Living Car Free - George Will Continues to Struggle with Facts

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2009/5/19/732962/-George-Wills-continued-struggles-with-facts

Here's Will's column in its entirety, if you're so inclined.

http://www.newsweek.com/id/197925

It subverted their agenda of expanding government—meaning their—supervision of other people's lives.

That's absurd. As a gun-toting libertarian conservative, one of the main reasons I love to live car free is it REDUCES the supervision and control of government. I need no registration, no license, no nothing. I am burdened by almost no rules, and cops never bother me. I can do whatever I want, go wherever I want, whenever I want. No streets are closed, no barricade effective. The state has almost no control over me on a bike, and I have no need for them. It's real freedom.

Yes, those Democrats only want to control everything everyone does. That's why, with Obama now in power, there is a secret plan to have all Americans fitted with RFID chips under their skin and determine kids' aptitudes and assign future jobs in Kindergarten.

What a clown.

He must have never seen a bicycle on a street while it rode past him in traffic.

He's getting nutso in his old age... did you see his article a few weeks back about how jeans were ruining the world (something to that effect)..

Him and his silly bow ties...

Lol.

Here's an excerpt from Will's Newsweek column. I added emphasis to the part about bikes.


You might think the Department of Transportation would be a refuge from Washington's inundation of painfully earnest and pitilessly incessant talk about "remaking" this (health care, Detroit) and "transforming" that (the energy sector, the planet's temperature). Transportation, after all, is about concrete practicalities—planes, trains and automobiles, steel, asphalt and concrete.

Furthermore, the new transportation secretary, Ray LaHood, was until January a Republican congressman practicing militant middle-of-the-roadism. He knows what plays in Peoria, and not just figuratively: He is from there. Peoria is a meatloaf, macaroni-and-cheese, down-to-earth place, home of Caterpillar, the maker of earthmoving machines for building roads, runways, dams and things.

LaHood, however, has been transformed. Indeed, about three bites into lunch, the T word lands with a thump: He says he has joined a "transformational" administration: "I think we can change people's behavior." Government "promoted driving" by building the Interstate Highway System—"you talk about changing behavior." He says, "People are getting out of their cars, they are biking to work." High-speed intercity rail, such as the proposed bullet train connecting Los Angeles and San Francisco, is "the wave of the future." And then, predictably, comes the P word: Look, he says, at Portland, Ore.


Riding the aforementioned wave to Portland, which liberals hope is a harbinger of America's future, has long been their aerobic activity of choice. But LaHood is a Republican, for Pete's sake, the party (before it lost its bearings) of "No, we can't" and "Actually, we shouldn't" and "Not so fast" and "Let's think this through." Now he is in full "Yes we can!" mode. Et tu, Ray?

Where to start? Does LaHood really think Americans were not avid drivers before a government highway program "promoted" driving? Does he think 0.01 percent of Americans will ever regularly bike to work? Intercity high-speed rail probably always will be the wave of the future, for cities more than 300 miles apart. And as for Portland ...

Here is the daily kos response:


Really, what is it about George Will that he acts like such an ass in the face of reality?

In a column that has so much wrong, he writes:


Does [Transportation Secretary Roy LHood] think 0.01 percent of Americans will ever regularly bike to work?

Ygesias:


Will claims to find it unbelievable that as many as 0.01 percent of Americans would ever bike to work regularly. But rather than tossing off ridicule, he might have looked up the Census Bureau’s statistics on commuting patterns and seen that right now 0.4 percent of commuters normally get to work on bicycles. Now that’s a small percentage. But it’s forty times larger than a percentage that Will deems unrealistically utopian. This would be like saying Dwight Howard is 2 feet tall.
The rest of that Will column is equally atrocious, so follow the link above for all the gory details. Yglesias concludes:


Why does Newsweek want to offer its audience a columnist who wants to write about transportation polic but can’t be bothered to bring any facts or logic to the table?



http://www.newsweek.com/id/197925
http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2009/5/19/732962/-George-Wills-continued-struggles-with-facts

LaHood was a featured speaker at the National Bike Summit. It's good to have a Secretary of Transportation who is squarely behind bicyclists.

