“The recent quick fade of the Deficit Commission...”
First of all I’m not so sure it did a quick fade. I expect many of these ideas to be debated in the near future.
Secondly I would not compare the work of a “commission” to projects like the hoover dam, etc.
Thirdly I’m glad they didn’t get the required super majority vote which would have done what, exactly? Forced congress to vote up or down on their proposals?
Sorry, that’s not how this country is supposed to work. Bad enough we have too many robed masters usurping the power of the legislatures, we don’t need 18, or 14 out of 18, basically random people restructuring our nation’s economy. That is a job for US through our ELECTED REPRESENTATIVES to do.
And I hope they get on it PDQ and take the good from the commission and toss the rest.
So, more mush from the wimpy middle is what I’d call this from Forbes.
1. I suspect one reason why we don't "do Big Things" anymore -- in the sense the author describes -- is that we have a better understanding of the poor return on investment for so many of these things. I'll use the Apollo program and most tall buildings as two good examples of this. The World Trade Center in New York City, for example, was the tallest building in the world when it was constructed in the early 1970s -- and was such a costly project that it was an enormous boondoggle from Day One.
2. We still do a lot of "Big Things," but we've become so inundated with information, so desensitized to the marvels of human achievement, and so ignorant of current affairs that we simply don't realize just how "Big" these things are, if we even know they exist at all. One good example that made news in a very negative way was the BP oil platform in the Gulf of Mexico. I don't think a lot of people realize just how much of a "Big Thing" it is for oil to be drilled in water that is more than 5,000 feet deep. I'd also use the ongoing railroad project in North Baltimore, Ohio as an example of something that just doesn't get a lot of attention. CSX Railways is in the process of constructing what will be the largest intermodal rail yard in North America there right now, and when it is completed it will completely revolutionize the freight rail network in the Northeast.
Item #2 is a good example of a "Big Thing" that has a value far beyond its physical characteristics. It's just another example of a "Big Thing" we do today that is largely a major refinement of ordinary infrastructure and existing technology to make something work a hell of a lot more efficiently. Here's another awesome illustration of just how well we have been able to refine existing technology to an extraordinary degree:
25 Hours of FedEx Flight Operations
If you had told people even during the peak of U.S. technological superiority (say, the 1960s during the height of the NASA space program) that one day they'd be able to deliver a package from New York City to Los Angeles in less than 12-14 hours -- for not much more than the cost of a typical pizza pie -- they'd think you were crazy.
>> Why Can’t We Do Big Things Anymore?
Greed and envy.
What happened? We got tangled up in Lilliputian chickensh*t, that’s what happened. People got carried away being concerned with minutiae to the point that they couldn’t see the forrest for the trees, nor the trees for the bark. Then they wrote regulations about it and killed virtually any desire among the young to dream because they weren’t allowed to do it, whatever it was.
< Oh come on... that generation did everything they could to pass on their values. They were shouted down by the power of television in the 50's and 60's - the early voices of the victimized left. The children of the sixties drum marched with Hollywood's angry malcontents...
It is because there were two world wars that destroyed competition while America remained intact and geared for production. America did not lose millions of people and was not literally destroyed.
In the last half century the world has rebuilt and is able to be competitive again. The present world is no longer handicapped by the need to rebuild everything including people. Money and effort can and have been redirected to living rather than just existing.
People from all over the destroyed world migrated to America and had two things on their mind no more war, ever and become America wealthy.
This process has not been evenly distributed over time but it happened. China and India are now emergent say 25 years after Europe and Japan.
Russia tried but failed in the process and still suffers. The people of the Mideast are no longer choked by the Ottoman empire and have developed their resources and are thriving beyond the wildest dreams of 25 years ago.
I think the author hit on a big theme here. Lawyers and insurance companies have done a bang-up job of bubble-wrapping life and hence ensuring that risk become too....risky.
The bottle we drank from:
http://nationaljuggernaut.blogspot.com/2009/09/this-cartoon-seemed-far-fetched-in-1948.html
Because we(our government) is pre-occupied with tiny things.
At some level..it is our (We the People’s) fault for having allowed this to happen.
Lawyers.