Governor Jerry Brown took ownership of California's controversial high-speed-rail project on Wednesday in his State of the State speech, forcefully defending the plan that has received blistering bipartisan criticism in recent weeks.
Brown likened the project to massive infrastructure advances of past decades, including the building of the Panama Canal, BART and the interstate highway system - all of which he said were derided in their time - and he called on the Legislature to approve several billion dollars in funding for the first phase of construction "without any hesitation."
(More on Brown's support of high speed rail . . . )
