Pay no attention to the man behind the bow tie

While high-speed rail might be no more than a partial solution to expediting access to resort cities like Las Vegas and New Orleans, at least one of its naysayers used to be a vocal advocate. Who? Why none other than that nattering nabob of negativism, George F. Will. Seems he once thought rapid rail transit was not some nefarious socialistic scheme (tarring every train buff as a pinko in the process) but a capital idea, just grand, by Jove! And it would get some of those confounded flying machines out of the sky, too, he argued.

Again, I remind y0u that this is the same Geo. Will who once also huffed and puffed about having to sit in Vegas traffic jams, a by-product of the automobile that he now venerates as a vehicle of individual expression. (I really ought to write a faux Will-esque essay, fatuously decrying the horseless carriage as a manifestation of anti-social behavior and incivility; just look at all those fender-benders and all that “road rage,” by thunder!) Perhaps someone could bend time and introduce the 2011 edition of Mr. Will to his 2001 incarnation. If consistency is a hobgoblin of small minds, Mr. Will’s cranium must surely dwarf the planet Jupiter in its enormity.

While I agree with Will 1.0 rather than his latter-day, nonsense-spouting counterpart, the exposure of his amusing flip-floppery will no doubt have his wattles in full Flap Mode the next time he’s venting bombast on TV. (Does that insufferable Beltway gasbag Cokie Roberts still feed him straight lines?) Tripped up by progress yet again! Oh for the days of quill pen and inkwell, when inconvenient previous statements were not simply ‘inoperative’ but biodegradable too.