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The right assumes the government is incompetent, and then crafts policy to kneecap government at every opportunity. The left assumes the government could be co

The right assumes the government is incompetent, and then crafts policy to kneecap government at every opportunity. The left assumes the government could be competent, but only if everyone tries to make it so, and they know what the right is doing (all of this policy is completely aboveboard and public). Net result, everyone can safely assume the government is incompetent. It is much easier to prevent it from working than to make it work. We'd have to have bipartisan interest in making it work effectively, and we do not have that.

tcmart14 4y ago
Or another way to put it, it actually requires effort to make it work, but it requires no effort to not make it work. Its about like saying "hey that kid is drowning! I could swim and go save him, but instead I am going to go get a Slurpee."
- kansface 4y ago
  No, in my estimate, its more like, you have to be willing to piss some people off to make stuff go. Perhaps better wording would be that you can't accomplish things without sacrifice. We aren't willing to do that. You can't have CA's environmental review process and timely/cost effective construction. You can't have SF's discretionary review process and ... any construction, really. You can't solve the housing crisis without building housing, but to do that, you'd actually have to build housing. The cost of that housing is multiples of the public sectors budget, so you'd need to first of all, admit that, and then allow the private sector to do it. The private sector only does stuff that makes a profit... so we'd just rather not build housing than change regulations. Now, we get to say we like affordable housing and protecting the environment when our policies don't result in affordable housing and we push people out of environmentally efficient cities into the suburbs/exurbs/wilderness. Fundamentally, if you want to be able to build stuff in CA, you have to get rid of all of the universal, asymmetric vetoes that allow any person to spend $200 to cause millions in costs via review processes.
- jgeada 4y ago
  I the US that inaction is called "thoughts & prayers". Somehow that absolves politicians etc from actually having to do anything constructive.
shigawire 4y ago
To add to this - in general a conservative agenda is easier to implement since it requires maintaining status quo versus engaging in radical change.
treis 4y ago
I live an extremely democratic leaning city and they basically suck at everything. Yard waste has sat on my curb for 2 months now because I guess they just don't feel like picking it up any more. Equipment has been broken in my local playground for nearly a year now. The only one that actually picks up trash in my local park in an organized fashion is the Libertarian Party of all people. And I could go on. There's no right crafting policy to kneecap the city's ability to function as a city.
- rootusrootus 4y ago
  Cities have different problems from the federal government, usually funding being the big one. Even a Democratic city that overall favors good government will have problems being effective without sufficient funds to pull it off. I do wonder why your city government is in charge of yard waste, though? I've lived a lot of places, mostly very liberal, and it's always been a private company hauling away trash/recycle/yard debris.
  - treis 4y ago
    >Cities have different problems from the federal government, usually funding being the big one. Even a Democratic city that overall favors good government will have problems being effective without sufficient funds to pull it off. We've got 25 million to build a bridge to a sports stadium. Think we could find $100 a week to pay someone to pick up trash for 4 hours. >I do wonder why your city government is in charge of yard waste, though? I've lived a lot of places, mostly very liberal, and it's always been a private company hauling away trash/recycle/yard debris. Because my city is not good at being a city.
    - trs8080 4y ago
      > We've got 25 million to build a bridge to a sports stadium Sports stadiums are massive sources of revenue for cities. > Think we could find $100 a week to pay someone to pick up trash for 4 hours. It takes more than one person working four hours a week to collect garbage for an entire city.

tcmart14 4y ago

Or another way to put it, it actually requires effort to make it work, but it requires no effort to not make it work. Its about like saying "hey that kid is drowning! I could swim and go save him, but instead I am going to go get a Slurpee."

kansface 4y ago
No, in my estimate, its more like, you have to be willing to piss some people off to make stuff go. Perhaps better wording would be that you can't accomplish things without sacrifice. We aren't willing to do that. You can't have CA's environmental review process and timely/cost effective construction. You can't have SF's discretionary review process and ... any construction, really. You can't solve the housing crisis without building housing, but to do that, you'd actually have to build housing. The cost of that housing is multiples of the public sectors budget, so you'd need to first of all, admit that, and then allow the private sector to do it. The private sector only does stuff that makes a profit... so we'd just rather not build housing than change regulations. Now, we get to say we like affordable housing and protecting the environment when our policies don't result in affordable housing and we push people out of environmentally efficient cities into the suburbs/exurbs/wilderness. Fundamentally, if you want to be able to build stuff in CA, you have to get rid of all of the universal, asymmetric vetoes that allow any person to spend $200 to cause millions in costs via review processes.
jgeada 4y ago
I the US that inaction is called "thoughts & prayers". Somehow that absolves politicians etc from actually having to do anything constructive.

shigawire 4y ago

To add to this - in general a conservative agenda is easier to implement since it requires maintaining status quo versus engaging in radical change.

treis 4y ago

I live an extremely democratic leaning city and they basically suck at everything. Yard waste has sat on my curb for 2 months now because I guess they just don't feel like picking it up any more. Equipment has been broken in my local playground for nearly a year now. The only one that actually picks up trash in my local park in an organized fashion is the Libertarian Party of all people. And I could go on. There's no right crafting policy to kneecap the city's ability to function as a city.

rootusrootus 4y ago
Cities have different problems from the federal government, usually funding being the big one. Even a Democratic city that overall favors good government will have problems being effective without sufficient funds to pull it off. I do wonder why your city government is in charge of yard waste, though? I've lived a lot of places, mostly very liberal, and it's always been a private company hauling away trash/recycle/yard debris.
- treis 4y ago
  >Cities have different problems from the federal government, usually funding being the big one. Even a Democratic city that overall favors good government will have problems being effective without sufficient funds to pull it off. We've got 25 million to build a bridge to a sports stadium. Think we could find $100 a week to pay someone to pick up trash for 4 hours. >I do wonder why your city government is in charge of yard waste, though? I've lived a lot of places, mostly very liberal, and it's always been a private company hauling away trash/recycle/yard debris. Because my city is not good at being a city.
  - trs8080 4y ago
    > We've got 25 million to build a bridge to a sports stadium Sports stadiums are massive sources of revenue for cities. > Think we could find $100 a week to pay someone to pick up trash for 4 hours. It takes more than one person working four hours a week to collect garbage for an entire city.