On the US front line
I’m in Springfield, Illinois, which if you’ve heard of it at all, you may know of as the place where Abraham Lincoln lived before he became President. It’s also where Barack Obama declared his candidacy for the Democratic Party’s Presidential nomination, which is one of the reasons I’m here.
Just hours before I got here, about a foot of snow got dumped on Springfield, which meant that the train south from Chicago was both very late and very slow. But it did make it eventually, which is rather more than I suspect a British train would have done, so thank you, Amtrak.
I spent the morning at the Lincoln Museum, where among other things I tried without success to find out which way Mr Lincoln will be voting on Tuesday. (Apparently, I was trying to interview a waxwork dummy, but he was so much taller than I am, how was I meant to tell?)
Downtown Springfield on a snowy Saturday in February is not exactly throbbing with activity … just about the only things I’ve seen moving so far are the snow ploughs. But I am not daunted, and will be talking to various local movers and shakers before heading back to Chicago tomorrow night.
Illinois is one of the biggest states to be voting on Tuesday – Barack Obama is one of the local senators and Hillary Clinton was brought up here. It should be fun, so watch this space …
Welcome to the American Midwest in the middle of winter Mr. Lustig. For the Northeast, this has been a remarkably mild one. It takes a lot of energy to keep America running in this and in the equally harsh hot summers. China may have stopped moving in the cold and snow but America hasn't. Nobody will tell Americans to drive around in these kinds of conditions in what amounts to golf carts or freeze in their homes so that people in China can continue to bring on two new coal fired power plants a week to improve their lives while reducing overall global CO2 emissions. All the promises and threats won't add up to a row of beans when the Senate has to vote on a Kyoto-like treaty to paralyze America. Prepare for further global warming, it's inevitable. Too bad the environmentalists wasted their precious time talking about cutbacks instead of demanding intensive research into alternate energy sources on a scale that actually might work to maintain our mode of living. Nor did they demand a reduction in global population nor an end to burning down the rain forests. Now we will just have to endure the consequences.
Complain about this postI guess ±«Óãtvr wasn't talking either
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