>Gore has latched onto or blundered into a long-running literature on
>de-urbanization and metropolitan government. The story is not crap. In a
>nutshell, it is that governmental fragmentation under federalism fosters
>inefficiency and inequality. Suburbanites exploit the amenities and
>economic advantages of center city locations and take their money home with
>them. Suburbs get overbuilt, resulting in more pollution, time lost in
>commuting, and loss of green space. Cities get depopulated, their public
>infrastructure is allowed to decay, neighborhoods deteriorate, "brownfields"
>proliferate, and human potential is wasted. Job markets are hampered by the
>difficulties of getting to work in an unplanned regional transportation
>network. All this is fed by public policies favoring suburban sprawl. Key
>to reversing this is a regional transportation network that facilitates the
>exploitation of urban land by increasing the density of activity on it.
>(See EPI's report, Does America Need Cities?, which includes many
>references.)
>
>The thing missing from Gore's message is money.
Well, exactly. It's a symbolic (or maybe imaginary) solution to a real problem. You don't seriously think Gore's going to de-localize U.S. governance, do you? Bring our 83,000 government count down to even 70,000? It'd be easier to hit our Kyoto targets than that.
Doug