Seeing the gaping hole at Ground Zero this morning pissed me off.
It's as though nine years later there were still wrecks adrift in Pearl Harbor.
Y'know, at least the Muslims seem to want to build something in NYC. Would there even be a controversy about their little building if it was being built in the shadow of a giant, gleaming, quarter-mile-high middle finger, instead of two blocks away from the National Embarrassing Vacant Lot and Monument to Red Tape & Inefficiency?
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Entire war ships were churned out in four days back during WWII. It's like we lost the will to get shit done.
Yup. Someone took the time and found for some reason, US builds much more slowly these days. It took, what, a little more over a year to finish the Empire State Building? WTC construction took a decade, I think. Or maybe just seven years?
Besdies, there's no reason to rebuild them apart from vanity. From what I understand, WTC had a lot of vacant floorspace when it went down in flames.
With this economic downturn.. whose end is not in sight.
"Someone took the time and found for some reason, US builds much more slowly these days."
I'd wager that there's more than a small connection between this well-known fact and the moribund state of the US economy, at least relative to what it could be. We're becoming downright European in our layers of stultifying regulatory bureaucracy...
Yup, got that right. I always thought we should rebuild the towers exactly (with fireproofing on the structural members this time that wouldn't shatter and leave them exposed to the flames)but add an extra floor, with a large bronze statue on the top, aimed at Mecca, of the aforementioned dextrous digit.
"Someone took the time and found for some reason, US builds much more slowly these days."
Safety regulations, Building code inspections, Incompetent Bureaucrats, OSHA, Labor Unions, ridiculous permit processes, Environmental Loons filing lawsuits on behalf of non-sentient life forms that may or may not exist within a 100 mile radius of the building site, Etc. I am not surprised it is slow, I am shocked anything gets built at all.
The greens are a whole movement dedicated to preventing "shit getting done" especially when it's the "wrong shit".
And their fav method of doing that is via regulatory bureaucracy which endears them to the Nanny Staters and others.
Although it's also a great counter example for nationalized-healthcare, nationalized-industry, and nationalized-housing (just you wait it's already started with 'everyone deserves a home').
If .gov can't rebuild a single building in 9 years how can they run, well, anything?
Is it not strange that the Sultan of Dubai can order a 1,700+ft office building to be erected, and in less than 5 years, there it is? Is it not strange that an obscure Imam all of a sudden finds a way through some Islamic Developers to build a Mosque dedicated to the Holy Martyrs of 9/11 just around the corner of the WTC site, yet threatens the U.S. with attack if it is NOT built? Could the message that is being sent that the TRUE Financial Power of the planet is now in the hands of Islam, not in the Degenerate Western Spawn of the Great and Lesser Satans? Or have I spent too much time studying the mindset of the IslamaFascists over the past few years as a means of "Knowing Thy Enemy"? Yeah that must be it. Probably spending too much time clinging to my "God and Guns" as the Anointed One, B. Hussein Obama said. Yeah, that must be it. After all, Islam is a "Peaceful" religion, just like the Prophet said before he set out to conquer the World in the Name of Allah.
One of these days I will post my WTC stories.
Meanwhile, RIP lots of things.
So, essentially, none of you have the first clue about the underlying conflicts delaying rebuilding, so you're making shit up.
Google is your friend. Use it.
Actually, there ARE still wrecks in Pearl Harbor, the Arizona and Utah. They were too much trouble to dismantle at the time, and monuments had to wait until after the war was won. Although these days I'm starting to question our ability to do either.
MB,
I've spent nine years googling excuses, thanks.
Word.
Along with idiot bureaucrats and bullshit regulations, let us not forget the PC morons who just couldn't STAND simply rebuilding, and the arguments about what would be 'appropriate', and on and on and freaking on.
And Mayor Nanny, who can get all worked up about what you eat and how it's cooked and how your mind should work, but not about actually REBUILDING.
Every time I see Chuck Schumer, Bloomberg, et al, I think people stupid enough to continually elect these guys deserve more Islamic terrorists in their city.
