A Crumbling Legacy
One of the most important parts of proposed Stimulus/Recover plans put forth by the President involves repair of infrastructure. Our roads and bridges are in desperate need of repair and upgrading. This however is not a new condition or one that should not have been anticipated. After years of right wing policies that made infrastructure spending a low priority, the crumbling bridges and roads of America have become the proof of a legacy of neglect.
As the daily reports come in documenting the failure of key bridges around the country, a couple of thing seem to be unavoidable. There needs to be a major commitment to repairing and improving our infrastructure, and it needs to be done now! While there can be no doubt about the necessity for working on our infrastructure, the need for taking this opportunity now has become a political issue for those who oppose the President on philosophical grounds. They often speak of the debt we will be passing on to our children and the danger that a commitment to large scale infrastructure development could pose to our immediate and long-term economic health. They often raise the specter of "Big Government", using all the old stock phrases. They do this while ignoring that the problems we now are forced to address have their legacy in the Reagan era's policies that have guided the direction of domestic policy for the last three decades.
Because of the three decades of Reaganomics inspired policies the country has lacked the necessary commitment of resources to modernizing our infrastructure. We stood pat as the rest of the world moved forward, and in some cases caught up and moved ahead of us in areas where we had long been leaders. A general feeling that we didn't need to spend supplanted the recognition that spending on the infrastructure is an investment in the country's future.
Obama faces many problems but also has before him a great opportunity. As we are about to begin the second decade of the 21th century, the necessity of making major changes. We need to change such things as in the way we generate and use energy. We have to also incorporate new technologies in order to address problems with our environment and climate change. Fundamental changes in every aspect of the nation's on-going development are needed to address problems that threaten our quality of life. The Reagan legacy of neglect must be addressed with a long-term commitment to repairing our infrastructure while incorporating new technologies. The government must take bold steps based on a philosophy of moving America to the lead in technological development. To do this will require that we invest in the future. Failure to start that investment now will be catastrophic to our future.
