Wednesday April 4, 2012, 10:31 am
Public money needs to be spend to address issues such as this, the problem is that public money comes from taxation and with society increasingly falling in to two categories - those who cannot afford to pay any more and those rich enough to avoid doing so it is hard to see how the many will ever be raised. Privatising the basic infrastructure would raise the necessary money but could very well lead to an underclass of people who cannot access them. To those who think that this might be okay, think what will happen if the poorest people cannot get access to clean water and sewage treatment - if this happens then the type of conditions found in third world countries will be an awful lot closer to home as will the diseases that accompany them!

Wednesday April 4, 2012, 10:36 am

I think it is past time we begin to think less about republican-v-democrat and begin to think of our own lives. We all know that during fever pitch of presidential elections many things are said to rally us to gather toward one person over the other. Right now I submit, we need to think less about them and more about our own lives. The world seems to move rapidly now, the news takes us from one situation to another quickly without a deep focus on this country and what is happening, or more honestly what is not happening in this country.

There's lots of talk, talk, talk, about budgets, and deficits. I submit to you that is far less important than a country that is already in so much disrepair that we are now a second world country falling daily into the state of a third world country. Our infrastructure is not just a pot hole in the road. It is what keeps our water clean and flowing, farm lands able to grow food, bridges now, barely standing sewer systems daily flowing into drinking water. Our attention is constantly refocused to nonsense that meets the agenda of one party or the other and not to what is most important for our lives today and for the future. Most of our infrastructure is 50-70 and at it's worst nearly 100 years old. We have become accustomed to this declining situation, we have allowed ourselves to focus on things that keep us apart, rather then focusing on the reality of what is keeping us alive and our country (barely) functioning. We are grievously and dangerously close to that new but now common term the "tipping point", for all the positive things that this film will show you, there are 100 or more negatives in every city. Think of the simple fact that "Texas provides an example of the limitations of FHWA’s compliance reviews. Texas has 48,492 bridges on the 2003 Bridge Inventory, by far the largest number of all states, but has only one FHWA bridge engineer and one assistant engineer. (http://capitolannex.com/archive/2007/08/02/texas-bridges-193-are-structurally-deficient-highest-number-in-nation/)

Meanwhile, take some time to discover the state of your state, bridges, water ways, safety measures for clean water, safety of roads and highways, sustainability of the electrical grid and never forget the sewer systems. Stop being a pawn in the political gamesmanship that is used to distract you from the real and present crisis.

If you happened to read this and live in Canada - this also applies to you.

We do have new and exceptionally modern techniques that we could use to replace bridges - in fact the new I-35 bridge is a mostly self maintaining bridge. It monitors and sends feed back to the engineers. So could new highways, water systems and sewer systems and even the grids. Until we do something beyond talk about this, we will go beyond the critical point and the cost of replacements will sore to nearly incomparably high levels of cost. I will not say the time is now, the time was 30 years ago, but this is where we are, now decide what you will do for your safety and protection.

The grade for the USA based on a GPA score is a D - is that really okay with you? Are you ready to focus on more foreign wars, or to focus on the needed building and restructuring at home? This also will employ many, many people at all levels, and allow us to finally make the needed conversions to cleaner more efficient and safer technology for our energy. How do we pay for this?

Equal and fair taxation, end all corporate subsidies and increase fines for all corporations adding to the problem. Begin to think in terms of a new paradigm. We can save our country now, as a unified people or we can be stupid and continue to fight over silly issues that will not repair the infrastructure or put people to work. I chose to be a part of those who want to look forward.

I can not force you to watch this film, I can not force to look at this reality, I can only ask that you put aside preformed ideas and stop, look and listen. Then please do some research about where you live and find out how you and your community can do something.

Thank you,
Miss Kitty

Wednesday April 4, 2012, 10:38 am

If you can't spare the time to watch, I'm not sure you really can learn what this is all about.

Wednesday April 4, 2012, 3:14 pm
Good Article. Thanks Kit.

Wednesday April 4, 2012, 4:24 pm


Thnx for posting sweetie!!