I worked on the sight the appalling lack of cohesion between contractors,government agencies and foolish rules and regulations and resulting lack of progress are a stain on this country and its citizens.The victims of the attack and the people of this country deserve better.Our leaders from all parties have failed abysmally. Time to get all new ones.Vote them out, hang them all.
Here's another thing... isn't POTUS all about how the Feds can and should run roughshod over states, municipalities, and individuals when it's for the greater good?
And isn't he all about "shovel ready" work (or at least all about talking about it)?
Also isn't he all about showing up da Boooosh (as it was a crater on Bush's watch too)?
Then there's his desire to look like a tough and decisive man...
So you'd think it'd be in The One's interest to push and get construction going NOW.
But nope.
This isn't an endorsement of "hurry up and DO something", just an observation on how selective extralegal statism can be.
"I'd wager that there's more than a small connection between this well-known fact and the moribund state of the US economy, at least relative to what it could be. We're becoming downright European in our layers of stultifying regulatory bureaucracy..."
And its not just regulations at the federal level ... local regulations are almost as bad. When I first started as a draftsman 26 years ago I could survey, design, draw up and have permit in hand for a highway entrance from the Delaware DOT in less than 2 weeks.
The last one I did took 18 months.
And people wonder why productivity has dropped in this country.
@Tam
European? You know, while technically it's sort of unified, and some places may be pretty deep in red tape and statism(parts of UK have state economy acccountinf for 70% of GDP), but practically, it's a lot of different countries.
I've seen stuff being built here pretty rapidly. Then, in Britain, they couldn't even build a few new nuclear power plants to replace their old ones. While in France they have about half as many as in the whole of US...
And you wouldn't believe how fast photovoltaic arrays have been sprouting in Czech Republic(from one gigawatt of installed panels to ten gigawatts the next year) ever since some anonymous fuckers paid off legislators to pass a bill that'd give very juicy guaranteed subsidies to companies running photovoltaic power plants.
I'd really like their heads on a stick. Next year, the power bill is going to go up 25%.
That, or supreme court invalidating the whole mess on basis of it being grossly immoral.
Not to interrupt the furyfest at red tape -- with which I entirely agree, BTW -- but I did want to offer a minor aside about the wreck of USS Arizona in Pearl Harbor. The wreck of Arizona was a menace to navigation in the harbor, which couldn't be allowed in wartime. So in early 1942 the Navy removed much of the superstructure along with the after main battery turrets -- at enormous risk to the Navy salvage divers involved, I might add; there's a damn good reason that "Navy diver" is among the few noncombat positions eligible for a Medal of Honor. Once the "menace to navigation" portions had been removed, though, it was judged too dangerous to salvage the rest. So it was left there. It wasn't until long after the war that the wreck became a memorial.
If I heard someone was planning to burn a copy of the zoning regulations, my reaction would be to get the marshmallows.
Joseph wins the internets!!!!!
@ Tam: Damn straight. The One World Trade Center (they had to do away with the hypocracy of the "Freedom Tower") is scheduled to be done in 2013, twelve years after the predessor fell. On Sept 12, 2001, every New Yorker I knew was shouting, "Build another one, twice as high!"
It's taken this long to get to a watered-down design, and we're up to 29 floors. At this point, I'm about to demand that a giant glans be constructed on the top floors.
(It would at least show some kind of vigor in us, yet. As it is, I'm afraid that particular structure might be built, but will never be raised off the pavement, a pitiful half-block away.)
"If gov can't rebuild a single building in 9 years how can they run, well, anything?"
Like, run the government? I too, am frustrated that nine years later the scar is still there. I'm tired of people's stupidity getting in the way.
The whole thing with the mosque at ground zero wouldn't even be an issue if people would realize the solemnity of the site and what it was that happened there is why they don't want a mosque there, not because they want to deny anyone the right of freedom of religion. I applaud the Muslim community for attempting to reach out to the neighborhood, but perhaps there is a better way to do it, a better place to build a mosque than near ground zero.
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