Archived Collapsing America: America's Infrastructure Decaying into 3rd World Status (investmentwatchblog.com)
submitted ago by pcdude
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Archived Collapsing America: America's Infrastructure Decaying into 3rd World Status (investmentwatchblog.com)
submitted ago by pcdude
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[–] Rottcodd 0 points 8 points 8 points (+8|-0) ago
I think that the quality of the infrastructure should be one of the primary measures of the quality of a nation's government, and arguably THE primary measure. It's probably the most basic and straightforward service a government is expected to provide, and any government that does a lousy job of it is self-evidently a lousy government.
[–] forgetmyname 0 points 2 points 2 points (+2|-0) ago
A lousy government is exactly what one would expect from a lousy population.
[–] Rottcodd ago
I would say that you have chicken and egg exactly reversed.
A lousy government benefits from a population that's shallow, ignorant and driven by emotion, since such people are much more easily manipulated than people who are deep, knowledgeable and reasonable. So a lousy government that wishes to remain in place and remain lousy has a vested interest in creating a population that's shallow, ignorant and driven by emotion, and that's exactly what they do.
It's not an accident that, for instance, the American public education system has been co-opted by the federal government, which has put regulations in place that effectively require schools to invest all of their time and resources into teaching students what to think rather than how to think. That's a specific policy intended to ensure the establishment of a population that's as shallow, ignorant and emotive as possible.
And yes - once the trend toward a shallow, ignorant and emotive population is established, that does indeed generate even more lousy government (and shallow, ignorant and emotive children), so it becomes a sort of self-sustaining circle (or more to the point, a downward spiral), so there is some legitimacy to reversing the cause and effect. But I think it's obvious that, ultimately, it's the government that's driving the process, as evidenced by the resistance it meets from the population and the efforts it goes to in order to overcome that resistance. If the cause and effect were the other way around, the government would simply be swept along in a veritable stampede toward lousiness.