Free Republic

California’s high speed rail project is facing a financial reckoning after the Federal Railroad Administration declared it in default on $4 billion in federal grants. The latest report from the Department of Transportation exposes years of mismanagement, missed deadlines, and unrealistic ridership projections, raising serious doubts about whether the project will ever be completed. The numbers tell the story. The rail system was originally planned as an 800-mile network, connecting San Francisco to San Diego. Over time, the scope shrunk to 500 miles, then 171 miles, and now just 119 miles. The federal review describes the project as a Sisyphean...

U.S. President George W. Bush's twilight effort to make peace between Israel and the Palestinians faces far more challenges than his predecessor Bill Clinton's failed attempt in 2000. In his waning months in office, Bush is trying to resolve the intractable conflict when the Palestinians are divided, Israel's prime minister is unpopular and the U.S. president's own credibility has been eroded by the Iraq war. Diplomats, former negotiators and regional analysts said they welcomed Bush's decision to host a conference on Tuesday in Annapolis, Maryland, that he hopes will trigger formal negotiations on creating a Palestinian state. But given the...

For those of us in the information business, this is truly an earth-shaking time. Who would have imagined that the downfall of one of the world's most powerful news executives would be precipitated by an ordinary citizen blogging his eyewitness report at Davos in the wee hours of the morning on Jan. 27? It's simply stunning. The courage of Rony Abovitz cannot be overstated. This ordinary American citizen raised his voice at an international forum of media and political heavyweights--also attended by Europe's most influential America-haters--and demanded that Eason Jordan back up his poisonous assertion about the American military targeting...