Our Man In New York: Baseball and bombs get the cash - bridges are just dull

[cal04]

It may be the wealthiest nation in the world but the US sure has odd priorities when it comes to spending all that cash. Bridges and roads at home are allowed to crumble until the worst happens, while wars and weapons are never too expensive.

Budget analysts in Congress last week reckoned the $500bn (£250bn) of taxpayers money allocated so far on wrecking and then rebuilding Iraq will double before it's all over to $1 trillion. The war now accounts for 10 per cent of everything the government spends.

It is even more depressing when you consider the things that should have public funding lavished on them. It would be nice to see universal health care introduced, but that is too expensive and sounds like socialism. More money for the arts, education and the poor would be good too. And how about choking the torrents (albeit partly from private sources) spent on electing presidents?

No one could help but be astounded by last week's images of the bridge collapse in Minneapolis. The miracle, given the timing in the middle of rush hour, was that more people did not perish. That it happened is not such a surprise, however. We now learn there are tens of thousands of bridges across the US considered "structurally deficient" and in need of repair.

http://news.independent.co.uk/world/americas/article2838640.ece