5 ms·

Excellent article. It is only mentioned in passing, but being 60 years ahead of schedule and 30 billion dollars under projected costs is such a boss move. Hav

Excellent article. It is only mentioned in passing, but being 60 years ahead of schedule and 30 billion dollars under projected costs is such a boss move. Having stories like these better represented in media would help a lot in preventing general apathy and disillusion toward politics/government-- it might even help channel slight patriotism in a very positive way (toward improving infrastructure/society). In western nations, we have reduced nationalism (and national pride in general) by a LOT for the last generations (especially on the left side of the political spectrum), and I do believe that there is a significant hidden price to pay for this (as society and country).

082349872349872 2y ago
> toward improving infrastructure/society Having moved someplace where the general attitude seems to me* to be "we don't have a wrong side of the tracks, we're not barbarians after all" I'll vouch that being surrounded by this variety of patriotism is indeed pleasant. * the indigenous view things differently: my wife (who has wild stories about her youth like being in the same city during the mass shooting) and I were going to an art opening run by the olympic organisation in our capital city, and directly in front of the venue she asked "can we park here? it's such a sketchy neighbourhood"; I wanted to grab her by the shoulders and shake her while yelling "WTF? sketchy? I've been broken down in NWA-era Compton, and this here reads to me as like, maybe, lower middle class?" Lagniappe: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LREf9SXfHBI&t=13s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LREf9SXfHBI&t=13s
- defrost 2y ago
  Seems pretty wholesome and folksy: https://youtu.be/K6D5xpCgETk?t=16 https://youtu.be/K6D5xpCgETk?t=16
- immibis 2y ago
  I get the opposite impression in Berlin. Nothing that's as dangerous as people seem to think happens actually happens. I happened to be hanging around sn area where some anarchist activists set on fire on New Year's Eve a few years ago... in the middle of the closed off road far away from other flammable objects, which the fire department only got to once it was already dying down. Yet the reporting and public perception of that event was as if the whole block burned down and you cannot ever go in that area or you will be arsonized. Police presence was ramped up at all following NYEs and fireworks were banned in that particular area, enforced with a police cordon, as if that was supposed to achieve anything. (There were illegal fireworks there anyway)
  - 082349872349872 2y ago
    The german-speaking space is yes world-master in „motzen“ (bellyaching). [then again, I made my peace with that after learning that „na, und?“ is not only a thing, but has been perfectly cromulent since at least the 1500s]
    - LargoLasskhyfv 2y ago
      Und? by itself suffices.
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
peterldowns 2y ago
You may enjoy the book How Big Things Get Done by Bent Flyvbjerg and Dan Gardner. It details quite a few large-scale projects, mostly those that failed and went way over budget, and tries to come up with a model for why this happens so often. The examples it uses of how to do things well are really exciting — did you know the Empire State building was also built ahead of schedule and under budget?
- FredPret 2y ago
  Another book about a civil servant doing great things is “Racing for the bomb” about General Leslie Groves who built the Pentagon and led the Manhattan Project, completing both in record time.
  - peterldowns 2y ago
    I just finished The Making Of The Atomic Bomb by Richard Rhodes, and Groves comes across as a very fascinating guy. I'll add this to my bookmarks list, thank you. Any chance you know of a good biography of Henry Stimson?
0xEF 2y ago
Your comment has given me something to contemplate. Growing up, I was taught that we (the US) was the greatest country on Earth. You can only imagine my disillusionment upon entering voting-age and adulthood. The cracks in the veneer were starting to show. Fast forward to the Obama presidency, when Hope was a selling point. By then I had no real faith in the US. I'd experienced the lingering impact of financial destitution, homelessness and addiction, which our country would rather pretend does not exist here. I'd been exposed to things that made it feel like we lived in a society that put more value in appearances than it did substance. The food turned out to be fake. The educations we were getting turned out to be a lie. The idea that one could work hard and succeed was all smoke and mirrors. Our flag was starting to be co-opted by racists and fascists, the early bubblings of the boil-over we are now experiencing. So, it was easy to see why Hope was a marketing pitch. But these days, I am trying so hard to reclaim whatever love I can for the US. There are good people here trying to do good things, but they so easily get drowned out by the alarm bells and angry shouts, that it is difficult to see or hear them. Even my initial approach to this article was tainted by my experiences, leaving me to assume it was another "feel good" piece about something that should be normalized, but instead is treated like the exception to the cynical rule. I will try to find more stories like this.
