Save the Train and Partner With the Neighbors

The Sierra Club is sponsoring a Save the Train Rally here in Madison on Saturday. There will be others around the state as well including La Crosse and Eau Claire. So why are western Wisconsin cities so interested?

Here's your answer:

A Commerce Department report suggesting that Minneapolis-St. Paul is poised to overtake Detroit as the Midwest's second-largest metro economy didn't get much attention when it was released a year ago, perhaps because it told more about Detroit's decline than MSP's rise.

Wisconsin is between the two (or what will soon be) largest urban economies in the Midwest – Chicago and the Twin Cities. Making Madison the new terminus on Amtrak's Hiawatha line is about providing an alternative to driving to reduce highway traffic, pollution, wear and tear on the roads, and whatnot but it's also about strengthening Wisconsin's ties to our regional neighbors economically (and otherwise). Yeah, there will be commuters and there will be vactioners and people going on day trips. Great. I may be one of those too. But what concerns me the most is that rail is also going to connect, say, the folks at the UW Solar Energy Lab to investors and capital in Chicago.

To my ears, Scott Walker is saying, "All we need to do is get rid of corporate taxes, defund the UW system, and build more roads. Then businesses will be beating down our door to move here. Well, except stem cell research companies because I want to rid ourselves of embryonic stem cell research." To me, that's not a great way to foster growth in a global information economy.

Richard Longworth of The Chicago Council on Global Affairs writes about the Midwest and its place in the global economy at his blog The Midwesterner. His latest post is called "The Election's Impact on the Midwest" . He lists several examples of negative impacts for the Midwest and the incoming Republicans look to fulfill his prophecies.

* Tax cuts, which means both higher deficits in states that already are wallowing in debt and less money for these states to do what needs to be done. In other words:

"A complete list of Walker's previously-promised $3.8 tax breaks"

* Less government, which means less government investment to towns and cities that have relied on state and federal funds to pay the bills. Somewhere, these localities are going to have to find the money themselves or see their quality of life crumble.

* Less government spending on education. Not that the electees are necessarily hostile to schools. But in any budget squeeze, schools -- especially universities -- are the first to get cut. The fact that university research is a key to reviving the Midwestern economy cuts no ice, especially since universities are seen as part of the "elite" which the Tea Party has vowed to punish.

"Do more with less, Gov.-elect Walker tells regents"

* Less spending on infrastructure, like high-speed rail -- an investment that could link the Midwest's isolated towns and cities and enable them to leverage each other's strengths.

"we have been exploring all legal options to stop the train from moving forward"

* Hostility to immigration. In much of the Midwest, immigrants, including undocumented immigrants, are keeping declining populations afloat and injecting much-needed new ideas and money. No one denies that immigration reform is needed. But keeping immigrants out now could doom some declining areas.

"Republican in Wisconsin Assembly proposing iimmigration bill modeled after Arizona law"

* No help in fighting the recession. Federal government programs, like the stimulus, kept this recession from being worse than it is and literally rescued America's auto industry from bankruptcy. This help won't be available now if the recession dives into a second trough.

* Anti-globalization. The Midwest has always lived by trading. An open global economy is failing the region now, as industrial jobs get shipped overseas or are lost to labor-saving technology installed to meet global competition. The solution is a stronger safety net (plus stronger schools), not new trade barriers. But the anger at globalization, corporations and foreigners exhibited in the midterm election makes this balanced response unlikely or impossible.

At least we'll have some time before the Republicans hermetically seal Wisconsin in the 1950s. State Seantor Scott Fitzgerald's biggest concern at the moment is a bill mandating that voters show a photo ID at the polls. Only after that can we get down to the business of Walker paying back his donors in the road building industry.