George Will, William Kristol and Charles Krauthammer need to stay on the right of things. That's their bread and butter. Problem is, the Right these days is in complete disarray. The "ideas" these guys were espousing over the last number of years have been proven a crock of ****.

So now they need to come up with some new ideas. I'm not surprised Will is way low in his estimate of commuting cyclists. He was undoubtedly way off in his estimation of "weapons of mass destruction" in Iraq.

As always... in time... reality will catch up with you.

I was kind of mystified about George Will's column and its total lack of anything that resembles reason, until it occurred to me that he's just currying favor with a Republican Party that has responded to its recent severe ass-whupping by becoming ever more openly Fascist. (It's a political strategy that I sincerely hope meets with the success the GOP so richly deserves.)

While I'm a cycling enthusiast, part-time bike commuter, and advocate for local bike lane and trail construction and other cycling-friendly things, I mostly agree with Will. I don't see a role in any of that for the national DoT. In my opinion (and Will's), the federal government has no business telling people, through the tax code or massive expenditures on pet projects or any other means, how "dense" their communities should be, how they should get to work, how they should spend their leisure time, etc. Those are choices best left to individuals and local communities.

National government intervention in all areas of our lives leads to homogenization by stifling state and local experimentation and initiative. Some will counter that they'll never get bike lanes, or paths, or some other favorite hobby horse in the places they live unless the feds dictate it. My suggestion is that those folks move to a place that's more aligned with their worldview (e.g. Portland). That's the beauty and genius of federalism; there's someplace for almost everyone. I live in New Orleans. I live here, by choice, because I like the music, food, culture, etc. I don't want to live in Portland or Los Angeles or New York or Peoria (I like to visit all those places, though, except Peoria, to which I've never been).

George Will made an argument. A reasoned counter argument is certainly possible, but attacks of the ad hominem (e.g. "nutso") and ad hitlerum (e.g. ...ever more openly fascist") variety are not arguments and those attacks degrade those that make them.

Kurt,

As far as I know, the federal government doesn't and can't dictate what population density cities must build to and what transportation methods people use to get around.

What the federal government currently does is subsidize local governments with transportation and development dollars. The feds also put restrictions on what that money's spent on. As far as I know, the local governments are perfectly welcome to turn the money down if they don't like the strings attached.

As a gun-toting libertarian conservative...

I am a flower-toting pinko liberal, and I am pleased that cycling brings us to the same conclusion on this.

Fight the power, man

jim

its pretty clear that unlimited suburban sprawl is not possible. thus the government is attempting to keep a serious crisis from occurring by attempting to shift development. they aren't on a power trip, rather they are elected to guide policy and they are attempting to promote policies that they feel are best.

George Will made an argument. A reasoned counter argument is certainly possible, but attacks of the ad hominem (e.g. "nutso") and ad hitlerum (e.g. ...ever more openly fascist") variety are not arguments and those attacks degrade those that make them.

no, George Will told some lies. If you don't like it, move to Time.

Kurt,

As far as I know, the federal government doesn't and can't dictate what population density cities must build to and what transportation methods people use to get around.

What the federal government currently does is subsidize local governments with transportation and development dollars. The feds also put restrictions on what that money's spent on. As far as I know, the local governments are perfectly welcome to turn the money down if they don't like the strings attached.

They do try to at least influence and, some would say, dictate things like population density by exterting strong control over most of the public housing and the policy surrounding it.

I think your second paragraph makes my point rather than refuting it. The feds take such a large bite in taxes that it's tough for states to justify the higher taxes that would allow them to forgo federal transportation funding. The result is an ever more homogenous country.

no, George Will told some lies. If you don't like it, move to Time.

Several people on this thread have asserted that Will is lying in this column but I haven't seen any examples. Can you share any?

If it's his assertion that less than 0.01 per cent of people will ever bike to work is what peopled are referring to, I think "lie" is a bit too strong a word. Uninformed or engaging in a bit of hyperbole? Yes, almost certainly, and probably the former as most people can't imagine commuting by bike to be anything other than a fringe activity. But, he certainly didn't seem to be trying to make some kind of detailed statistical argument from a knowingly false position.

