Let me get this straight, we are cutting public works on our crumbling infrastructure

[iemitsu]

11. Yesterday, north of me on I-5, a bridge, spanning the Skagit River

collapsed, dropping two cars and three people into the chilly river below. Fortunately, the people got out of the river safely.
We used to maintain our interstate highway system. It is vital to our living in this area.
Union organized, civil service engineers and crews were employed by state and local governments to make sure these arteries were kept open. It was good for business and good for people.
Today, we are broke, or told we are broke. The professional government crews are gone, the result of the insane push to privatize every public asset, and they have been replaced by expensive, profit driven mega-firms and their cost cutting policies and under-paid, non-union employees.
Anti-tax initiatives (which benefit only business owners and the wealthy) are on the ballot every election cycle. Everyone is broke so they vote for the anti-tax measures and things get worse.
The cost of higher education is creating a generation of debt peons. This is unacceptable and unfair. American students can't afford advanced degrees because their debt requires servitude while foreign students, with little or no debt, take all the places in our graduate programs.
As long as money dictates politics I don't see things getting any better.