High-Speed Rail Proposal Mocked by Both European and American Officials for Different Reasons

A federal proposal for a high-speed rail line operating at 150 miles per hour between two major cities has been simultaneously mocked by European transportation officials, who consider it 'not actually high-speed,' and by American political commentators, who consider it 'a dangerous experiment in European-style government overreach.' 'One hundred and fifty miles per hour is what we call regional rail,' said French National Railways spokesperson Pierre Vitesse. 'The TGV operates at 200. The new lines in China operate at 220. One hundred and fifty is what our trains do when they're slowing down for a station. It is charming that America considers this fast.' 'One hundred and fifty miles per hour is an affront to the American way of life,' countered conservative commentator Hank Freedom on his syndicated radio program. 'Americans don't need to go 150 miles per hour. We have cars. We have planes. We have freedom. Trains at 150 miles per hour are what they have in France, and look at France.' The proposal, which would connect two cities currently separated by a five-hour drive, has struggled to find support among either the transportation community, which views it as insufficiently ambitious, or the political establishment, which views it as excessively ambitious. 'In Japan, they'd laugh at 150,' said transportation analyst Dr. Keiko Track. 'In Texas, they'd shoot at it. This proposal exists in a zone of universal disapproval — too fast for Americans, too slow for everyone else.' The project's engineers have attempted to find a compromise speed that is 'acceptably fast for an international audience and acceptably slow for a domestic one.' They have settled on 150 mph as a number that 'offends everyone equally.' 'We could go faster,' said project director Monica Rail. 'The technology exists for 220 mph. But the political will exists for approximately 45 mph, which is the current speed of Amtrak on this corridor. One hundred and fifty is the fastest we can go without being called communists.' The proposal is currently in the environmental review phase, which is expected to take seven years, by which time the technology will be 'even more embarrassingly slow by global standards.'