Rep. Thad McCotter (R-Livonia) had an op-ed in the Detroit News slamming the stimulus package signed by Obama yesterday and he repeated one of the most ridiculous talking points the Republicans have been using against the bill. I’m sure you’ve heard all about that high-speed rail line that Harry Reid between Los Angeles and Las Vegas, since the GOP has been mentioning it relentlessly. McCotter provides a typically colorful version of it:
 

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid stashed a “necessary” high speed rail project in the bill. But how does this $8 billion “Sin Express” from Los Angeles to Las Vegas put someone like Greg from Milford back to work?

This is a nearly verbatim repeat of a statement made by House Minority Leader John Boehner of Ohio, who said, “Tell me how spending $8 billion in this bill to have a high-speed rail line between Los Angeles and Las Vegas is going to help the construction worker in my district.”

The problem, as Matthew Yglesias points out, is that there is no such project and there likely will not be. The $8 billion is not for a rail line between L.A. and Las Vegas, it is for the development of high-speed railroads between major cities all across the nation. The money will be targeted at areas that the Federal Railroad Administration has designated as “high-speed rail corridors.” There are ten such corridors identified that are ideal candidates for a high-speed rail system. And guess what? L.A. to Vegas is not one of them.

But here’s something McCotter didn’t bother to mention: Detroit to Chicago is on the list of high-speed rail corridors that may well receive these funds for a project to connect those two cities with a high-speed railroad line. Here’s the map from the FRA:

So that $8 billion is far more likely to be used to build a high-speed rail from Detroit to Chicago than for one between L.A. and Las Vegas. Greg from Milford may well be able to get a job building that railroad. He may well even be close enough to build another line you can see on that map, between Chicago and Toledo.

His other complaints about the bill? A $300 million expenditure for STD prevention and a $30 million item for something in Speaker Pelosi’s hometown. Those two items combined amount to approximately .0004% of the money allocated. But hey, why worry about pesky little things like facts when you’ve got a perfectly good talking point to spread — especially when you can sell that talking point as something sinful?