All Fall Down

The terrible disaster in Minneapolis, Minnesota, in which an 8-lane highway bridge collapsed into the Mississippi River during the afternoon rush hour, points up an insidious problem here in the United States - our crumbling infrastructure.

Talking heads on TV and "experts" of all sorts will be debating the cause of the collapse for years, but my simplistic mind has already identified the root problem: we're too darned cheap. Years of protest against taxes of all sorts, a government that believes in spending our money in Iraq rather than on our needs at home, and a general unwillingness to spend money on mundane yet important things...all these fiscal chickens have come home to roost. Our local TV news broadcasts are full of officials swearing confidently that the dozens of bridges in the Washington, DC metro area are perfectly safe, but one has to wonder...I'm sure that lots of similar officials in Minneapolis would have said the same thing.

The state of our infrastructure - roads, bridges, dams, electrical grid, water supply, and so on - is one of those things we never think about until something goes wrong. Bridges are always there. Clean water comes out when you turn on the tap. Throw a switch, and the lights come on. It's our birthright, isn't it?

The next time you complain about paying your taxes, think about the things they help pay for. Let your elected Reprehensibles know that you'd appreciate more money being spent to fix things at home rather than repeatedly fix things in Iraq just so that the local morons can blow them up again.

The Minnesota bridge disaster was avoidable. The next such disaster will have been avoidable also. And we'll have the same talking heads mouthing the same platitudes while nothing gets fixed.

Have a good day. More thoughts tomorrow.

Bilbo