Local Mary Hunt poses an excellent question in a Letter to the Editor in the Daily Journal. It goes like so:

Question: While our state budget crisis deepens and the state is forced to defer payments to schools and vendors, what will our lame-duck governor Arnold Schwarzenegger be doing to help resolve the worst budget crisis in decades?

Answer: Our governor will be AWOL — taking a trade junket to China, Japan and South Korea from Sept. 9 to Sept. 15 (This is also the period for the governor to decide the fate of hundreds of bills recently passed by the Legislature). That’s bad enough. But there’s more reason for concern: Traveling with the governor will be the new CEO of the High-Speed Rail Authority, Roelof van Ark. This gives credence to the talk that Gov. Schwarzenegger wants China to invest tens of billions of dollars to make up the huge investment shortfall that many experts predict in the funding of California’s high-speed rail system. Why would China invest tens of billions of dollars in a project that — according to our state treasurer— Wall Street investors are, “convinced that no one can finance the routes from Los Angeles to the Bay Area?” That question needs to be answered, not in the California governor’s office, but in the president’s National Security Council.

Mary L. Hunt

And a guest opinion in the Chronicle hits on another aspect of the private investment needed

those investors will need to see a potential return. The hitch? The way the phasing or building of the system is currently proposed may not produce a return.

And the proposal which is quite logical is

Recall from Part 25 of our High Cost Rail series, that the CSHRA's survey results needed some external review.  A modest synopsis of the survey results has finally surfaced.  It may take several installments to find all of the gems in the report, but here are a couple that just jump off the page

Taking an airplane ———————— 30%

Amtrak or other rail lines —————- 12%

Driving in your own car —————— 75%

Riding a bus ———————————- 4%

"In general" is right since it really matters how far one is going and what the origin and destinations are.  Does 12% taking some form of train sound even close to you?  Here's another question:

Here are some statements from people who support the planned high-speed rail line. After hearing each statement, please tell me whether you find it very convincing, somewhat convincing, or not convincing as a reason to support the project. If you do not believe the statement, please tell me that too.

"The high-speed rail line will attract large amounts of public and private investment to California. The state received over two billion dollars in federal funding. And California’s nine billion dollar investment will generate 34 billion dollars of investment from non-state sources."

Amazingly, 34% are Very Convinced of this and another 37% are Somewhat Convinced!  13% are Not Convinced and 12% Don't Believe the statement.  I'm not sure what the difference is between not being convinced and not believing it, so let's add those two for a 25% total.  Now the wrinkle:  HSR has been in the works for years and has yet to attract a single dime of private investment–yet 71% of respondents apparently want to ignore this private money boycott.  Yikes.  Maybe you didn't need to be told this, but 38% of the respondents get their news about HSR from…..the TV.  Oh well.