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| Also listed in: Campus Progress Blog |
Hundreds of homes in Nevada are entirely under water since Sunday because of a levee break. Cold weather and ice blocked a canal, causing it to rupture. However, Nevada Governor Jim Gibbons said the canal was not full when the bank failed:
"This indicates to me there might have been a structural weakness over the years."
I know the Minneapolis bridge collapse had nothing to do with waether, but that event did trigger discussions about state infrastructure, budget priorities, and the status of our bridges, roads, and other engineered structures. Alternet.org (in an article that HB pointed out to me) theorized that fiscal conservatism and a reluctance to invest in infrastructure were at least partly to blame.
Is this a stretch? The article claims that "short sighted public policy" had a hand in a number of events:
A bridge collapse in California the day before Minneapolis, the explosion of an 80-year-old steam pipe in Manhattan a few weeks before, the collapse of a section of tunnel in Boston, and lastly but most importantly, the levee failure in New Orleans.
Classic conservatism values small government and prizes cutbacks in spending. In response to the Nevada flooding, an onsite enginner state that the earthen levees used there were “the least strong and the least expensive” of the various materials used different forms of levee construction.
Thoughts?
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75% of them are states that are clearly left of center from a state gov't prospective. Does not sounds well reasoned to call out conservatives if you don't cite more examples in conservatives states.
Besides, lets ask the big question...In each of these cases WHO HELD THE BURDEN OF MAINTAINING THEM!
After all, by your logic couldn't I blame my cold on conservatives too?
Oh an FYI, that steam pipe was owned by a private utility--so you support government subsides to power companies to maintain their infrastructure, right?
Actually 100% of them are in states with leftist dominated state government. And you forgot New Orleans which has been controlled by left leaning politicians for decades. Leftist social policy is notorious for neglecting infrastructure in favor of spending publc funds on the latest social program du jour.
There's a significant difference between blaming your cold on the government and recognizing the importance of reinforcing a state's infrastructure. Waiting for a disaster and relying on big earmarks to clean things up is hardly responsible fiscal conservatism.
Leftist government/Union Inaction at it's finest.