Friday, August 03, 2007

Everything's inevitable

From http://www.cbsnews.com/:
Search For Answers In Bridge Collapse

2005 Report Called Minnesota Bridge "Structurally Deficient" And Possibly In Need Of Replacement

Inspections as far back as 2000 on the bridge identified both corrosion in the steel and a lot of cracking, says Stehly.

Questions are also being raised about a 2005 report in the U.S. Department of Transportation's National Bridge Inventory which rated the bridge as "structurally deficient" and possibly in need of replacement.

The report said there were fatigued details on the main truss and floor truss system. Yet it concluded there was no need to prematurely replace the bridge because of fatigue cracking, avoiding the high cost associated with such a large project.
Yep, no money for repairs. Because we're such an impoverished society.

We just can't spare a dime.

Cost of the War in Iraq
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I swear, with our crumbling infrastructure; wrong-headed war that hemorrhages money and makes no one safer; lack of health care; increasing gap between poor and ultra-rich; liberal newspaper editors being assassinated in the streets; and all the cheap, lethal goods we continue to import from China (even though they've hit us where it hurts: our kids and pets), America's looking more like a third-world country every day.

FDR's spinning in his grave.

3 comments:

ms. whatsit said...

You forgot to mention CEOs taking huge raises while company workers taking pay cuts.

It's not just on the political landscape.

daveawayfromhome said...

Republicans claim that anyone talking about pay differences is trying to start a "class war", but it's we of the lower-income brackets who feel assaulted. The tax-cutting mantra that took off a quarter century ago under Reagan has borne its bitter fruit; in all this time, the cut-taxes-and-help-the-economy model of economics has helped only one group of people: the super-rich 1%. The rest of us have seen our income (in real terms), at best stagnate, but most likely slip downwards, even as basics like health care and education have rocketed upward as if this is Weimar Germany. Our infrastructure is crumbling, and we're digging ourselves a deep hole of debt to spiral down into, all because while we're willing to spend money we dont really have for a bigger and better television, we dont want to pay for anything better than a cheap, plastic nation. Woo-Ee. What a bunch of partriots.

Forget Franklin, his bearings are probably long locked up from wear, it's Teddy that's starting to smoke from the rotational velocity.

Chance said...

m.w: that's probably the number one injustice in this country.

dave: as usual, very eloquently put.