If it's something other than that that he's lying about, I'd like to know.

They do try to at least influence and, some would say, dictate things like population density by exterting strong control over most of the public housing and the policy surrounding it.

I think your second paragraph makes my point rather than refuting it. The feds take such a large bite in taxes that it's tough for states to justify the higher taxes that would allow them to forgo federal transportation funding. The result is an ever more homogenous country.

Is "an ever more homogenous country" necessarily a bad thing? I'm sure you don't pine for "the good ol' days" when blacks were denied their civil rights and were barred from voting in the South. It took action by the federal government, i.e. the passage of the Civil Rights Act and the Voting Rights Act and the enforcement of these laws by the Johnson administration to put an end to the situation. We were certainly more homogeneous then, and "states' rights" were used as code words by defenders of segregation and the status quo.

We are now faced with a dire situation (peak oil, dependance on imported oil, global warming...) that requires, once again, strong action by the federal government. We need to work together on this as a nation. Having different states pulling in opposite directions is not in our national interest.

Is "an ever more homogenous country" necessarily a bad thing? I'm sure you don't pine for "the good ol' days" when blacks were denied their civil rights and were barred from voting in the South. It took action by the federal government, i.e. the passage of the Civil Rights Act and the Voting Rights Act and the enforcement of these laws by the Johnson administration to put an end to the situation. We were certainly more homogeneous then, and "states' rights" were used as code words by defenders of segregation and the status quo.

We are now faced with a dire situation (peak oil, dependence on imported oil, global warming...) that requires, once again, strong action by the federal government. We need to work together on this as a nation. Having different states pulling in opposite directions is not in our national interest.

I do think an ever more homogenous country is a bad thing. That, however, doesn't apply to basic freedoms. Those have always been (mostly) homogenous and we should strive to make them ever more so. The Constitution protects citizens against infringements of their rights by local, state and federal governments. The Civil Rights and Voting Rights Acts rightfully extended those fundemental freedoms to those who had previously been unprotected from their governments.

By the way, I don't think we were at all "more homogenous then". State positions on civil and voting rights varied widely from region to region and even within regions. In the case of basic human rights and freedoms the lack of homogenity was a bad thing.

I don't view different states taking different approaches to things as "pulling in opposite directions". I think different approaches to similar problems result from a variety of factors including local conditions (weather, terrain, population density, etc.) and traditions; one size does not fit all. More importantly, though, varied approaches result from honest differences in opinion about how to attack a certain problem. We're more likely to end up with a good universal solution through the experimentation that federalism engenders than through federal fiat (which often results in unintended negative consequences like the SUV being birthed by CAFE standards).

We'll just have to, I suspect, agree to disagree on how dire the situations you mentioned are (anhropogenic climate change and peak oil). I think they're substantially overblown but that if I'm wrong technological adaptation is more likely to be the solution than forced reductions in consumption.

Will's articles always creep me out. I think it is that the falsehoods are mostly unstated or ambiguous. I once watched a friend's brother and friends get stoned on cannabis. He and his buddies started talking the way Will writes, a bunch of thoughts expressed with little coherence and less substance. But the stoners thought they sounded good and laughed at each others absurdities.

"Riding the aforementioned wave to Portland, which liberals hope is a harbinger of America's future, has long been their aerobic activity of choice." In just one sentence, so pregnant with crap, where do you begin debunking? Its really meaningless. He uses numbers as imprecisely as he uses words. The problem with the 0.01 percent statement isn't that it is off by a factor of 40, it is the unquestioning attitude that Americans won't use other modes so don't bother building infrastructure. I sat in on community meetings for transportation projects and engineers- who should be more precise with numbers - said things like "No matter how many non-car transportation facilities are built only 1% of people will use them, therefore it makes no sense to spend 0.05% of the budget on non-car facilities. So, we won't accommodate bike and pedestrian access to those subway stations." I think the idea that George Will's incoherent world view has seeped into important decisions is what creeps me out about his essays.

