Going Backwards Down a Gravel Road

I've read a couple of articles recently that talk about the idea that a large percentage of Americans now think that today's children will not have an America as powerful or as prosperous as when they become adults. I'm not sure that I agree with that assessment. I'm not even sure how you quantify it. And I'm not convinced that any feelings I might have that would agree with that opinion aren't just the normal musings of a person "a little" past middle age, or maybe just reflective of my current disgust with our socialist leadership and the long term damage they are inflicting.

Then, a couple of weeks ago when we were back at the Northern Compound in Michigan, I heard a news report that one area county had decided that rather than fix a few local paved roads which had deteriorated badly, they were going to revert them to gravel. Yep. No money, and no longer a priority apparently. Grind up whats left of the old, tired asphalt, and take them back to 1950-something condition.

I assume that you are starting to see the connection I'm making here.

At one time, not that long ago, we tamed thousands and thousands of old country roads with asphalt, guard rails, graded shoulders and real bridges across little creeks, not just big steel culverts. During that same era, we also built an entire interstate system across the country. Most of this was done in about a thirty or forty-year period. Apparently we had the money and the will to do these things. Why do we not have the same things required just to maintain them?

I know. This is a small point to be making in the bigger question, but I made the connection in my head anyway. How and why is it, that we could we ride down a nice, smooth, and paved country road in our new 1965 Pontiac, but now, we need to rattle down the same road in our 2010 something-or-other, on gravel ??! That isn't what I call progress, and in fact, might point to exactly the kind of thing that indicates a country going the wrong way.

Of course we could, and should, expand the issue beyond just a few country roads to really consider our entire infrastructure of roads, bridges, sewers, water-mains, etc., etc.. When we do that, then the question of what we will leave our children is a very legitimate one, and I'm afraid of the answer. But why is it that way, and does anyone really care?