President Jimmy Carter Tells Trump to Build High Speed Rail!
President Trump called former President Jimmy Carter for the first time this weekend.
He said Trump told him that he is particularly concerned about how China is "getting ahead of us."
Carter said he agreed with Trump on this issue. "And do you know why?" Carter said. "I normalized diplomatic relations with China in 1979. Since 1979, do you know how many times China has been at war with anybody? None. And we have stayed at war," he said.
Carter said the United States is "the most warlike nation in the history of the world" due to a desire to impose American values on other countries, and he suggested that China is investing its resources into projects such as high-speed railroads instead of defense spending.
"How many miles of high-speed railroad do we have in this country?" Zero.
"We have wasted, I think, $3 trillion," Carter said, referring to American military spending.
"China has not wasted a single penny on war, and that's why they're ahead of us. In almost every way.
"And I think the difference is if you take $3 trillion and put it in American infrastructure, you'd probably have $2 trillion left over. We'd have high-speed railroad. We'd have bridges that aren't collapsing. We'd have roads that are maintained properly.
The former president said he understands that Trump is worried about China surpassing the U.S. as the world's top economic superpower, and why he told Trump to build high speed rail as China has done.
The White House confirmed the conversation in a statement released Monday.
"As CSX famously noted in its ad campaign, a train can move a ton of cargo more than 400 miles on a gallon of fuel. A Boeing 747, on the other hand, burns one gallon of fuel every second."
