August 7, 2007 at 07:10:52

The Bridge Too Far

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8 5 07

The Bridge Too Far

By Mary Lyon

The bridge disaster in Minneapolis should finally make us face the bridge we really have to repair. There is another bridge that needs crossing. And it's that unmentionable bridge, that fearsome Bridge-That-Must-Not-Be-Named, The Bridge WAY Too Far, especially for America's loyal, patriotic CONservatives. They fear to tread that way even more than they shrink from accountability. More than they dread bringing an end to their war of choice. More than they even fear bin Laden or Saddam or some boogeyman to be named later. In fact, to them, the worst terrorist of all isn't either of these, or any of their friends or associates. It's the obligation to pay taxes especially to the federal government.

What much of America still doesn't want to understand or accept is the harsh but necessary reality that comes with a large, sprawling society with many shared needs and demands. Like, say, maybe a bridge about which we can feel secure when we drive onto it. The Minneapolis bridge disaster is just the latest disgrace that illustrates America's refusal to connect the dots. It motivated me to revisit an effort to do just that, written in time for last Halloween called "The Last Scare Tactic":

http://www.worldnewstrust.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=511

The bottom line, there and here, is simply this:

We CANNOT have a successful democracy in which all are created equal and all pledging allegiance to the same flag, nor can we have any semblance of genuine "Homeland Security," without the financial underpinnings that come from tax money. We just can't. In the larger issues and crises that cross state lines (Hurricane Katrina), span every demographic group (universal health care), and otherwise outstrip a community, city, or state's ability to cope (the I-35W bridge collapse), tax money is an essential ingredient.

Just in that last one, the bridge tragedy, the benefits are shared, so the support should also be shared. We are all affected. Every walk of life, with every agenda, reason, destination, and political leaning imaginable drove across that bridge. It was and is a common property, a public work, for everyone's use. It wasn't slipped under some lucky bureaucrat's pillow by the Tooth Fairy one night. Jeannie didn't fold her arms in front of her chest and blink and simply conjure it up. Neither did Harry Potter. That bridge was born thanks to millions of midwives who covered its construction with taxes paid. The costs to restore it will come from public coffers, every bit as much as its collapse resulted from the penny-wise/pound-foolish wish to shave a nickel here and cut a dollar there, and postpone the rest for someone else to worry about later. Cut corners now so the inevitable failure later will punch out somebody else's ticket. Save a couple of dimes now so that many multiples of dollars later will have to be coughed up maybe by the Tooth Fairy or somebody.

In the interests of full disclosure, I, too, would like not to have to pay so many taxes. But I understand what those taxes are meant to underwrite. That's one of many reasons why I continue vehemently to oppose the war. We're spending roughly 100-thousand bucks A MINUTE in Iraq, building bridges and roads that are blown up, frequently, before they're even finished. We're pouring money down that rat hole with little or nothing in terms of return on investment. HOW MANY bridges like Interstate 35W could be repaired or retrofitted to prevent another collapse like the one we just saw across the northern Mississippi River? How many lives could we avoid losing?

The Minneapolis bridge calamity will, hopefully, underscore that overriding bridge that simply HAS to be crossed: we CANNOT afford to keep cutting taxes. Studies on other bridges around the country show that there are many of them are in greater danger of disaster than the I-35W.

http://www.cnn.com/2007/US/08/02/bridge.structure/#cnnSTCOther1

Should we just keep dancing along, cutting taxes, while more of our bridges circle the drain? And that's just a single issue. I've said this before and I'll repeat it here:

Just once, I'd like to see our guys stand up and explain exactly WHY it is that we have those annoying taxes to face, to begin with. Maybe they're a necessary evil, but the word "necessary" comes before the word "evil" in this clichÃ© for a reason. As Ronald Reagan came to power, fiendish thinkers like Newt Gingrich were already working it. He was the guy behind the "Wisdom of Chairman Newt" a nefarious little black book of catch phrases, slogans, and buzzwords to use as cheat-sheets for a kind of political "Mad-Lib" game. There was a list of good and positive words and phrases to be used whenever one spoke of anything conservative, reactionary, or Republican. There was a corresponding list of negatives for use to describe all things liberal, progressive, or Democratic. Taxes, as expected, got lumped into the bad group as in the term "tax RELIEF" implying that taxes were something you needed RELIEF from ie: something bad. And because nobody's ever tried to attack this general strategy head-on, that misrepresentation has been allowed to stand, unassailed, for almost three decades. Americans need some help connecting the dots, because taxes do not exist in a vacuum. Our Dems need to get specific and explain WHAT we pay those taxes FOR:

Let's start with the bridge. If you don't want to pay taxes, FINE. Try not to be terrified every time you have to steer your car toward some delicately-arching bridge over a mighty river or a crowded freeway. Try not to think of what will happen the longer those bridges are neglected and fall further and further into disrepair.

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Mary Lyon is a veteran broadcaster ad five-time Golden Mike Award winner, who has anchored, reported, and written for the Associated Press Radio Network, NBC Radio "The Source," and many Los Angeles-area stations including KRTH-FM/AM, (more...)

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