- myrmidon 2y ago
  Fully agree with your attitude. Its always easy to fall into cynicism and and its trivial to justify to yourself and others, but in the end, its a shit attitude that is more likely to do harm than any good...
- panarky 2y ago
  This article is a particularly relevant example of why there's broad support in the US for gutting the national government, eliminating entire departments, cutting those that remain by large percentages, and replacing the nonpartisan experts who somehow survive the cuts with know-nothings who can pass a test of loyalty and ideological purity. Who is willing to spend 60 to 90 minutes carefully reading 12,450 words, with technical vocabulary like "longwall mining" and "abutment load", with long sentences that contain multiple clauses? Who has the sustained attention and intellectual curiosity needed to grasp abstract relationships between ideas and complex, multi-layered concepts, such as the tension between safety and profitability, the inherent incentives of market economies, the power imbalance between workers and owners, and the long-term systemic changes resulting from the well financed campaign to blame government and collective action for systemic market failure? Very few people have the capacity, attention, interest or stamina to thoughtfully read an article like this and understand exactly why the wealthy mine owners wouldn't fix this problem on their own, why the market couldn't fix this problem, why it required deep expertise from a government worker to fix this problem. It's far easier to simply parrot the idea that government is the problem, that corporations need less regulation, that tax cuts for the insanely wealthy will magically trickle down to workers, that our many serious problems can be solved by concentrating migrants and homeless in camps, that protesters should be imprisoned or killed, that democratic elections are fraudulent, that only a strongman ruler can fix it.
kwhitefoot 2y ago
Such people should be much more visible in the world: Frazer Lockhart Manager, Rocky Flats Project Department of Energy Evergreen, Colorado https://servicetoamericamedals.org/honorees/frazer-lockhart-and-the-rocky-flats-cleanup-team/?itid=lk_inline_enhanced-template https://servicetoamericamedals.org/honorees/frazer-lockhart-... I think the reduction in national pride in some nations has more to do with it being obvious that many of the people running the country at a high level have no loyalty to the people; that kind of thing trickles down and poisons us all.
triclops200 2y ago
I think you might enjoy the book "manufacturing consent," it answers a lot of the hows and whys of stuff like this as well as provides some general thoughts around the phenomenon of patriotism and why it might be on the decline in some groups (though it's actually on the rise, statistically, in other large segments of the US)
- djangelic 2y ago
  The documentary was also insightful: https://youtu.be/Li2m3rvsO0I?si=QsJLtqES3AEhbcEO https://youtu.be/Li2m3rvsO0I?si=QsJLtqES3AEhbcEO
pessimizer 2y ago
> In western nations, we have reduced nationalism (and national pride in general) by a LOT for the last generations (especially on the left side of the political spectrum) We really haven't, we've reduced national jingoism and converted it into identity jingoism, then redefined modernity as a harmonious collection of designated and licensed identities at war with the corruption of evil foreign influences. We've continued or escalated international aggression, to the extent that the fear of or the desire for revenge upon foreigners has become the main issue in politics. It is absolutely mundane now to accuse your neighbor of being the servant of a foreign power. In western nations, we have reduced or eliminated civics education, which was our only chance to tell people about popular sovereignty, that government springs from their rights and is for their comfort. Now many of them think that their rights have been granted for the government's protection. Nationalism is poison.
- myrmidon 2y ago
  > We really haven't, we've reduced national jingoism and converted it into identity jingoism This is kinda what I mean-- instead of identifying with the nation (freedom & opportunity), a lot of people have latched onto their party instead, and this is an obvious disadvantage for social cohesion (you could even reframe this a bit as freedom vs opportunity, an interesting thought). I find it curious how your wording implies direction/intention/agency in these changes, which i personally don't believe to exist. Sure, some people owning large media might sit at a longer oar, but in the end we're all just along for the ride and no single person or entity really sits at the helm and controls how culture and society changes (in my view). edit: I honestly think that education is roughly better than it ever was-- I would not really blame it for this despite some failings (but got no US education personally).

