Lee: Abolish the interstate highway system or we'll have civil war

[Progressive Pessimist]

A better way to prevent a new civil war (which is still an extreme and unlikely possibility) is for the Republican Party to stop alienating and ostracizing a majority of the country's population.

[Rules for me, but not for thee]

A lot of government programs should be reworked and/or cut to fix the massive deficit, but this is starting at the wrong end. 

[IceSpear]

Cletus and Jimbo aren’t interested in starting a civil war to repeal US highways lol. They are however tempted to start a civil war if one more Mexican family drives through their trailer park town.

This is what the GOP establishment fails to understand. Their base is angry as Hell but not quite for the reasons they always think.

[RussFeingoldWasRobbed]

Cletus and Jimbo aren’t interested in starting a civil war to repeal US highways lol. They are however tempted to start a civil war if one more Mexican family drives through their trailer park town.

This is what the GOP establishment fails to understand. Their base is angry as Hell but not quite for the reasons they always think.

[Former Dean Phillips Supporters for Haley (I guess???!?) 👁️]

Cletus and Jimbo aren’t interested in starting a civil war to repeal US highways lol. They are however tempted to start a civil war if one more Mexican family drives through their trailer park town.

This is what the GOP establishment fails to understand. Their base is angry as Hell but not quite for the reasons they always think.

[🐒Gods of Prosperity🔱🐲💸]

Think Progress always comes up with the most creative spin on things, it's quite impressive.

Mike Lee could have made a case for the impact of the interstate highway system cutting through the old hearts of cities, encouraging sprawl, and diverting travelers away from driving through & patronizing many small towns dotting the landscape along older roadways; and how all this contributes to isolation and economic concentration, eroding social solidarity and trust and feeding dissatisfaction and conflict.     

but he didn't actually go into that at all, it was a quick mention of things that might be devolved more  to states and localities.  Lee's focus in the talk was not on specific programs but in the general effect of nationalizing all political issues and how this feeds conflict & prevents accountability and effective local representation.  On a practical level I'd be ( in some cases ) more hesitant than Lee to deconstruct the programs of the federal government, since the states have to be both able and willing to effectively take over these responsibilities.  But in terms of the general principle I very much agree with Lee - more local and immediate levels of decision making could do a great deal of good for our country and the crises we face.

[pbrower2a]

Does anyone want to bet that he would vote against an Interstate highway that gives a shortcut from Interstate 80 to Provo (along US 189) and along Blood Alley 6 from Interstate 15 to Interstate 70?

[Sir Mohamed]

Lord, please hand out a brain for Mr. Lee. It seems as he needs one very badly.

[Virginiá]

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That doesn't only apply to the federal government. There are plenty of state legislatures where Republicans have, through gerrymandering election rigging, seized power and held that power despite voters choosing Democrats, sometimes by large margins, such as but not limited to Michigan. All they had to do was win the legislature and Govs office in one midterm and bam, they stole an entire decade's worth of legislative influence in one fell swoop.

That sounds like half (often less than half, actually) the state unilaterally imposing its will and its values on the other half. And yet I rarely hear long-winded screeds from conservative politicians on that.

[KingSweden]

Think Progress always comes up with the most creative spin on things, it's quite impressive.

Mike Lee could have made a case for the impact of the interstate highway system cutting through the old hearts of cities, encouraging sprawl, and diverting travelers away from driving through & patronizing many small towns dotting the landscape along older roadways; and how all this contributes to isolation and economic concentration, eroding social solidarity and trust and feeding dissatisfaction and conflict.     

but he didn't actually go into that at all, it was a quick mention of things that might be devolved more  to states and localities.  Lee's focus in the talk was not on specific programs but in the general effect of nationalizing all political issues and how this feeds conflict & prevents accountability and effective local representation.  On a practical level I'd be ( in some cases ) more hesitant than Lee to deconstruct the programs of the federal government, since the states have to be both able and willing to effectively take over these responsibilities.  But in terms of the general principle I very much agree with Lee - more local and immediate levels of decision making could do a great deal of good for our country and the crises we face.

That’s a very valid critique of the interstate highway system, and overall I agree that federalism is usually the way to go, but I generally am skeptical that most states *want* to assume responsibly for programs. Easier to make it somebody else’s problem.

[pbrower2a]

Think Progress always comes up with the most creative spin on things, it's quite impressive.

Mike Lee could have made a case for the impact of the interstate highway system cutting through the old hearts of cities, encouraging sprawl, and diverting travelers away from driving through & patronizing many small towns dotting the landscape along older roadways; and how all this contributes to isolation and economic concentration, eroding social solidarity and trust and feeding dissatisfaction and conflict.     

but he didn't actually go into that at all, it was a quick mention of things that might be devolved more  to states and localities.  Lee's focus in the talk was not on specific programs but in the general effect of nationalizing all political issues and how this feeds conflict & prevents accountability and effective local representation.  On a practical level I'd be ( in some cases ) more hesitant than Lee to deconstruct the programs of the federal government, since the states have to be both able and willing to effectively take over these responsibilities.  But in terms of the general principle I very much agree with Lee - more local and immediate levels of decision making could do a great deal of good for our country and the crises we face.

True to some extent. The Interstate Highway system has had its benefits. Small towns bypassed by the Interstate System have typically had freeway exits that have attracted commercial services from motels to gas stations and restaurants. Retailers such as Wal*Mart have flocked to interchanges because that is where the traffic is.  Let us remember also that the freeways that skirt a town can bring people to the town itself.

Truth be told, the commercial sprawl near Interstate highways is dull -- so people can go into town. That is where the individual small businesses are.

Of course the Interstate Highway system has had its faults. It has destroyed urban communities.  Political decisions often chose to destroy the commercial viability and the cohesion a coping-but-struggling minority community in some cities, which says as much about race relations as about highways. A greenfield site of an interchange can bring much growth in the wake of a freeway and its service roads (think of Dallas around the LBJ Freeway (I-635) that went from rural to fully urban in about ten years, but a freeway through an existing urban community creates a scar. Maybe we should have relied upon highways that orbited big cities instead of leading in. Add to this, urban freeways made possible commutes by car for commuters to the spanking-new suburbs, ravaging urban real estate.

There is discussion of privatizing all public infrastructure to private profiteers, progress being defined as profit loaded onto what used to be inexpensively administered and cheap to free for consumers. This is consistent with the Trump ideal of huge amounts of easy money for a few in return for hardships to the many.

[Alabama_Indy10]

These Freedom Caucus types really confuse me sometimes.

[Mopsus]

Wow, very strong statement! There’s a reason he’s one of my favorite Senators.

[KingSweden]

These Freedom Caucus types really confuse me sometimes.

[RussFeingoldWasRobbed]

Bold Prediction: Some time in the next couple decades, Mike Lee will lose his senate seat to a democrat, as I believe they will absorb Mormons into their coalition

[Torie]

I find Lee's angst about the interstate highway system very odd. And his reason is to babble on about the Constitution, as if SCOTUS decisions are mere vagrants of the law. I am gong to mark him down as a KOOK.

[fluffypanther19]

this is utterly insane and this is from an actual senator and once potential SC pick?

[Sirius_]

Stop civil war by encouraging disunity and weakening the federal government? Yeah ok.

[Obama-Biden Democrat]

I would expect Trump's rationale against interstate highways would be that blacks get to use them too.