Wednesday April 4, 2012, 5:59 pm
It is terrible each time I read about how some communities are tearing up roads to dirt as they can't afford to pave them anymore, that some towns have removed street lights as they can't afford to keep the lights on.

In the past our ancestors were proud of the accomplishments they could do and gladly paid their taxes. We had the highway system under Eisenhower and before him look at the bridges, subway system, running water into people's homes, and the railroad lines that connected east to west. A vision that included all the citizens.

Wonder if those people who lived then said, nah, I'm not paying any more taxes, I'll take my boat across the river, or a subway system that is stupid, or who needs to get to the west coast faster the covered wagons do just fine.

Well I guess that is one way to go green, no lights, no rail, no highway system, no damns, no anything to use any carbon, except for the most wealthy. Some might have ideas to still have high speed rail, cars that run on algea, solar to heat and cool our homes, but I guess for the short sighted, that seem to be in control of things, that might be asking too much.

So it's drill baby drill, fall baby fall into the rivers, until the last drop of oil is taken. The Elites will have their private air buses, their private airports, their private roads, their private gated communities, their private get a ways, their private chemical free food areas, and private water sources, and we'll get to stand in line for a ration of water, if we are lucky.

We use to have a Country that had the best educational system to be the great equalizer, rail that was so advanced for it's time and connected this whole Country, the tallest buildings, the first on the moon. Now we are D in about everythings and #37th in health care. From the top to the bottom in one human lifetime. Way to go! Glad I won't be around for the next 100 years.....don't think I could stand it.

Thursday April 5, 2012, 12:25 am
Sad.

Thursday April 5, 2012, 12:37 am
Noted.

Thursday April 5, 2012, 1:22 am


Informed .......but it' the same in Ireland,

Thursday April 5, 2012, 6:07 am
Our area is one reverting to dirt. if only the Obama "stimulus" had had a real public works omponent a la WPA and CCC of the post depression era.

Thursday April 5, 2012, 8:08 am

Oh my, John, that would worse then social construction in today's crazy world, that would be called communism. And...it would get the job done within a few years while employing millions of people both skilled and unskilled. We could actually completely pull out of this economic mess, begin a re-start of the economy and dump all fossil fuels. Let's get busy and push for this to happen. Or do we need more people to die first? Are we waiting for a pandemic?

Check this out: Starfrackers

Mark Ruffalo And New York Pols Promote Fight Against Hydrofracking

http://www.politicker.com/2011/11/30/mark-ruffalo-and-new-york-pols-promote-fight-against-hydrofracking-11-30-2011/

Thursday April 5, 2012, 11:29 pm
Good post.

As I was reading Kit and Dandelion's comments, I suddenly remembered the movie, Logan's Run. Any one else remember it? There are two parts in particular --- one where the main characters escape the confines of their ordered world to find knocked down infastructure over grown with vegetation since it had been so long since the collapse of the infastructure. The second was of the Capitol building all covered over in vines and vegetation. Books resting on tables and shelves to provide clues to the past.

We have to decide what and how we can do this so that we don't end up covered invines and other vegetation, held back by our own inertia.

Friday April 6, 2012, 6:11 am
Lynn S. this section alone gave me goose bumps "escape the confines of their ordered world" and the Leaders who always speak of a "new world order".....

Friday April 6, 2012, 12:01 pm
But paved roads use huge amounts of petroleum products that destroy birds and other life forms. I can't tell you how many times I've found birds covered in tar.

Friday April 6, 2012, 12:24 pm

They also contain products that kill small animals and over time humans. This is outdated technology and as I addressed above, there is new technology that we should be using. Newer safer roads can even be made from solar panels and tie into the existing grid systems - though our grid systems are woefully outdated as well.

Friday April 6, 2012, 12:33 pm
I'd personally like to see something like this solar roadway go into being a common thing.
SOLAR ROADWAYS

Friday April 6, 2012, 12:35 pm
lol....Kit we are on a roll, while I'm putting the story on you are also writing the same thing.