I am worried about the Lafayette bridge, too. Here's why:
Gosh, Pawlenty sounds just like a person who spends money on entertainment
instead of fixing the house, and is surprised that the roof fell instead of the
roof just developing a leak.
The Republicans supported the override of the transportation bill, supported
the policy of do not maintain our bridges, our schools and all of our community
infrastructure. Instead we have "No New Taxes" for the rich, the poor pay more.
Instead we have a ground breaking ceremony for the new government financed new
ballpark on the day after the bridge fell. How appropriate that the ballgames
was playing as everyday ordinary people and first responders worked to save
lives!
How Republican it is to spend on entertainment first, and delay maintenance or
use credit to pay for maintenance. Republicans trying to make "structural
deficient" not mean structural deficient, it means "safe". And then in the same
speech claiming how surprised they are that a bridge labeled "structural
deficient" would fail, simply because there were no voices actually asking to
close the bridge. Duh, "structural deficient" means we have to repair or
replace and spend money fixing things. No one asks to close bridges, that is
politically impossible. Spend money fixing things - that is contrary to the
notion of No-new-taxes. So Republicans claim it can wait, it is not that bad,
we can "prioritize" meaning fix that which we know will break in this
Republican term. So then it becomes the engineers' fault for not correctly
predicting what will fall in this Republican term. So what do you think those
"special" independent firms that Pawlenty hired to study the bridge failure are
going to say? Corporations use the hired expertise to sell the great lie all
the time. Yeah, "independent", yeah right.
Why is this important to the Layfayette bridge? The 35W will get lots of
attention and money. The Republicans will pretend that this is some "special"
design flaw of this particular bridge, when truly the principle that we should
learn from all of this is that we need to invest taxes in our community
infrastructure, progressively taxing more to catch up on our repair/replace
schedule for all Lafayette bridge. Horrors, Republican tax more and tax the
rich more! (Republicans everywhere shriek in agony at the very idea!) Yeah, not
very likely, not while we have a Republican governor and not enough Democratic
votes for an veto override.
So the Layfayette bridge is doomed! I think people will believe the smiling
pretty guy like Pawlenty. How could such smiling pretty nice guy put our lives
in danger? Just go to the new ballpark and don't worry.
I think we should print new bumper stickers "No New Taxes" written over the
picture of the fallen I35 bridge.
(and so I leaving humming to myself)
The 35 bridge is falling down, falling down
Layfayette bridge is falling down, falling down
Take the taxes and build a park, build a park
Just don't worry
Grace Kelly nicknamed Kelly
Humming curmudgeon in Merriam Park