WHEN I OPEN THE NEWSPAPER IN THE morning (assuming it’s morning), I always read the sports first. The news depresses me. I see Barry Bonds** finally broke the home run record, the Dodgers can’t score a run and Kobe whines he’ll never play for the Lakers again. So I switched to the front section, where I notice the unity government in Iraq is imploding worse than the Dodgers. Five more ministers are boycotting. This leaves zero Sunnis in the cabinet. Perhaps it’s time to take the word “unity” out of unity government?
The big national story last week was the tragedy in Minnesota. The eight-lane I35-W collapsed during rush hour, sending dozens of cars, trucks, a school bus and hundreds of tons of concrete plunging toward the Mississippi River. (My right-wing friends instantly suspected terrorists without thinking why jihadists would pick Minnesota?) It’s remarkable only eight died. It’s also remarkable that there are 77,000 bridges in the U.S. rated worse than that I35-W. This prompted Transportation Secretary Mary Peters to urge all states to do immediate inspections. She might add the caveat, don’t wear heavy boots when you do.
Guess what, folks? Our infrastructure, to use the technical term, sucks! Even Bush, during his flight over I35-W, commented, “I guess things are really getting old.” Yes, Mr. President, how astute. (The rumor is false, however, that when W saw all the damage, he asked, “Didn’t we already fix New Orleans?”) Engineers have been warning about an infrastructure disaster for decades, but in the 2000 election campaign, I don’t remember anyone even mentioning the word. The words I recall were “decency and integrity,” as in Cheney’s: “On the first hour of the first day, we will restore decency and integrity to the Oval Office.” Looking back, an hour is about all it lasted. In 2004, the big issue was gay marriage, which now seems absurd. (Actually, it did then, too.) But who knows? Maybe some die-hard conservatives on the I35, inside their Mercedes plummeting toward the Mississippi, might have reflected, “Well, it could be worse. At least gays can’t marry.”
Much of our infrastructure was built during the New Deal as WPA projects. And yet, we currently spend only $22 million annually on inspections. (That’s one hour in Iraq.) To completely rehabilitate our infrastructure, estimates range from hundreds of billions to two trillion dollars. Where could we possibly get that kind of money? Wait a minute, those are the same numbers from the Iraq war, assuming we aren’t still “surging” past 2010. (Debatable, since Tony Snow compared Iraq to Korea, where we’ve been for more than 50 years.) I can hear my right-wing friends. Is Jack seriously blaming poor George and his war in Iraq, which has cost $500 billion (including $9 billion that just disappeared), and climbing at $12 billion a month, for a collapsed bridge in Minnesota? Yes, I am. Take a deep breath and try to bear with me.
In world history, no country has ever fought a war and lowered taxes at the same time. Until Bush. You see, we’re not actually paying for this war, we’ve just maxed-out the credit cards, so to speak. Our children and grandchildren will be the ones paying. And don’t forget, Bush fired the guy who warned the war could cost $200 billion, while the one who predicted $50 billion (Wolfowitz) was promoted. So I suppose when George says he listens to the experts, what he really means is he listens to those who agree with him.
As it turns out, the big winner of the war has been Iran, which, ironically, Bush labeled part of the “axis of evil.” They feared Saddam, but now they’re the dominant players in the region. In fact, we desperately need Iran’s help. (I sure hope they aren’t sore about that “axis of evil” thing.) If there were no invasion, the terrorists wouldn’t have an on-the-job training laboratory and we’d have an extra 1/2 trillion dollars. (To fix bridges, health care, education, Walter Reed, etc.) And there’d be zero American combat deaths, instead of 3,681, and zero wounded, instead of 27,104 — one-third so severely we’ll be supporting them for the rest of their lives.
Besides Haliburton, Blackwater and the 100,000 contractors, what American jobs have been created? Fixing our infrastructure, however, could put Americans to work in America. Unless, of course, we outsource it to India or China, like AOL and pet food, which has worked out swell, hasn’t it?
Arianna Huffington notes that all the new hospitals, schools, roads and bridges are in Iraq, while ours are falling into rivers. So what’s the answer? We either face the infrastructure issue and re-prioritize (no more unnecessary wars), or we can just wait and cross that bridge when it collapses.
Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on August 10, 2007. Read the original PDF.