Yesterday evening I was watching CNN, as I usually do. I heard that we are going to spend 1 trillion dollars on the Iraq war and I immediately thought of all the things we could be doing instead - instead of this totally ill-conceived, indefensible conflict. Health care for everyone, world-class education for everyone, much needed infrastructure repair and so much more - not to mention a return to the civil rights this country was so deservedly proud of. And then the breaking news flash of the bridge collapse in Minneapolis. Infrastructure repair was my first thought. Later the CNN reporters hastened to reassure the listeners that this was not a terrorist attack, which had probably been their first thought. But that had never occurred to me. Infrastructure repair. And now it is beginning to look as if indeed that was the problem. The bridge was inspected two years ago and scored a 4 on a 1-10 scale. How many other bridges, highways, buildings are barely hanging on? And how much longer are we going to spend a trillion (a million million) on something that wasn't supposed to cost us anything - all to be paid for by oil revenues - and how many more lives are going to be lost on something that is completely indefensible while our own country crumbles, the gap between rich and poor grows ever larger, and our high standards of right and wrong grow ever more blurred.

Gillian Parrillo
The Sacramento Executive