082349872349872 2y ago

> toward improving infrastructure/society Having moved someplace where the general attitude seems to me* to be "we don't have a wrong side of the tracks, we're not barbarians after all" I'll vouch that being surrounded by this variety of patriotism is indeed pleasant. * the indigenous view things differently: my wife (who has wild stories about her youth like being in the same city during the mass shooting) and I were going to an art opening run by the olympic organisation in our capital city, and directly in front of the venue she asked "can we park here? it's such a sketchy neighbourhood"; I wanted to grab her by the shoulders and shake her while yelling "WTF? sketchy? I've been broken down in NWA-era Compton, and this here reads to me as like, maybe, lower middle class?" Lagniappe: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LREf9SXfHBI&t=13s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LREf9SXfHBI&t=13s

defrost 2y ago
Seems pretty wholesome and folksy: https://youtu.be/K6D5xpCgETk?t=16 https://youtu.be/K6D5xpCgETk?t=16
immibis 2y ago
I get the opposite impression in Berlin. Nothing that's as dangerous as people seem to think happens actually happens. I happened to be hanging around sn area where some anarchist activists set on fire on New Year's Eve a few years ago... in the middle of the closed off road far away from other flammable objects, which the fire department only got to once it was already dying down. Yet the reporting and public perception of that event was as if the whole block burned down and you cannot ever go in that area or you will be arsonized. Police presence was ramped up at all following NYEs and fireworks were banned in that particular area, enforced with a police cordon, as if that was supposed to achieve anything. (There were illegal fireworks there anyway)
- 082349872349872 2y ago
  The german-speaking space is yes world-master in „motzen“ (bellyaching). [then again, I made my peace with that after learning that „na, und?“ is not only a thing, but has been perfectly cromulent since at least the 1500s]
  - LargoLasskhyfv 2y ago
    Und? by itself suffices.
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]

peterldowns 2y ago

You may enjoy the book How Big Things Get Done by Bent Flyvbjerg and Dan Gardner. It details quite a few large-scale projects, mostly those that failed and went way over budget, and tries to come up with a model for why this happens so often. The examples it uses of how to do things well are really exciting — did you know the Empire State building was also built ahead of schedule and under budget?

FredPret 2y ago
Another book about a civil servant doing great things is “Racing for the bomb” about General Leslie Groves who built the Pentagon and led the Manhattan Project, completing both in record time.
- peterldowns 2y ago
  I just finished The Making Of The Atomic Bomb by Richard Rhodes, and Groves comes across as a very fascinating guy. I'll add this to my bookmarks list, thank you. Any chance you know of a good biography of Henry Stimson?

0xEF 2y ago

Your comment has given me something to contemplate. Growing up, I was taught that we (the US) was the greatest country on Earth. You can only imagine my disillusionment upon entering voting-age and adulthood. The cracks in the veneer were starting to show. Fast forward to the Obama presidency, when Hope was a selling point. By then I had no real faith in the US. I'd experienced the lingering impact of financial destitution, homelessness and addiction, which our country would rather pretend does not exist here. I'd been exposed to things that made it feel like we lived in a society that put more value in appearances than it did substance. The food turned out to be fake. The educations we were getting turned out to be a lie. The idea that one could work hard and succeed was all smoke and mirrors. Our flag was starting to be co-opted by racists and fascists, the early bubblings of the boil-over we are now experiencing. So, it was easy to see why Hope was a marketing pitch. But these days, I am trying so hard to reclaim whatever love I can for the US. There are good people here trying to do good things, but they so easily get drowned out by the alarm bells and angry shouts, that it is difficult to see or hear them. Even my initial approach to this article was tainted by my experiences, leaving me to assume it was another "feel good" piece about something that should be normalized, but instead is treated like the exception to the cynical rule. I will try to find more stories like this.

