Gas Tax Hike.

On Fox TV news Neil Cavuto was raking a Congresscritter over the coals about a gas tax hike.  The Congresscritter (his name escaped me) was bound and determined to get a gas tax hike to preserve the infrastructure.  Cavuto was hammering the Congresscritter to explain where all the billions of dollars already authorized for infrastructure had gone.  The Congresscritter clearly had no clue, and no clue about how much has been appropriated in the past. 
   Cavuto has a point.  The federal gas tax paid for building the interstate highway system.  But that is done, the system is built, has been built for the last forty years.  Routine maintenance, mowing, plowing, repaving, bridge repair, cleaning storm drains and culverts, is one hell of a lot cheaper than building the road in the first place.  The state highway departments have been taking care of it.  In well run states like New Hampshire, the asphalt is smooth and black, the stripes are bright and freshly painted, the bridges get rebuilt every thirty years or so, and the road doesn't wash out in the spring.  In poorly run states like New York, the interstates are not as well maintained, and in fact can get pretty shabby.  For instance I-95 across the Bronx.
   But that is a state problem.  If New Hampshire, with no income tax and no sales tax, can keep its interstates in good shape, there is no reason why New York (which has both) cannot do so too. 
   Either way, we don't need the feds slinging money around for "transportation" or " infrastructure".  The real needs are handled be state governments, using state tax money.  Which is the way it should be. 
    The last big federal project was the Big Dig in Boston.  Taxpayers all over the country got soaked for years to pay for a massive project that did make Boston prettier, but didn't improve the traffic flow at all.  You gotta ask, why should citizens in, say North Dakota, be paying for a project of benefit only to Boston real estate interests. 
   Cavuto has it right, we don't want to hike taxes during Great Depression 2.0 just to maintain full employment at some state road contractors.