April 22, 2016 3:12 PM

Smith: It is Not Infrastructure; It is Our Life Support System

From the Left: QR’s Liberal Columnist Glenn W. Smith argues that roads, bridges, water systems etc. are more than infrastructure – they are life support systems we must maintain.

It’s no mystery to popular culture’s storytellers: life requires life support systems. When life support systems don’t exist, they must be built. When they fail, they must be fixed. Robinson Crusoe knew it. Chuck Noland, the Tom Hanks character in Cast Away knew it. Astronauts Mark Watney, Matt Damon’s character in The Martian, and Dr. Ryan Stone, played by Sandra Bullock in Gravity, knew it.

Judging by our lack of attention to our life support systems, we are a bit slower on the uptake. You may know these systems by the dull, unromantic and uninspiring term “infrastructure.” There’s nothing about the term that signals its significance to life.

It’s easy for selfish politicians to refuse to spend money on something called infrastructure. We know that must be true because politicians in Texas and around the nation have refused to do just that.

The full column from Glenn W. Smith is in the R&D Department.

By Glenn W. Smith