It's hard being a lefty in Madison these days.

You live on the east side, you support Barack Obama and all that hope and change... and high speed rail... in your backyard?!

"I think there will be some things that will be upsetting, kind of on a personal level. Like maybe you've enjoyed your backyard in a certain way or there's a tree you've enjoyed looking at. Maybe it's not your right to use them, but you've just had it there and benefitted from it, and then it changes."...

[T]here are concerns about the fate of several pedestrian and bicycle crossings, both sanctioned and unofficial ones. Right now, he says, the railroad tracks are not considered a barrier for anyone, from "10-year-olds to 90-year-olds," to cross and the freight trains pose little danger. But high-speed rail is a different animal, and the probability for fencing all the way along the tracks is high....

"I think people were more concerned about getting to Walgreens than getting to Chicago"....

Yeah, why do you need to go to Chicago? Compared to strolling around your own neighborhood, getting to Chicago is nothing.

For Ken Fitzsimmons, the Ohio-Farwell crossing is a key one, as is one on Corry Street. If both are closed, he and his immediate neighbors will be "boxed in," with no access to the west side of the neighborhood except by going east to Milwaukee Street first.

"We're a two-person household with one car, so we definitely at almost all times are dedicated to some alternate transportation," he says.

Ironically, the high speed rail is presented as an alternative to driving to Milwaukee, as if it's going to reverse global warming, but in real life, people will have to drive more, just to get around their own neighborhood.

[Ken Fitzsimmons] jokes that he and wife "aren't becoming Republicans" because of the high-speed rail line - referring to Republican gubernatorial candidate Scott Walker's pledge to stop it from happening. 

Why not? What's stopping you? A fear of change?

Good lord, the rail line is a disaster — a disaster justifying single-issue voting this time.

"The train is coming through as far as we're concerned... We're not putting in any effort to stop it because it could be a really good thing... I think the important point I was getting at is if they're really receptive to some of these ideas, we've got ideas. We're not trying to stop this train, we're just trying to limit its possible damaging effects."

Why not stop the train? I don't get it. You just have to accept everything that's jammed down your throat by the party you've been faithful to all these years? It could be a good thing? Maybe it will work out for the best? Why would you support an immensely intrusive change that affects your daily way of life? Why isn't the presumption against change — or at least against drastic new things that look terrible? Why this trust?

Why is obeisance to a political party compelling you to defy everything that your common sense is screaming?