PENNY of savings he claimed as true. In full. All of it. Given all that, it amounts to less than 1% of the government expenditures.
He singlehandedly proved, beyond the shadow of a doubt, that the US government is AT LEAST 99% free of Fraud. 99%+ free of Waste. 99%+ free of abuse.
All I can say to that is... Thank you sir!
Re:are we winning yet? (Score:4, Insightful)
you have to admit is effective.
Define "effective". Musk is great at self promotion but if you looked at the details, he just made everything worse.
With a team of unpaid (??) minions and unfettered access to quite literally everything, he spent weeks on end tearing everything apart to find inefficiencies.
No he did not. What he exposed is that he does not understand basics of things. For example, Musk claimed there were fraud [x.com] in the Social Security Administration because he found "duplicate SSNs". What he exposed out is he does not understand basics of data and a fact table can have duplicate foreign keys . . . because it is a fact table. It would be like me claiming there is "MASSIVE FRAUD" in my companies sales data because there are duplicate Customer IDs.
He singlehandedly proved, beyond the shadow of a doubt, that the US government is AT LEAST 99% free of Fraud. 99%+ free of Waste. 99%+ free of abuse.
What he proved is he is an idiot. What you proved is you believed him without looking at details.
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It wasn't that subtle or oblique, tbh.
How many sock puppets did you need (Score:4, Insightful)
Think critically Google competently.
Those of us who know how to use Google we know that Trump added trillions to the national debt already. Elon Musk is personally responsible for hundreds of billions of dollars of that debt increase. Because when you cut things that people need and that the country needs it ends up costing money instead of saving it.
I want to say it's like skipping your oil change to save money and then wondering why your engine blew up but it's even more short-sighted and stupid than that. It's like refusing to put gas in your car and then you can't get to work to earn money. That is how incompetent muskrat is.
Government is incredibly efficient. Medicare costs of fraction of private insurance for vastly better benefits.
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Obama was sworn in January 2009. The financial bullshit started in 2008. Let that sink in.
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Barry's magic Time machine strikes again (Score:2)
I mean have we ever asked where was President Obama on 9/11? Inquiring minds want to know!
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I am glad (Score:3)
I am glad I'm not flying any time soon. Getting your flight canceled just sucks. Even just worrying about getting cancelled sucks, especially if you have a lot of money invested on a trip.
I wonder if travel insurance would pay off on something like this.
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Re: I am glad (Score:2)
They say anyone can get a refund from them -- even people with bottom of the line economy tickets.
They're refunding tickets for cancelled flights? Do they want a bloody medal?!
Re: I am glad (Score:2)
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Well, that's good.
For the travel insurance, I was thinking more about lost hotels and such.
My most recent trip was to Ireland to see a football game. Had my flights been cancelled, I would have lost thousands for game tickets and hotels, were it not for Travel insurance.
I have never had to use travel insurance, but I bet it is a pain in the ass get refunded for stuff.
Like Trump said (Score:5, Insightful)
This is about stopping the Democrats from getting a win right before the midterm elections. It's the Republican party making your life worse so that you will blame the Democrats because they think you're stupid.
Well? Are you?
About so many things (Score:5, Interesting)
It is also about the overall fascist project - they have sold themselves on the need to dominate and crush. Being forced to negotiate is a big power-balance setback for them.
And it is also about Trump's BFF. Right now Holy Mike is refusing to swear in a new (D) representative. That rep just happens to be the deciding vote on releasing lots of juicy Epstein documents. Documents that have already been confirms by members of this admin to mention Trump.
Just remember the phrase, "Everything Trump touches dies." It hasn't been wrong yet.
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If Johnson can hold the Democrats off until then and if the cheating works then they win. The Epstein files never get released and Trump and all the Republicans in there are safe.
Nobody's going to care about any of the Democrat names in the Epstein files because those people have won since ret
Re:About so many things (Score:4, Insightful)
Priorities (Score:4, Interesting)
I don't share some of your concerns, but that's fine; I expect you don't share some of mine. But it does sound to me like you're much more familiar with Republican critiques of Democratic policy than actual Democratic policy. One such thing is you putting the words of activists into pols' mouths and pretending that's the official capital-D Democratic line. It isn't - activists are activists precisely because they want to change the current party line. This is literally
. None of which is to say I'm a rah-rah fan; only a few of them actually come anywhere near reflecting my policy preferences. But given a choice between a getting a cold and getting measles, I'll take the cold.
