Your point 1) is the equivalent of you rebutting someone’s claim that their hair is black by saying that their eyes are brown.

In any case, it doesn't really effect my first point, because whatever America's system of government is today, it's the same one as it was before.

To the actual point, all of these great projects for which we will be remembered by 25th century historians, ran over budget and over schedule, and we had people talk sh*t about them, and they got built anyway. Who remembers the naysayers (today it happens to be the Reagan/Trump Republicans, yesterday it was 'Whitey's on the moon')? Nobody. They are not memorable.

That said, as is always pointed out on HN, high-speed passenger rail doesn't make a lot of sense for this country at this point in time, it's a high-hanging fruit without that much juice. Better places to spend our billions.