That's absurd. As a gun-toting libertarian conservative, one of the main reasons I love to live car free is it REDUCES the supervision and control of government. I need no registration, no license, no nothing. I am burdened by almost no rules, and cops never bother me. I can do whatever I want, go wherever I want, whenever I want. No streets are closed, no barricade effective. The state has almost no control over me on a bike, and I have no need for them. It's real freedom.

I don't really describe myself as libertarian (although I do have certain libertarian sympathies) and I'm certainly not a conservative, but this paragraph sums up why it has never made sense to me why so many libertarians and conservatives are so anti-bike. There's nothing inherently left-wing about the technology.

I don't really describe myself as libertarian (although I do have certain libertarian sympathies) and I'm certainly not a conservative, but this paragraph sums up why it has never made sense to me why so many libertarians and conservatives are so anti-bike. There's nothing inherently left-wing about the technology.

Yeah it has never made sense to me why so many who label themselves liberal think that being pro-bike is a liberal thing. I was at a party where two bike advocates where upset that a person who had worked for a republican organization had applied for a job at whatever pro-bike group they worked for. They thought a republican couldn't be an effective bike advocate.

Several people on this thread have asserted that Will is lying in this column but I haven't seen any examples. Can you share any?


There was a lot of press in February around George's stated facts about climate change.

http://www.cjr.org/the_observatory/the_george_will_affair.php

http://scienceblogs.com/intersection/2009/02/george_will_lies_music_to_my_e.php


Then his view of hybrids:

http://www.ecoautoninja.com/eco-hybrid-vehicles/george-will-lies-about-the-prius-13212/

From the article:
" Americans by the scores of millions have been happily trading distance for space, living farther from their jobs in order to enjoy ample backyards and other aspects of low-density living. And long before climate change became another excuse for disparaging America's "automobile culture," many liberal intellectuals were bothered by the automobile. It subverted their agenda of expanding government—meaning their—supervision of other people's lives. Drivers moving around where and when they please? Without government supervision? Depriving themselves and others of communitarian moments on mass transit? No good could come of this.<<<<<<

Therefore, it's better that the government subvert their agenda building billions of dollars in massive highways, roads and bridges? George prefers that I'm supervised into into a life of motor transport? Depriving me of communitarian moments on transit? No good could come of this!

We'll just have to, I suspect, agree to disagree on how dire the situations you mentioned are (anhropogenic climate change and peak oil). I think they're substantially overblown but that if I'm wrong technological adaptation is more likely to be the solution than forced reductions in consumption.

The last president had eight years to expand supply. He provided hundreds of millions in tax cuts to oil companies hoping they were expand supply. Nothing happened. When gas prices started to skyrocket, he went to the middle east with his hand out asking OPEC leaders to pump more gas. Nothing happened. The mantra of "Drill Baby Drill" went out in the hopes of getting Congress to drill on for oil on the west coast but nothing happened.

So now we are going in the other direction of forced reductions in consumption by requiring our bankrupt auto companies to produce fuel efficient cars. The notion that supply side economics would deliver the cheap oil that would enable inexpensive motoring forever are over.

You got to hand it to George Bush. Under his leadership, the price of gas went so high, thousands of more bicycle commuters are hitting the streets than ever. Who ever heard of a hybrid car during the Clinton administration? Nah, it took good old George to really mess things up for all these developments to come about!

Yeah it has never made sense to me why so many who label themselves liberal think that being pro-bike is a liberal thing. I was at a party where two bike advocates where upset that a person who had worked for a republican organization had applied for a job at whatever pro-bike group they worked for. They thought a republican couldn't be an effective bike advocate.I'm on the left side of the center, but it's pretty clear to me that if anything, a Republican who really believes in bicycling would be a better bike advocate than a liberal, because the Republican would be far more effective at appealing to decision-makers who are to the right of center. An advocacy strategy based on appealing to liberals is only going to go so far; a strategy based on garnering support from legislators across the political spectrum will be far more successful, in my opinion.

Demerits to those two advocates who want to keep their base small and comfy.