We are DETERMINED! (Score:4, Insightful)
"We are so DETERMINED to hurt people by denying them affordable healthcare that we're also determined to hurt them by causing travel chaos!!!" -- The GOP.
Are we getting tired or winning yet? (Score:2)
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I mean they give him participation trophies because he owns the course. He really thinks its because he's good at golf.
Re: Are we getting tired or winning yet? (Score:2)
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Why does THE STATE have to pay for all this? (Score:3, Interesting)
I understand this is a partisan fight issue, our policy of most rationality vs. their utter barbarism type of discussion. But please:
Air traffic safety is an important service. Why would that need funding from the government, if so many customers need and purchase that service?
Every flight passenger is using this service to get from A to B safely. Every flight passenger is buying a ticket that includes all sorts of fees and taxes, including airport security. (we disregard a debate about the TSA for now).
Why don't all airlines PAY for the FAA service proportional to the number of flights they perform? Why would "the taxpayer" have to fund and subsidize "the airline passenger"? Why would the state go into more debt to pay for something that is a commercial service to a select few people, many of which are tourists or foreigners who don't even pay US taxes in any substantial amount.
Use a service -> pay for that service.
If John is purchasing a flight ticket and boards an airplane, his ticket must include all the costs required to do that safely. John cannot expect some random Steven and Michael to pay for that with their taxes. It's John's flight. John pays for John's safety. Steven and Michael aren't traveling right now and so they don't pay anything. If they were to travel later, they, too, will pay for safety of THEIR flights, respectively.
Everything else is immoral. I don't understand why this is an issue at all.
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This. Money is fungible, whatever these seemingly specifically allocated taxes go towards it first goes into a big pot, then is doled out. In the current admin they have decided to use the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) to direct/redirect funding to their political aims despite the original intent, or even the law(s) passed by the congress.
Also what the previous poster mentioned. A person may think they will never fly anywhere (sad) , just as I think I will never drive to Fort Wayne, Indiana.
Go on, follow The Dumb a bit longer (Score:4, Funny)
If you make a really determined effort, you may even get rid of your air travel system completely!
Re:Go on, follow The Dumb a bit longer (Score:4, Insightful)
maybe I don't have to hear planes going overhead every minute - and no I am not near a major airport but somehow over the decades this became a major route; often one plane is only a mile after another on the same path.
-yes I yell at clouds, because there are planes in them.
Pay for politicians (Score:2)
Regardless of who's to blame for this instance of taking ourselves hostage, a fundamental problem is that the president and congresspeople and staffers all continue to get paid during a shutdown, even if everyone else does not. Fix that exemption, and they'd have a strong personal incentive to do their job and make government work.
except for the independantly wealthy among them.
wait, nevermind, doesn't actually matter after all...
Trains? (Score:2)
If Amtrak doesn't start looking into grabbing a bigger share of the transportation market, they are idiots.
Trains work.
Re: Trains? (Score:2)
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Trains won't replace planes for 1000 mile trips but they will for 500 mile trips! [transportgeography.org]
Will they pay you back? (Score:2)
If your ticket is cancelled because of the government, will the airlines pay you back - or will they tell you to sue the government?
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And in actual reality, the Republicans have all the power except for this tiny bit and it is really ALL their fault. If you have no ability to compromise, you have no business leading anything.
Also a nice occasion to identify zero-insight fuckups. Hint: You are one.
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The only thing Republicans care about is reopening the government and resuming services for the American people. Republicans are the only adults in the room.
Found the maga cultist!
Re: Idiots of Slashdot (Score:4, Insightful)
Are these the same "adults" posting AI videos of Trump dropping poop on his enemies?
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That would be expensive.
Any buyer with any brains would demand a huge cash up front payment to take it on, because its systems are so antiquated. It will cost many billions and billions of dollars to modernize it.
A sensible buyer would require all that work to be done FIRST, before taking any responsibility for running it.
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