California’s infrastructure is crumbling just like its culture, freedoms and economic future
02/24/2017 / By JD Heyes
Radical Left-wing Marxists who run the state of California have been belly-aching about secession since Donald J. Trump rode a populist, anti-establishment wave of sentiment nationwide into the White House. But those who are stumping the loudest for a new “Republic of California” should step back, breathe deeply for a few moments, and take an honest, solemn look at their state before making such a rash move.
If they do that, many of them won’t like what they see.
Dominated by the far-Left Democratic Party since the end of the Reagan revolution, California is a mess – culturally, socially, legally and financially. Its residents are selective about which laws they want to be enforced and which they want to be ignored. The state has a debt problem, and while it’s being temporarily controlled by sky-high taxes, soon lawmakers will have to confront a public pension crisis that threatens to consume the budget. The California culture is dramatically different from most of the country. And then there’s that crumbling infrastructure. (RELATED: Mysterious Sinkholes Are Plaguing Vietnam)
As James Poulos, writing for Foreign Policy, puts it in reference to the growing #Calexit movement:
Critics warn that the state’s progressive management has grown paradoxically sclerotic, overseeing a slow-motion public pensions crisis, neglecting infrastructure, and building a budgetary house of cards hostage to fluctuating income tax levels from the resident superrich.
The infrastructure problem is potentially the biggest – and most expensive. Sinkholes instantly appear on roadways, swallowing cars whole. Dams like the one in Oroville are close to failing, which could potentially kill tens of thousands of people because there is no way to escape the rushing onslaught of water. The power grid is old. And no one seems to have an answer – or even seems at all motivated to fix the problems.
As Newstarget reported, more than a dozen years ago officials were warned that the Oroville Dam’s earthen emergency spillway was at risk of failing, putting some 185,000 people in danger should it give way. A few days ago, it nearly did, and still the politicians dither.
“I’m not surprised by any of this that is happening right now because we have been delaying maintenance everywhere,” Hasan Ikhrata, executive director of the Los Angeles-based Southern California Association of Governments, told the Daily Breeze.
“I guess that’s testimony of the amount of maintenance needed in California,” added former San Bernardino Mayor Patrick Morris, referencing sinkholes that appear suddenly below roadways and streets.
In recent years, major arteries into and out of California have also been disabled, usually from weather-related incidents. For instance, in July 2015 tropical storms knocked out an Interstate 10 bridge between Southern California and Phoenix, Arizona, causing a several hours-long detour as repairs were made over the months.
But such incidents don’t just create major inconveniences for residents; they are also massive hits to the state’s economy because they delay or deter commerce. If products can’t get in or out, then that’s a huge financial hit, Ikhrata said. (RELATED: America following in footsteps of Venezuela with polluted water, infrastructure failures and economic collapse)
Some have blamed California’s infrastructure neglect on “human nature” – that is, politicians tend to react to problems rather than plan for them. “We need a little more forethought in our state,” former Assemblyman Mike Gatto, D-Glendale, told the Daily Breeze.
Try a lot more.
Natural News founder/editor Mike Adams, the Health Ranger, was a lot more blunt – and honest – in his assessment of the Oroville Dam problems and why nothing has been done for more than a decade to fix the discrepancy of the earthen spillway.
“California’s Department of Water Resources, however, concluded that there was no problem. Bureaucrats, you see, don’t live beneath the dam, and thus it’s not really their problem. History has repeatedly shown that bureaucrats are particularly bad stewards of things that don’t impact them personally,” he wrote.
J.D. Heyes is a senior writer for NaturalNews.com and NewsTarget.com, as well as editor of The National Sentinel.
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Tagged Under: California, Collapse, culture, infrastructure, society
