Nation Building: Roads, Laws, Cops, Jobs And The Challenges Of The Afghan Surge

You wouldn't believe how the stimulus reached my neck of the woods.  Ok, I'll tell you.

When politician­s say "Grow our way out of debt", what that actually looks like is massive loss of open green space to land developmen­t.  The land in between cities gets subdivided­, homes and shopping centers, etc.  Homes on larger tracts of land (old farms, 20 acres or more, or country homes on larger acreage) get subdivided­, new homes built on anywhere from 1 to 5 acres, but here's the rub:  There's no infrastruc­ture for supporting it.

That's what happened under Clinton.  

By 1998, the county I lived in had grown by nearly 1/3rd.  The highways feeding into it hadn't changed, hadn't expanded, nor had any major roads been built off them.  The same roads and highways had to accommodat­e close to 200,000 more people traveling them on a daily basis, PLUS all of the tourists (huge tourism developmen­t, too).

The stimulus money went to add one lane to the highway coming into the county. 

What made living here desirable, the way and pace of life, is now a nightmare of gridlock, road rage, etc.
About Afghanistan
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