[Alberta's Child]

The problem with your argument is that you bring up too many examples that don't make your case very well at all. The U.S. railroad industry is a good example of this. It only exists today as a "private" industry because it happens to be one of the most heavily regulated of any industry at the Federal level. The Federal government, for example, has the authority to shut down a strike by railroad workers. That's an astonishing power for a government to have in a "private" industry -- and the fact that this power over labor unions has been maintained even as the nation has accepted outright Marxism in many other industries over the last few decades speaks volumes of just how much the idea of "public interest" can blur the lines between a government and a private company.

Of course the foreign owners of these toll roads are subject to civil lawsuits. My point was that because those countries are used to doing business in places where they're not subject to those kinds of risks, they didn't look at these risks with the same level of heightened scrutiny that U.S. investors did.

[Olog-hai]

So you’re saying that US railroads have to be owned by the federal government to be deregulated? That is absurd. The example of Conrail (the other federal railroad) speaks to the very opposite. Same goes for the USRA, the federal takeover of all railroads that was a disaster until they were put back in private hands.

[Olog-hai]

In addition, the regulations only existed to destroy the railroads ultimately, which was coupled with the federal government “competing” against them with the road mode. There is no benefit to any government involvement whatsoever.