So how many folks out there are thinking along the same lines as I am, that the collapse of the Champlain Towers building in Florida is an apt metaphor for the state of the country in general? Ignored, unattended to, cheapskated and ready to collapse? When a 40-year-old residential high rise collapses and crushes everyone in their homes we have passed a point of crisis. These things tend to seem to come out of the blue. Everything is bopping along in normal “low-level crisis mode” with everyone willfully ignoring the fact that we live in a swindler’s society, in which corporations rule, they make their own laws by either buying corrupt politicians or walling themselves off from the rule of law with an army of lawyers. We are stuck in a country of creeping decrepitude.
Seeing as how the country’s infrastructure has begun its disintegration before our eyes, it’s past time to admit that there is something essentially wrong with a system in which once an individual reaches a certain level of wealth, they are no longer bound by the same laws as ordinary citizens. If its cheaper for a billionaire to buy their way out of any opposition or prosecution for wrongdoing, then let’s face it, there is no law anymore. It’s over, the system is a scam and it’s exposed for everyone to see. Corporations no longer have accountability. Billionaires have no accountability. Those involved in the construction of buildings where families live—no accountability.
Was the Champlain Towers collapse an aberration? The next few years will probably tell whether or not that is true, if the government can’t finally pull themselves together and pass REAL infrastructure improvement. I don’t know how others feel about this, but I thank dog that I live in a one-floor domicile. One would think that folks who buy a condo expect the building to last their lifetime, don’t you think? These were not rental units, not that it really matters, but the thought that you could buy a condo unit to live in for many years, or perhaps your entire life, and the building’s life span itself is shorter than a person’s lifetime? Even if that doesn’t kill you it still seems like a pretty raw deal that a citizen could buy a lifetime residence that is so shoddily built that it collapses on top of you? I believe at this point we need to radically rethink the direction this society is heading towards. Are we going to be living in a society where everything for the normal citizen is crumbling while rent and house prices are through the roof and half the country is earning starvation wages?
If Congress doesn’t get their act together and pass some strong infrastructure legislation we will be accelerating along the path to a downward spiral. This is exactly what the fascists want. I’d say that when things get so bad that a person can’t fall asleep at night because they worry that the crappy building they live in might collapse there’s a problem that requires radical solutions. As usual the narrative will change to fit the desired scenario that the people who are buried in the rubble are to blame because they hesitated to scrape up the money to pay for the renovation of their overpriced residence. It is always the responsibility of the underpaid overworked people on the bottom to pay. Now those residents of Champlain Towers are literally – on the bottom. The Rethugs of course will not lift a finger to help working people. The Dems HAVE TO step up and for once go beyond good manners and play all-out hardball politics and get this done!
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