The last president had eight years to expand supply. He provided hundreds of millions in tax cuts to oil companies hoping they were expand supply. Nothing happened. When gas prices started to skyrocket, he went to the middle east with his hand out asking OPEC leaders to pump more gas. Nothing happened. The mantra of "Drill Baby Drill" went out in the hopes of getting Congress to drill on for oil on the west coast but nothing happened.

So now we are going in the other direction of forced reductions in consumption by requiring our bankrupt auto companies to produce fuel efficient cars. The notion that supply side economics would deliver the cheap oil that would enable inexpensive motoring forever are over.

You got to hand it to George Bush. Under his leadership, the price of gas went so high, thousands of more bicycle commuters are hitting the streets than ever. Who ever heard of a hybrid car during the Clinton administration? Nah, it took good old George to really mess things up for all these developments to come about!

Actually, supply increased a great deal during this decade but demand increased just as much or more. I'm sure the tax cuts in the US played some role in the rising demand, but the vast majority is attributable to the normal business cycle. 9/11 probably had some short-term negative effect on demand while active hurricane seasons in 2004 and 2005 had a negative effect on domestic supplies. The tax breaks for domestic production enacted in 2004 and 2005 certainly had some positive effect on production. Countless other factors impact world oil supply and demand but few have much to do with who's occupying the White House.

Regarding gas prices, excepting a relatively brief price spike in the Spring and Summer of 2008, gas prices in this decade have been near or below the inflation adjusted average price for gas since 1918 (http://www.inflationdata.com/inflation/images/charts/Oil/Gasoline_inflation_chart.htm). That spike was mainly attributable to a booming worldwide economy, especially to the fast growth in China and India.

There has been much talk of alternatives to the internal combustion engine propelled car since at least the Arab oil embargo in 1973. It happens everytime there's any quick increase in the price of gas. The Toyota Prius was introduced in Japan in 1997 and in this country in 2001; someone must have heard of it as far back as 1992 or so. In fact, I remember ads in the back of Popular Mechanics for hybrid conversions for picjup trucks in the early 80s.

Actually, supply increased a great deal during this decade but demand increased just as much or more. I'm sure the tax cuts in the US played some role in the rising demand, but the vast majority is attributable to the normal business cycle. 9/11 probably had some short-term negative effect on demand while active hurricane seasons in 2004 and 2005 had a negative effect on domestic supplies. The tax breaks for domestic production enacted in 2004 and 2005 certainly had some positive effect on production. Countless other factors impact world oil supply and demand but few have much to do with who's occupying the White House.

US production has NOT increased this decade - it has been dropping steadily this decade from 5.9 Mil bpd to 4.8 mbd currently, while consumption has increased (EIA production data). Hard to read the table I tried to insert but we increased consumption every year and decreased production every year.

Consumption - Production
2001
2002 +0.6% -0.8%
2003 +1.4% -1.3%
2004 +3.5% -4.6%
2005 +0.6% -4.4%
2006 -0.5% -1.5%
2007 +.05% -0.05

The only increase in production came from OPEC countries as the US, North Sea, Mexico, Saudi Ghawar and other giants all have declined significantly (they are past peak). World oil production peaked in July 2008 at 74.82 million barrels/day (mbd) and now has fallen to about 71 mbd (EIA). It is expected that oil production will decline slowly to about December 2010 as OPEC production increases while non-OPEC production decreases.

After 2010 the resulting annual production decline rate increases to 3.4% as OPEC production is unable to offset cumulative non-OPEC declines. This is where life as we know it is going to change significantly, since there will not be enough oil to go around, especially if the economy tries to make a recovery. We are basically headed for a train wreck.

While I'm a cycling enthusiast, part-time bike commuter, and advocate for local bike lane and trail construction and other cycling-friendly things, I mostly agree with Will. I don't see a role in any of that for the national DoT. In my opinion (and Will's), the federal government has no business telling people, through the tax code or massive expenditures on pet projects or any other means, how "dense" their communities should be, how they should get to work, how they should spend their leisure time, etc. Those are choices best left to individuals and local communities.

