Gary Shaffer

[Winning in America @WinningintheUSA]

If you were impressed with the dollar amount of the OKC Streetcar, wait until you see this…

They’re talking about a project that could hit nearly $1 billion!

The OKC Streetcar cost $136 million to build. It was bringing in about $100,000 a year in fares while costing taxpayers $6.3–7 million annually to operate. That’s a 1.7% fare recovery rate.

So they made it permanently free.

The few people still paying are now off the hook, and the rest of us just keep writing the checks.

Now the same region is pushing a far bigger version of the same idea.

ONE Transit wants a 39-mile commuter rail line from north Edmond through downtown Oklahoma City all the way to south Norman.

It would run on the existing BNSF freight tracks. Ten regular stations plus one special-event stop for OU game days. Downtown stations in Edmond, OKC (Santa Fe hub), and Norman. Park-and-rides scattered along the route.

Capital cost estimates currently sit between $700–800 million and “just north of one billion dollars.”

Officials say they expect roughly half from federal grants.

The local share would come from a brand-new, permanent one-cent sales tax across Oklahoma City, Edmond, and Norman.

That tax is projected to generate more than $130 million a year. About three-quarters of it would go to the rail and bus upgrades. The other quarter would go to roads, bridges, and sidewalks.

City councils still have to sign off, then voters would get the final say—most likely sometime in 2027. Even if it passes, you’re looking at years of construction after that.

Here’s the part that should sound familiar.

Older studies (already a decade old) projected about 5,700 daily riders for the full corridor and annual operating costs in the $5–5.5 million range for portions of the line.

Real-world numbers almost always climb.

Shared freight tracks mean passenger trains will take a back seat when BNSF needs the rails. Event days (OU, Thunder) will look decent. Everyday commuting in a metro built around the car is a much harder sell.

The streetcar already showed what happens next.

Low fare recovery leads to free rides. Free rides become the new baseline. The operating subsidy never goes away. Taxpayers own it forever.

This project is simply the same model scaled up: big capital number, permanent new sales tax, heavy ongoing subsidy, and optimistic ridership assumptions that will be memory-holed once the trains are running half-empty outside of Saturdays in the fall.

Nothing about this is free.

The only question is how many more zeros they add before the bill lands.

[Gary Shaffer @gshaffer311]

https://t.co/3IIFRk0M9O

[Jaimee Michell @JaimeeUSA]

This clip should be required viewing on EVERY single campus in the United States.

I would never want to find myself on the other end of a debate with this man. Absolutely MASTERFUL 💥😮‍💨

[Gary Shaffer @gshaffer311]

Stop the scammers https://t.co/SpWr9BhRlr

[Daily Signal @DailySignal]

Victor Davis Hanson: Girls schools next to Iranian military bases par for the course in that part of the world

I mean, after October 7th Hamas basically said to the Israelis, “we're going into our subterranean city and we have exits, and they're right under hospitals, schools, and mosques, and we have command centers and under there.

Do you wanna blow 'em up? Because if you do, our friends in the western media are gonna call it genocide” And so Iran, number one knows that, argues @VDHanson on this weekend’s edition of “Victor Davis Hanson: In His Own Words:”

Full episode: https://t.co/UtOnneF8tJ

[Daily Signal @DailySignal]

Victor Davis Hanson: When Barack Obama Hijacked a Funeral

The Democrats have a long history of using the venue of the funeral memorial service to hijack it and use it for political purposes. Once again, Barack Obama hijacked a funeral.

All of these speeches at these funerals that Obama presents are basically about himself.

@VDHanson

Full episode: https://t.co/RCYRyBZW1A

[Victor Davis Hanson @VDHanson]

https://t.co/GXqIlTnLLI

[Alex Epstein @AlexEpstein]

It’s always advisable to try to understand someone’s argument before trashing them. Especially if that someone is Chris Wright, who knows a lot about energy.

Wright’s point is that only 20% of global energy use today is electricity, and solar panels just generate electricity.

So with today’s energy economy, even if you had enough solar panels to cover all electricity—or even if you had far, far more—you still wouldn’t be providing 80% of energy.

What Wright wasn’t saying, but that his statement was interpreted by many as saying, was: “There’s not enough space on Earth to have all its energy generated by solar.”

While using solar does create real, costly land issues, there is for sure enough space on Earth for solar to generate way more kilowatt-hours of raw energy than humans use in all our machines.

The main reasons we don’t use that much solar are:

1) The versatility problem Wright is alluding to: Electricity as such isn’t yet good for many things, most obviously flying planes, powering container ships, etc.

2) The classic intermittency problem: Solar isn’t a stored, on-demand, independent electricity source, and batteries are prohibitively expensive to make it one for the foreseeable future.

(For a full explanation of these issues, see Chapters 5-6 of my book Fossil Future.)

I, Chris Wright, and other advocates of energy freedom wish solar the best; we just feel compelled to point out its limitations because opponents of energy freedom try to justify subsidies and mandates for solar based on fantasies about its cost-effectiveness and versatility.

As the pro-freedom side says over and over, insofar as solar has anywhere near the potential many claim it does, then it shouldn’t need subsidies, mandates, or any other form of government preference.

So why can’t we all agree on energy freedom?

[Gary Shaffer @gshaffer311]

America Needs Tough Grading - WSJ https://t.co/3UrJw8L7La

[Cato Institute @CatoInstitute]

Some claim tariffs are just "consumption taxes" like a VAT or sales tax. But that’s wrong in form and function. Consumption taxes are transparent and apply to the final sale of all products equally. Tariffs target foreign goods only and apply throughout the supply chain, distorting the economy.

It's protectionism disguised as tax policy. https://t.co/y5AD4gqnVP

[Gary Shaffer @gshaffer311]

Gaza Starvation Photos Tell a Thousand Lies - WSJ https://t.co/PZAz64Knv0

[Gary Shaffer @gshaffer311]

@The Big Money Show @Fox Business …why does it say Poteau,Ok with a shot of St. Louis?

[Mayor David Holt @davidfholt]

No surprise here. The #1 Best Big City to Live in the entire United States is… OKLAHOMA CITY!

(According to U.S. News & World Report).

What have I been saying? This is our time, OKC.

https://t.co/hHegGNT6no

[The Wall Street Journal @WSJ]

Occidental Petroleum and other oil giants are expected to get billions of dollars of incentives for carbon capture. An oil tycoon and a pro-fossil-fuels activist want to turn off the tap. https://t.co/Oo3Z9VnE9d

[Gary Shaffer @gshaffer311]

The Great Medicaid Hospital Scam - WSJ https://t.co/Je9aeXknmv

[Gary Shaffer @gshaffer311]

Iran’s Latest Nuclear Breakout - WSJ https://t.co/na0ScHshHM

[Gary Shaffer @gshaffer311]

The Politics of Medicaid Reform - WSJ https://t.co/EZj1gpexbY

[Gary Shaffer @gshaffer311]

Spend, Baby, Spend - WSJ https://t.co/S3YhFOv6x0

[Gary Shaffer @gshaffer311]

Sean O’Brien and the UPS Layoffs - WSJ https://t.co/QhsbCvWb6z

[Gary Shaffer @gshaffer311]

Long After the Pandemic, Medicaid’s Crisis Persists - WSJ https://t.co/91kSBWLLdO