Hypocrisy anyone?

LEIGH POMEROY

The DeLay-Abramoff-Cunningham-Who's Next? scandals highlight how Washington works when one party attains too much power. These scandals are egregious and reflect the illegal aspects of political hegemony. But there are legal, though questionable and certainly hypocritical, ways power is more often brokered in Washington.

A small, Midwestern railroad, the DM&E, wants to ship coal from Wyoming to the Mississippi River at Winona, Minnesota. However, to do so they must increase and upgrade trackage. Proponents claim this will bring clean coal to power plants in the Midwest east of the Mississippi plus improve farm-to-market access. Opponents claim that coal is still a dirty technology, that the project is economically unfeasible, and that the proposed railroad expansion will intrude on Native American lands, destroy environmentally delicate areas, and disrupt cities along the way.

The DM&E has jumped through many hurdles to try to push the project forward, but ultimately it has come down to funding and congressional influence. A recent article in the St. Paul Pioneer Press points out the dilemma that the Republican Congress and White House face: Do they remain true to their ideals that the free market economy should determine policy? Or well maybe, in some cases, the federal government should step in to help those who are friends of powerbrokers in Washington?

See:
Railroad loan challenges Republican identity

Also see:
Number-crunching and — maybe — political influence
In the dark
Fresh financing