Clean Water Act? Just a guideline!

[Captain Picard's Hair]

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/13/us/13 ... anted=1&em

My country is going to hell. Not in a moral sense; it's literally falling apart right before us. Just the other day I watched a 2 hour documentary on the USA's aging and deteriorating infrastructure. Crumbling roads are the norm here in New York City; which also suffers from decades old water mains, electric lines, subway lines, etc. I lived through the blackout of 2003 along with 55 million others in the Northeast, caused by a single sagging power line that grounded to a tree in rural Ohio and within 12 seconds had created a failure that cascaded across a huge swath of the power grid. While power where I live has generally been reliable since, California has in the recent past endured a state of rolling blackouts. Hell, the relatively more frivolous facts that American broadband speeds and cellular service are reported to lag far behind those of the richer parts of Europe and Asia (Japan kicks our computer butts) are sad just the same.

[Tsukiyumi]

One of the main reasons I voted for George Bush in 2000 was his pledge to modernize America's power infrastructure.

Nice work on that.

[Aaron]

One of the main reasons I voted for George Bush in 2000 was his pledge to modernize America's power infrastructure.

Nice work on that.

Clearly it got derailed by his more important promise of killing brown people bombing Iraq. I often wonder just what could have been done with all the cash poured down the rabbit hole. Kinda sad actually.

[Captain Picard's Hair]

One of the main reasons I voted for George Bush in 2000 was his pledge to modernize America's power infrastructure.

Nice work on that.

Clearly it got derailed by his more important promise of killing brown people bombing Iraq. I often wonder just what could have been done with all the cash poured down the rabbit hole. Kinda sad actually.

Therein is the rub: these issues should have been addressed years decades ago rather than left to rot; now the costs have escalated hugely (of course we can't afford it now of all times), and will only further rise.

[Tsukiyumi]

To quote Ben Franklin, "A stitch in time saves nine."

*sigh*

[Lazar]

On the bright side though, I read that the EPA just recently decided to put a halt on mountaintop removal claims (which are an environmental nightmare).

[Sionnach Glic]

Clearly it got derailed by his more important promise of killing brown people bombing Iraq. I often wonder just what could have been done with all the cash poured down the rabbit hole. Kinda sad actually.

Considering the war cost 1 trillion dollars, they could probably have done quite a bit with it.

To quote Ben Franklin, "A stitch in time saves nine."

*sigh*

All too true. If youd don't keep maintaining the system, you're going to end up having to completely replace it.

My country is going to hell. Not in a moral sense; it's literally falling apart right before us. Just the other day I watched a 2 hour documentary on the USA's aging and deteriorating infrastructure. Crumbling roads are the norm here in New York City; which also suffers from decades old water mains, electric lines, subway lines, etc. I lived through the blackout of 2003 along with 55 million others in the Northeast, caused by a single sagging power line that grounded to a tree in rural Ohio and within 12 seconds had created a failure that cascaded across a huge swath of the power grid. While power where I live has generally been reliable since, California has in the recent past endured a state of rolling blackouts. Hell, the relatively more frivolous facts that American broadband speeds and cellular service are reported to lag far behind those of the richer parts of Europe and Asia (Japan kicks our computer butts) are sad just the same.

Seriously? Jesus, that's really bad.

[Tyyr]

That's the problem, even a trillion dollars isn't going to hack it.

Roads, bridges, power lines, water lines, etc. The biggest problem is that the U.S. public just isn't willing to pay for it. I can only speak on the power sector, from personal experience, but much of the way the system is handled necessitates that the individual companies look after themselves. The interconnects between the individual grids of companies are often the least cared for pieces of equipment as large scale power shipment isn't practical or common. It's hard to justify sinking millions of dollars into interconnects and long distance lines when the pay back for it can run into decades.

Here in Florida when it comes to the roads it's all the local government can do to keep up with the rate of expansion, forget what's already laid down.

[Mikey]

New Jersey's transportation infrastructure is in real deep. We are the most densely populated state in the USA, and decades of budgets have robbed the state transportation trust for all and sundry causes; the current gov is being demonized (partially jsutly, partially not) for increases on toll roads and municipal collection to try and re-seed the transportation trust, but it's too little, too late.

[Sionnach Glic]

I suppose it was more or less inevitable. The average US citizen pays practicaly no tax at all when you compare them to citizens of other first world nations. You can't keep cutting taxes without something like this happening down the line.

[Mikey]

Some of that balances. Not to reopen the debate, but health care for example - we don't have a national plan funded by taxes, but we pay for it privately. The real issue is the American mindset of "what will you do for me right now," which mindset leads to the inability of anyone getting elected who tells the truth about the necessity of raising taxes a/o cutting programs... or, at the least, the inability of getting re-elected once such things get done.

[Sionnach Glic]

Some of that balances. Not to reopen the debate, but health care for example - we don't have a national plan funded by taxes, but we pay for it privately.

Fair point. While you don't pay as much as we do in taxes, you also don't get as many public services that we do.

The real issue is the American mindset of "what will you do for me right now," which mindset leads to the inability of anyone getting elected who tells the truth about the necessity of raising taxes a/o cutting programs... or, at the least, the inability of getting re-elected once such things get done.

Yeah, I've heard that raising taxes is pretty much political suicide in the US.
Not that people over here would be thrilled with a politician doing that, but we'd at least accept it as a necessity.

[Tyyr]

The government has money, plenty of it. They are just horrific at using it.

[Sionnach Glic]

What are they using it on at the moment?

[Tyyr]

Buying votes, spending more than they have, wasting lots of money on projects of little real benefit just to make their constituents happy.