A couple weeks ago, Republican congressmen John Mica and Bill Shuster introduced a bill that would effectively privatize Amtrak’s northeast corridor, a move that would strip the passenger service of it’s most important line and result in the probable breakup of the national rail carrier. In a caustic and, at times, sarcastic column at Railway Age, William C. Vantuono dismisses the Mica/Shuster plan wholesale. Republicans try to break up Amtrak once a decade without really pushing the issue that hard, he says. Threatening to break up Amtrak is (probably-harmless) partisan window-dressing, and after all, lawmakers aren’t railroad people and therefore have close to no idea what they’re talking about.

Read more on AltTransport.