Privatized Cities

An Al-Jazeera English report by Canada’s own Avi Lewis (spouse of Naomi Klein, who wrote The Shock Doctrine, in which the Sandy Springs story also figures).

Want to see Completely Fucking Clueless in action? Get a load of that Republican dude. He doesn’t seem to grasp the most basic concept: Private-for-profit corporatist “government” only works if everyone is rich and can afford to absorb what the profits will cost them. Sure, that might work–for a while–in Sandy Springs, GA, which is a self-selecting rich white monoculture. But in the long run? CH2M Hill had better pray that their corporate governance is sound. And in the privatized, globalized, deregulated economy of BushCo’s America, that’s not likely to be the case. In any event, taxpayer-funded public servicing is more cost-effective than private-for-profit. If this guy and his ilk want to see more bang for their buck, they should be in favor of good, old-fashioned wealth redistribution through taxes and public services. The fact that they’re not, and that this is taking place in the southern US, makes me wonder if the racist component in all this isn’t the real reason behind his faulty reasoning. After all, what are Republicans in the South if not old-time segregationist Dixiecrats at heart? And what is their worst fear, as such? Seeing “their” money end up in a non-white neighborhood, enabling non-whites to be something more than virtual slaves a century and a half after Emancipation. Heaven forfend that economics should ever prove white supremacism to be full of shit!