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If you've got comments, please make them at Blue Jersey. BTW, I did become an official part of the site ("staff writer") a couple of weeks ago.
Decades ago, the water in South Brunswick tasted great. Well, it tasted like nothing, if you were used to it, as air looks like nothing. The watert came from local wells, it had no objectionable tastes in it and everyone was happy to drink it.
Now, like many towns, we've outgrown our local supply and mix local water with that piped in by Elizabethtown Water Company. And we use a lot more chlorine. Tests show the water is safe to drink, but I and most people I know find it very hard to drink more than a little of it.
Spending the money it would take to make the water appealing is not considered appropriate expenditures for the government, I guess. If you've got the money, buy bottled water and support private enterprise. Never mind that water was public before European kings started issuing New World land grants.
Paying something for water makes sense. But our basic infrastructure is supposed to be supported by taxes, which are supposed to be collected in a progressive manner. That way, society as a whole is supported by those who benefit from it in some proportion to their benefits, with those favored by the economic system paying more. The essential economic program of the conservative movement, from 1964 through the present, has been to reverse that.
Sixty years ago, if the water started tasting like this, the town would be up in arms to do something about it. And it would be fixed. The victory of the conservative movement is that now the taste is considered normal. And it's the privilege of some to pay more for better taste.
Decades ago, the water in South Brunswick tasted great. Well, it tasted like nothing, if you were used to it, as air looks like nothing. The watert came from local wells, it had no objectionable tastes in it and everyone was happy to drink it.
Now, like many towns, we've outgrown our local supply and mix local water with that piped in by Elizabethtown Water Company. And we use a lot more chlorine. Tests show the water is safe to drink, but I and most people I know find it very hard to drink more than a little of it.
Spending the money it would take to make the water appealing is not considered appropriate expenditures for the government, I guess. If you've got the money, buy bottled water and support private enterprise. Never mind that water was public before European kings started issuing New World land grants.
Paying something for water makes sense. But our basic infrastructure is supposed to be supported by taxes, which are supposed to be collected in a progressive manner. That way, society as a whole is supported by those who benefit from it in some proportion to their benefits, with those favored by the economic system paying more. The essential economic program of the conservative movement, from 1964 through the present, has been to reverse that.
Sixty years ago, if the water started tasting like this, the town would be up in arms to do something about it. And it would be fixed. The victory of the conservative movement is that now the taste is considered normal. And it's the privilege of some to pay more for better taste.