myrmidon 2y ago
Fully agree with your attitude. Its always easy to fall into cynicism and and its trivial to justify to yourself and others, but in the end, its a shit attitude that is more likely to do harm than any good...
panarky 2y ago
This article is a particularly relevant example of why there's broad support in the US for gutting the national government, eliminating entire departments, cutting those that remain by large percentages, and replacing the nonpartisan experts who somehow survive the cuts with know-nothings who can pass a test of loyalty and ideological purity. Who is willing to spend 60 to 90 minutes carefully reading 12,450 words, with technical vocabulary like "longwall mining" and "abutment load", with long sentences that contain multiple clauses? Who has the sustained attention and intellectual curiosity needed to grasp abstract relationships between ideas and complex, multi-layered concepts, such as the tension between safety and profitability, the inherent incentives of market economies, the power imbalance between workers and owners, and the long-term systemic changes resulting from the well financed campaign to blame government and collective action for systemic market failure? Very few people have the capacity, attention, interest or stamina to thoughtfully read an article like this and understand exactly why the wealthy mine owners wouldn't fix this problem on their own, why the market couldn't fix this problem, why it required deep expertise from a government worker to fix this problem. It's far easier to simply parrot the idea that government is the problem, that corporations need less regulation, that tax cuts for the insanely wealthy will magically trickle down to workers, that our many serious problems can be solved by concentrating migrants and homeless in camps, that protesters should be imprisoned or killed, that democratic elections are fraudulent, that only a strongman ruler can fix it.

kwhitefoot 2y ago

Such people should be much more visible in the world: Frazer Lockhart Manager, Rocky Flats Project Department of Energy Evergreen, Colorado https://servicetoamericamedals.org/honorees/frazer-lockhart-and-the-rocky-flats-cleanup-team/?itid=lk_inline_enhanced-template https://servicetoamericamedals.org/honorees/frazer-lockhart-... I think the reduction in national pride in some nations has more to do with it being obvious that many of the people running the country at a high level have no loyalty to the people; that kind of thing trickles down and poisons us all.

triclops200 2y ago

I think you might enjoy the book "manufacturing consent," it answers a lot of the hows and whys of stuff like this as well as provides some general thoughts around the phenomenon of patriotism and why it might be on the decline in some groups (though it's actually on the rise, statistically, in other large segments of the US)

djangelic 2y ago
The documentary was also insightful: https://youtu.be/Li2m3rvsO0I?si=QsJLtqES3AEhbcEO https://youtu.be/Li2m3rvsO0I?si=QsJLtqES3AEhbcEO

pessimizer 2y ago

> In western nations, we have reduced nationalism (and national pride in general) by a LOT for the last generations (especially on the left side of the political spectrum) We really haven't, we've reduced national jingoism and converted it into identity jingoism, then redefined modernity as a harmonious collection of designated and licensed identities at war with the corruption of evil foreign influences. We've continued or escalated international aggression, to the extent that the fear of or the desire for revenge upon foreigners has become the main issue in politics. It is absolutely mundane now to accuse your neighbor of being the servant of a foreign power. In western nations, we have reduced or eliminated civics education, which was our only chance to tell people about popular sovereignty, that government springs from their rights and is for their comfort. Now many of them think that their rights have been granted for the government's protection. Nationalism is poison.

myrmidon 2y ago
> We really haven't, we've reduced national jingoism and converted it into identity jingoism This is kinda what I mean-- instead of identifying with the nation (freedom & opportunity), a lot of people have latched onto their party instead, and this is an obvious disadvantage for social cohesion (you could even reframe this a bit as freedom vs opportunity, an interesting thought). I find it curious how your wording implies direction/intention/agency in these changes, which i personally don't believe to exist. Sure, some people owning large media might sit at a longer oar, but in the end we're all just along for the ride and no single person or entity really sits at the helm and controls how culture and society changes (in my view). edit: I honestly think that education is roughly better than it ever was-- I would not really blame it for this despite some failings (but got no US education personally).