It's heartbreaking for a railroad fan like me to see the state our once-dazzling web of transcontinental rail is in. And with the death of rail came the death of our steel industry too. And with steel's death was hastened the death of our labor unions. And with the unions' death came the rise of offshoring, and the continued death of our manufacturing base. And the death of our manufacturing base leaves us unable to take advantage of a weak dollar, and ultimately vulnerable to a whopper of a Depression. Of course, there are a jillion other factors, but I think one could make a strong argument that the murder of transcontinental rail and the subsequent reliance on an unsustainable petroleum-intensive highway-based transportation system was a fulcrum point in the transformation of the US from the thriving, middle-class-friendly economy of the post-war period into the corporate oligarch/feudal economy that it has become. Of course, what the hell do I know?