National government intervention in all areas of our lives leads to homogenization by stifling state and local experimentation and initiative. Some will counter that they'll never get bike lanes, or paths, or some other favorite hobby horse in the places they live unless the feds dictate it. My suggestion is that those folks move to a place that's more aligned with their worldview (e.g. Portland). That's the beauty and genius of federalism; there's someplace for almost everyone. I live in New Orleans. I live here, by choice, because I like the music, food, culture, etc. I don't want to live in Portland or Los Angeles or New York or Peoria (I like to visit all those places, though, except Peoria, to which I've never been).

George Will made an argument. A reasoned counter argument is certainly possible, but attacks of the ad hominem (e.g. "nutso") and ad hitlerum (e.g. ...ever more openly fascist") variety are not arguments and those attacks degrade those that make them.

How do you think we got the infrastructure we currently enjoy (or endure, depending on your point of view)? Interstate highways, car-centric transportation systems, urban sprawl, the proliferation of shopping malls and tract housing, etc., were all made possible by federal policy decisions made decades ago. Local decision-making played a role, to be sure, but it's not like they had town-hall meetings and uniformly implemented the will of the people. Let's not pretend that what we have now happened completely, organically by accident.

Presently, as a result of those federal policy decisions, in a lot of areas, people actually need to spend thousands of dollars of their own money every year to use a transportation infrastructure that costs hundreds of billions of tax dollars just to maintain. It's not efficient, it's not pleasant, and it's not sustainable in the long term. We need to come up with better ideas. George Will's columns offer nothing but grouchy complaints against people who are at least attempting something different. Why should anyone take his comments seriously?

How do you think we got the infrastructure we currently enjoy (or endure, depending on your point of view)? Interstate highways, car-centric transportation systems, urban sprawl, the proliferation of shopping malls and tract housing, etc., were all made possible by federal policy decisions made decades ago. Local decision-making played a role, to be sure, but it's not like they had town-hall meetings and uniformly implemented the will of the people. Let's not pretend that what we have now happened completely, organically by accident.

So let me see if I can recap: You don't like much of what we got from prior federal government action (e.g. urban sprawl, tract housing, and malls, etc.) and want more of it?

Presently, as a result of those federal policy decisions, in a lot of areas, people actually need to spend thousands of dollars of their own money every year to use a transportation infrastructure that costs hundreds of billions of tax dollars just to maintain. It's not efficient, it's not pleasant, and it's not sustainable in the long term. We need to come up with better ideas. George Will's columns offer nothing but grouchy complaints against people who are at least attempting something different. Why should anyone take his comments seriously?
The things you mention are not universally regarded as inefficent, unpleasant, or unsustainable. Many people like those things. They like having space and privacy and the convenience and variety that numerous retail outlets offer. They believe that our transportation infrastructure is one of the things that allowed us to become the richest country in the world. They believe that free markets are self correcting and the most efficient way to allocate resources.

Is it all beer and skittles? No, but as you so adeptly pointed out in your first paragraph, more federal government intervention will likely have more unintended results.

"We're" coming up with better ideas all the time. Zoning laws in many states and localities limit sprawl. Manufacturing is ever more efficient and less polluting. People, of their own accord and because of private advocacy (and because our wealth makes them able to afford it), have decided that they want more locally-grown, less processed, less industrial food and markets and home gardens have sprung up as a result. People, again of their own accord, have recognized the benefits urban living offers and have been returning to gentrifying downtowns in many cities. Where government intervention has played a positive role in these things, it's almost always been local governments.

George Will is probably grouchy because he continues to see these calls for federal government action that have been shown time and again to be, at best, ineffective.

George Will is probably grouchy because he continues to see these calls for federal government action that have been shown time and again to be, at best, ineffective.

Would you be able to list any of those ineffective programs (preferably keep your examples in the transportation sector)?

George Will writes:
"Americans by the scores of millions have been happily trading distance for space, living farther from their jobs in order to enjoy ample backyards and other aspects of low-density living."

Although I think George Will is a bit of a d0uche, I think this particular comment is correct. In the course of the conversations that I have had with ordinary working class and middle class Americans that I have worked with over the years, it has become apparent that most regard a long and expensive commute as a small price to pay for having a decent chunk of space to call their own. There is probably a point at which it would become unaffordable, but I think they'd continue to tolerate it even if the price were quite a bit higher than it currently is. Maybe their living arrangement could be salvaged with rapid rail transit, four day work weeks, telecommuting, or narrowing the space that would would be willing to commute to.

