In a new editorial, The Daily Inter Lake in Kalispell says rail safety is now the burning issue following a couple high profile Bakken oil train accidents. Instead of protesting coal trains, the Inter Lake says environmentalists may have gained more traction if they focused on oil trains, adding:
The rail industry has called for older, less reliable tank cars to be phased out and wants regulators to require tougher new tank-car standards. Those are both needed improvements.
A former North Dakota governor last week called for lower speed limits for oil trains.
At some point we might need to consider an option that is anathema to some — more pipelines. The much-debated Keystone XL pipeline isn’t going to ease the Bakken oil-transport dilemma but pipelines tend to have fewer catastrophic accidents than trains, so more pipes might be in our future if we want to continue to capitalize on the oil boom.
Plus, thou shalt not covet? State Rep. Keith Regier (R-Kalispell) responds to a letter to the editor in the same paper which argued that expanding Medicaid was somehow a Biblical requirement:
It (the Dec. 17th LTE) started by quoting the gospel of Matthew that says, “For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, I was sick and you visited me, I was in prison and you came to me.” This passage was used to justify Medicaid expansion in Montana.
What the writer fails to realize is that this passage is given to individuals, and is not a mandate to expand government. We need to evaluate what we can do for others, instead of what we think government should do for others. Arthur C. Brook, professor at Syracuse University, published a report titled, “Who Really Cares: The Surprising Truth about Compassionate Conservatism.” He found that conservatives donate more of their time and money to help others than their liberal counterparts.
Instead of misrepresenting the Bible to promote one’s extremist ideology, we need to consider the context of each passage; especially the Ten Commandments where the 10th Commandment is not to covet. That would change the “spread the wealth” philosophy promoted by the Democrat Party.