We've Got WILD Video of a Massive Bridge in China Collapsing a Month After it Was Opened

VCG. Getty Images.

You know, it's easy for we capitalists here in the Decadent West to look around the at the way the rest of the world gets shit done, and be guilty of a little Public Works Project Envy. Especially after China produced this engineering marvel Dante mentioned:

After all, it's not hard to look around at the way we do things around here and get frustrated by the fact we can't seem to pull off any worthwhile major project. The Francis Scott Key Bridge reconstruction is barely underway and could take years. California started a high speed rail line in 2015 and sunk $14.4 billion on it, barely laid any track, won't complete it until 2033, if at all. And don't get this Masshole going on the Big Dig, which as Conan O'Brien put it in 2004, "Any city that can get the rest of the country to spend $24 billion to shave 10 minutes off their trip to the airport deserves to win the World Series."

So yeah, these seem like great days to be living in a Communist dictatorship like China. Or a religious semi-constitutional monarchy like the UAE, who can build skyscrapers, indoor ski slopes, and put on American comedy festivals. They might not be the freest places to live. But damn, they know how to finish what they start. 

Then again, that comes at a price:

Source (paywall) - A recently opened bridge in China’s mountainous southwest partially collapsed Tuesday, with video showing huge dust clouds swiftly enveloping what remained of the structure. There were no reports of casualties. 

Parts of the 2,487-foot Hongqi Bridge in the city of Barkam, in Sichuan province, crumbled within seconds around 4 p.m. local time. The local government said in a statement that a landslide “caused the collapse of the roadbed and approach ramp in that section.”

Police had already closed the bridge to traffic and cordoned off the area by Monday night, after local authorities identified cracks in the structure and instability on the surrounding slopes. …

The remaining section hangs over the river.

The bridge, which opened to the public in April, was … [h]ailed by officials as a local engineering milestone, the project cost around $1.3 million and took around 19 months to complete, according to the local government website.

Its contractor, Sichuan Road & Bridge Group, removed promotional materials about the structure’s opening from its site following the collapse.

Since there was no loss of life and no one was injured, I can say this with a clear conscience: Ha! Take that, Socialists! Not feeling so full of yourselves now, are you? All your fucking Commie gobbledygook (RIP, Norm):

… about workers uniting to control the means of production isn't helping you now, is it? Fat lot of good all that collective ownership to end exploitation is doing you when you have to drive a million miles around to get to Tibet! Maybe Karl Marx can build your next bridge, Pinko. 

So yeah, we can score this collapse a month after it opened as a win for our side. For democracy. For the Good Guys. Sure, in my former hometown they resurfaced the Rte. 53 overpass next to the Hanover Mall, and it took NINE years. I say again, they resurfaced it; they didn't tear it down and build a new one. And it took almost a decade of delays, lane closures, and police details that for sure cost a lot more than the paltry $1.3 million China spent on the Hongqi Bridge. But at least you can drive up Rte. 3 and not have the thing come crashing down on your sunroof. As we're fond of saying in Massachusetts, "Don't kill the job."

Let's hear it for Good Old American over-regulation, delays, waste, cost-overruns and inefficiency.