I care about living within biking distance of my job, but most people aren't like me. Also, I can empathize, as I far prefer the detached rental house with a yard that I currently share with two friends over all the apartments I have ever lived in.

Would you be able to list any of those ineffective programs (preferably keep your examples in the transportation sector)?
Here's three off the top of my head:

All the mostly worthless, earmarked transportation projects that get jammed into the federal budget every FY (e.g.bridges to nowhere);
The birthing of the SUV by the CAFE standards;
The combination of tax credits for bio fuels and mandated ethanol content in gasoline that simultaneously raised energy and food prices.

The things you mention are not universally regarded as inefficent, unpleasant, or unsustainable. Many people like those things. They like having space and privacy and the convenience and variety that numerous retail outlets offer. They believe that our transportation infrastructure is one of the things that allowed us to become the richest country in the world. They believe that free markets are self correcting and the most efficient way to allocate resources.

Is it all beer and skittles? No, but as you so adeptly pointed out in your first paragraph, more federal government intervention will likely have more unintended results.

Our country became the richest in the world during the first half of the 20th century, well before most of the car-centered infrastructure we now have was put in place. At our moment of greatest growth, 1900-1945, we relied mostly on public transport and human-powered means of getting around, much as China has done during its period of explosive growth. Coincidence? Probably not. If anything, the vast network of congested roads that we've built is more of a net cost to our economy than an engine of growth. The costs are staggering. We spend hundreds of billions of dollars so that millions of people can spend thousands of their own dollars every year sitting in traffic and getting frustrated and/or angry. I can't help but think that there has got to be a better way to get people from their houses to their jobs without this level of public expense. What we have now is a perverse form of socialism that benefits the wealthy few and forces the masses to buy cars to get to their often low-paying jobs.

Funny, the start of the period of growth you describe (1900-1945) coincides almost exactly with the start of the auto industry in the US. I think Ford sold his first car in 1896 or so and FoMoCo started selling cars in 1903. Coincidence?

I think it silly to suggest that our roads are a net drag on the economy. If you can provide any support for that, I'd love to see it.

There may well be a better way for people to get to and from their houses and jobs. The entrepreneurs who figure it out and create the market(s) will make a lot of money.

The masses in this country have much more materially than the middle class and wealthy of just a century ago. The average person living below or near the poverty line has adequate shelter, plenty of clothing, more than enough to eat and a variety of luxury and non-essential goods (multiple color TVs and other electronics, refrigerators, cars, etc.). They also don't have to worry about the safety of their drinking water or food or the insect-spread deadly and debilitating diseases that afflict the truly poor (and not so poor) in much of the world. If that has resulted from a "perverse form of socialism", I'll take it. So would billions of the abjectly poor in rural China, sub-Saharan Africa, and India. Of course, this nation is probably the least socialistic in the developed world, but why let facts get in the way of a point you're making? (Yes, I understand that there are some truly poor people in this country and I don't derogate their plight, but there are very few of them relative to the total population.)

Here's three off the top of my head:

All the mostly worthless, earmarked transportation projects that get jammed into the federal budget every FY (e.g.bridges to nowhere);
The birthing of the SUV by the CAFE standards;
The combination of tax credits for bio fuels and mandated ethanol content in gasoline that simultaneously raised energy and food prices.



The first two aren't government programs, I'm not sure about the last. How
about the policy of easy money for suburban construction but tight money for
home improvement loans in the city? How about subsidizing air travel but not
passenger rail? It seems like if you look at the activities of most large complex organizations you can find ineffective actions and mistakes. Successful organizations systematically identify their ineffective actions and correct their behavior. The thing is sometimes organizations can't see the ineffective actions, they get caught up in habits. After going car-free it is easy for me to see how car-culture is one of those blind spots. I was talking to a guy on the train last night and he's thanking me for making a "sacrifice" to be "green". He acted all weird when I corrected him and told him I'm car free out of selfishness and life is a lot better without a car. The old more money, better health, more time, less hassle mantra didn't sink in.

