You’re entitled (and welcome) to your opinion, but it’s clear that you neither respect nor appreciate the standard of living the “auto-centric culture…in the United States” has made possible. Americans have voted with their feet and dollars FOR individual and personally owned private transportation.

They have chosen time and again NOT TO RELY on Busses, carpools, Light Rail or Taxies to “get around”. Of those who use these options for a daily commute, most still want cars for “everything else”. although many who may DON’T RELY.

The selling of hardware and services is how ALL the “business of America” is done, whether by individuals, sole proprietors, Partnerships, LLCs, or corporations (large and small). It’s called Capitalism.

Until a superior system emerges that similarly increases the size of the “economic pie”, GET USED TO IT or move to Europe, South America, Africa, the middle east , Russia, etc. Good luck with that!

The auto-centric culture that developed in the United States has created an unsustainable mess. It views land as a consumable and has created unwalkable, senseless sprawl. It facilitated subprime and the financial crisis. It has made us dependent upon petro-states and all the militarism to defend supplied and unsavory kingdoms.

IMO, “smart” or “intelligent” automobile-centric infrastructure is simply a program for large corporation to sell hardware and services to bankrupt governments and extract rents from the public.

It is more business as usual.

So you then advocate that taxpayers give our apparently mindless and clueless federal bureaucracies more revenue before they have shown themselves able to properly prioritize that which they have? Considering the mind boggling amount of taxpayer funds they increasingly shovel out year after year when Congress increases the debt limit, is this not continuing to do the same things and expecting different results?

In my opinion such is contrary to improving a situation the last thirty years have shown to be increasingly unsustainable. Your “philisophy” is not a “solution” but excuses for continuing failure(s), but we agree that the budget MUST be balanced sooner or later. There must first be agreement as to what should be in such “budget” before a debate can commence as to how much goes where. The journey of a thousand miles still begins with a single step, but that step must be FORWARD!

We need to debate and find majority consensus as to what services presently available governmental revenues can sustain for it’s taxpayers. Let’s call these “needs”. Each political party should have it’s own list of these, and the party “in power” should thus “define” what the government MUST do.

Then,, and ONLY then, does the discussion move to the “wants”…those things said government WANTS to do, i.e. that taxpayers will WILLINGLY pay “more” for.

YOU propose instead to increase tax revenues to throw into the same bottomless pit of a government culture that knows not how to prioritize. Good luck with that. On this subject I’m a pessimist; and believe every optimist a myopic fool.

Yes, the United States needs an intelligent infrastructure plan, any fool should know that. Politicians never do anything intelligent, and voters are no help. Both are dumb as rocks.

Both are knee jerk reactors.

Help is available for those willing to ask and accept.

Censorship is evil.

I would ask you to reconsider how this philosophy has worked out for the last 30 years, and where it will ultimately lead if we coninue it.

I have learned to prefer Eisenhower’s strategy of balancing the budget first (regardless of top tax rates),
and then working hard to reduce taxes within that requirement.
There is no doubt that Ike was the more fiscally conservative in that he actually did balance budgets, reduced debt/GDP, and put the country on a sustainable financial path.
As to “Bureaucracies”. After having worked in private industry for 25 years, I can tell you that government has no monopoly on bureaucracy or inefficiency.