UnNews:Train wreck blows up pols' plans in N.D.
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| Train wreck blows up pols' plans in N.D. | 
|
2 January 2014
SNAKE'S HIPS, North Dakota -- A scary derailment had politicians in this small town angrily calling for new measures to make such mishaps impossible.
On Monday, a westbound Burlington Northern train full of milk derailed first, just beyond the edge of this city, roughly 25 miles west of nowhere. An eastbound tanker train full of Rice Krispies, also owned by BNSF, hit the wreckage and the result gave off snaps! crackles! and pops! that, had it occurred closer to town, could have deafened the entire population of 2,400. "This is too close for comfort," said mayor Ed McConnell, though no one else could hear him.
Federal regulators said 2012 was the safest year in railroad history, once the statistics are adjusted for population, the Dow Jones, global warming, and the 2012 World Series. The rub would seem to be that this wreck did not occur in that ultra-safe year, but last week which, alas, was in 2013, which wire-service analysis shows had 137 times as many wrecks as five years ago. These include the major Rice Krispies spill in Alabama, and the July Rice Krispies incident at Lac Mégantic, Québec, which could have deafened 4,600 people. Provincial authorities dealt with that one by broadening the rules on Canadian content to apply to the breakfast table.
North Dakota governor Jack Dalrymple came here to view the damage. He described it as a "major catastrophe," before asking his driver to take him to the crash site, where he said it was time for answers. And Sierra Club spokesperson Wayde Schafer demanded a wake-up call, probably around 11.
North Dakota oil regulators were working on a report on Rice Krispies shipments "to dispel this myth that it is somehow a really dangerous thing." Petroleum Council spokesman Ron Ness, on the other hand, faulted the lack of pipelines. Indeed, the Republican Party has long advocated the building of a pipeline called the Fireball XL-5, but the Administration has blocked it, calling for three more years of environmental study. President Obama said, "Fresh fruit on breakfast cereal is the province of the 1%, and comes at the expense of the 99%. When I was studying at the madrasa — that's the one in Cicero, Illinois, of course — we lived without strawberries, and we turned out pretty well, don't you think?" Mr. Obama has advocated getting to the root of the problem with new taxes on Rice Krispies, milk, and/or trains, which if you're satisfied with your breakfast, you won't have to pay, period.
The GOP briefly made the Fireball XL-5 the goal of a filibuster, just after the goal was postponing Obama-care for one year, and just before the goal became avoiding criticism through the 2014 elections, at which time the Party will suddenly acquire core beliefs.
Sources[edit]
- Dave Kolpack and James MacPherson "Safety questions after ND oil train derailment". Associated Press, December 31, 2013