Here's three off the top of my head:


All the mostly worthless, earmarked transportation projects that get jammed into the federal budget every FY (e.g.bridges to nowhere);
The birthing of the SUV by the CAFE standards;
The combination of tax credits for bio fuels and mandated ethanol content in gasoline that simultaneously raised energy and food prices.



Thanks for the list, Kurt. Interesting that those projects were all enacted in GOP administrations, mostly with GOP majorities in Congress.

The first two aren't government programs, I'm not sure about the last. How
about the policy of easy money for suburban construction but tight money for
home improvement loans in the city? How about subsidizing air travel but not
passenger rail? It seems like if you look at the activities of most large complex organizations you can find ineffective actions and mistakes. Successful organizations systematically identify their ineffective actions and correct their behavior. The thing is sometimes organizations can't see the ineffective actions, they get caught up in habits. After going car-free it is easy for me to see how car-culture is one of those blind spots. I was talking to a guy on the train last night and he's thanking me for making a "sacrifice" to be "green". He acted all weird when I corrected him and told him I'm car free out of selfishness and life is a lot better without a car. The old more money, better health, more time, less hassle mantra didn't sink in.

If we're going to get all pedantic, please note that "program" was the word Roody used; I said "government action" and think the examples I provided qualify as government action.

I'm not sure where your info on easy money for one type of housing versus another comes from, so I can't comment on it directly. I do know that when the government or it's quasi-governmental lending arms have browbeat lenders into making "social justice" the prime criteria on lending decisions instead of the borrowers' ability to pay, the results have been ugly (e.g. our current housing/credit fiasco). (And yes, I know the financial sector shares more than a little of the blame for their complicity and greed in the housing/credit mess.)

Rail travel is heavily subsidized. In fact, there's not a single mass transit system (rail or bus) anywhere in this country that doesn't get the majority of it's funding from subsidies from some level of government (except New York which is about 52-48 in favor of fares over subsidies).

Over the last couple of decades, highways received, from the federal level, a negative net subsidy. That is, more federal tax dollars (mostly in fuel taxes) were taken in by the federal government than they spend on highways. Even with the modest sums the feds spend on bike lanes and trails cycling probably can't say that. Moreover, air and highway subsidies, on a per passenger mile basis, are by far the cheapest systems we have from the federal spending perspective. In other words, the mostly private parts of the transportation sector (highways and commercial air) are much cheaper, from the perspective of federal subsidies, than the mostly public parts (rail and bus). I bet that we you add in state subsidies and revenues the numbers are even more skewed.

Of course there are other costs of each of these systems (e.g. pollution and state/local subsidies for each) that aren't counted here. There are also benefits that acrue to each that must be accounted for in any rational discussion (health benefits of cycling, lower personal costs for the bus-rail-cycling-pedestrian axis, time savings for personal vehicles and air travel in many situations).

I'm not car free, but I also bike-commute for the same self-interested reasons you do.

Rail is profitable for transporting cargo. As far as transporting humans goes, it will probably remain a subsidized operation -- usually spearheaded by planners with quasi-utopian motivations -- at least until flying and driving become prohibitively expensive due to fuel costs.

I think a civilization based upon rail, sail, dirigible and bicycle can sustain itself for far longer than our current civilization, but we will only adopt the former after the present one becomes physically impossible. People won't abandon the car and airplane voluntarily.

Thanks for the list, Kurt. Interesting that those projects were all enacted in GOP administrations, mostly with GOP majorities in Congress.
I don't think it's helpful to bring party politics into this kind of discussion; that always ends badly, in my experience. I think I've kept my comments on the policy level and will endeavor to continue to do so.

Earmarks were not enacted by either party. They have been abused by both. Their are pork kings on both sides of the aisle (Stevens, Bird, Murtha, Young).

CAFE has been around for over thirty years. It has survived and been enhanced/modified by Congresses and presidents of both parties.

I think ethonal subsidies originated in the Carter Administration but those too have survived Congresses and presidents of both parties. Ditto mandated ethanol blending.