May 13, 2015, All in all, maybe I'd rather not be in Philadelphia
The City of Brotherly Love is the site of a disastrous Amtrak train crash, in which at least six people have been confirmed dead with dozens injured.
It's been a bad period for trains in our area , what with an earlier incident in Valhalla, NY where a commuter Metro-North struck an SUV, killing several people, and 2013's disastrous derailment in the Bronx killing four.
I'll make the obvious point: American infrastructure is not being maintained-- and that's physical infrastructure like track and rolling stock, and human beings, who, if you look carefully, are probably working longer hours than ever for the same or lesser pay than they received a long time ago. With the occasional deadly consequence. And for what? So a few sociopaths in the financial sector can continue to drive up real estate prices and pay outrageous prices for Picassos?
Given our blase national reaction to everything that the powerful don't want us to react to, I expect... a big yawn after this.
But it's falling apart, boys and girls. Rome was neither built nor brought apart in a day. We won't be either. But it's under way. Apparently, well under way.