GOP budget has language barring new wall construction

[Antonio the Sixth]

No new walk construction? Dang, I always knew that the GOP was pro-car, but never to this extent.

The War on Pedestrians continues.

[Antonio the Sixth]

No new walk construction? Dang, I always knew that the GOP was pro-car, but never to this extent.

The War on Pedestrians continues.

Pedestrians just need to be loved.Pedestrians comprise the larger part of humanity. More than that: itsbetter part. Pedestrians created the world. It was they who built cities,erected multi-story buildings, laid sewage systems and water pipes, pavedthe streets, and illuminated them with electric lights. It was they whospreadcultureallovertheworld,inventedtheprintingprocess,concoctedgunpowder, cast bridges across rivers, deciphered Egyptian hieroglyphics,introducedthesafetyrazor,destroyedtheslavetrade,anddeterminedthatone hundred and fourteen tasty, nutritious dishes can be made from thesoybean.And then, when everything was ready, when our native planet had as-sumed a relatively well-appointed mien, the motorists appeared.Itmustbenotedthattheautomobilewasalsoinventedbypedestrians.But somehow, motorists immediately forgot about that. They began torun over the clever, meek pedestrians. The streets, created by pedestrians,were taken over by motorists. Roads grew twice as wide, while sidewalksnarrowed down to the width of a cigar band. Pedestrians began flatteningthemselves against the walls of buildings in alarm.
Pedestrians lead martyrs’ lives in the big city, where a sort of trans-portationalghettohasbeencreatedforthem.Theyareallowedtocrossthestreet only at crosswalks
—
in other words, only at the precise place wherestreettrafficisheaviest,andwherethethreadbywhichthepedestrian’slifeusually hangs is easiest to break.In our vast land, the ordinary automobile, intended by the pedestriantobeusedforthepeacefultransportofpeopleandgoods,hasassumedthethreateningshape of a fratricidalmissile. It takes out entire ranks of unionmembers, along with their families. If, every once in a while, a pedestriandoes manage to flit back out from beneath a car’s silver snout, he is finedby the police for breaking the rules of the street catechism.Onthewhole,thepedestrian’sauthorityhasbeenbadlyshaken.Thosewho gave the world people as splendid as Horace, Boyle and Mariotte,Lobachevsky, Gutenberg, Meyerhold, and Anatole France are now forcedto act in the most vulgar, affected manner, simply to remind everyone of their existence. Oh God (who, in point of fact, doesn’t exist), what haveyou brought the pedestrian to, God (who really and truly doesn’t exist).

So true!