A throwaway comment in the July 25 broadcast of NPR’s “On Point” stopped me in my tracks. (If you don’t listen to Tom Ashbrook motoring incisively at speed through incredibly sticky issues, you’re missing some of the best public-affairs programming on air.) In a program on the debt debate, Daniel Mitchell, ostensibly an expert on tax policy at the Cato Institute made reference to “people in the productive sector of the economy” -- meaning the private sector. This kind of reference is common … [Read more...]
Two Unmentionable Words
I was in Salt Lake City some time ago and was advised sotto voce that it would be unwise to voice a certain term. In Kansas it’s just not done either, a local explained. Bruce Katz, who heads the Metropolitan Policy Program at the Brookings Institute no less, suggested less offensive words. These unutterable words? Climate change. In large swaths of the country, bullying by climate-change skeptics has made these words unsuitable for use in civil discourse. “They just start arguments,” … [Read more...]
Stop the Debt Limit Madness
I would not usually comment on the alleged deficit debate -- built around a ginned-up debt-limit-raising “crisis.” But it has move to a new level of fantastical unreality as it allegedly reach its endgame. The conservative radicals in Congress want tax breaks off the table even though many are really juicy targets. Democrats have succumbed to the fallacy that hacking debt now is more essential than creating an economy that generates jobs and wealth. The radicals argue that huge chunks of what … [Read more...]
Book, The Agile City, arrives in May!
I did not expect my book to be so grimly well-timed. The nuclear tragedy in Japan may do permanent damage to nuclear as a “clean” energy source for the future. Spiking oil prices are making at least a few of us think about how we can use less energy. The Agile City makes a case for conservation—through the design of buildings, communities, and transportation. It shows that reducing energy use can put climate-change goals within our grasp quickly and affordably. Urban agility doesn’t … [Read more...]
Why Ban the Beltways
Houston’s third outer beltway would bisect the precious Katy Prairie, but at least it’s advocates are honest about its purpose according to this Streetsblog post: to aid development not mobility. There’s plenty of unmet transportation demand around Houston but it is outer-outer suburban developers who get state road dollars to pave access to their doors -- before they’ve even built. It’s the most egregious example of why I call for banning beltways in my new book The Agile City (above, Las … [Read more...]
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