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Similar thing happened in Georgia once busy Friday night when tons of bridge railing came smashing down onto the Interstate below. Given the traffic that time o
by Mountain_Skies 1y ago
Similar thing happened in Georgia once busy Friday night when tons of bridge railing came smashing down onto the Interstate below. Given the traffic that time of day, it's a miracle no one was hurt, much less killed. Almost immediately the head of the DOT pleaded for the public to not blame the contractor who installed the railing. While it is important to do a root cause analysis, the DOT head should be mostly concerned about the people who could have been killed instead of the contractor. It was an incredibly tone-deaf moment.
- lazide 1y agoClassic sign of regulatory capture and/or corruption. Did they ever figure out who was sleeping with whom/who was related to whom?
- Dylan16807 1y agoWhy do you say that? Is there some obvious reason to blame that specific contractor?
- lazide 1y agoWhen the regulator is far more worried about covering the contractors ass than serving the public, it is a clear concern yes?
- Dylan16807 1y agoThat would be a concern! But I didn't see anything in that description that was against serving the public. The only way to serve the public at that point in time was launching an investigation, not making super preliminary statements about what could have gone wrong and who could have been hurt. I wouldn't say the tone deafness itself is a significant sign of corruption.
- lazide 1y agoIt’s simple. ‘We’ll investigate’? No concern. ‘Don’t blame the contractor?’ Concern.
- Dylan16807 1y agoThe description above was talking about an investigation. I think he said both of the things you listed. How do we interpret saying both? The thing he didn't do was separate, saying much about how dangerous it was.
- lazide 1y agoBecause why is the contractor’s health or wellbeing a concern here at all? Especially right at the beginning when no one has even said/done anything? If you answer that question considering that corruption may indeed be involved, the answer is quite obvious no?
- Dylan16807 1y agoSo the reason to think corruption is that there's no other reason to say that? Well that's not true. Incorrectly blaming a particular company in the heat of the moment could lead to harm or harassment, and it's good to remind people to wait for a real investigation. The last thing the DOT wants at that point is even more avoidable mistakes. And if it was motivated by corruption that statement seems like a bad idea. It draws a lot of attention to that specific contractor while telling people to wait for the investigation. If they are at fault, that extra attention is bad for them in the long run.
- lazide 1y agoIt’s this kind of willful ignorance of the signals put in front of people that leads to Trump. There is zero legitimate reason for the DOT to try to protect the contractor in this situation.
- Dylan16807 1y ago> the DOT head should be mostly concerned about the people who could have been killed instead of the contractor You can't do anything about the past, but you can do something about the future. The DOT head should be looking at both things. But at that point in time there's nothing they can meaningfully say about what happened except by making a serious promise to investigate. On the other end, the harm from incorrectly blaming the wrong people is something they can try to prevent. It probably was tone-deaf but when you say their underlying concerns are wrong I disagree.