New C.R. courthouse stunning in wrong ways

Regarding “wow factor.” I can understand the architect's enthusiasm for what sounds like an immense, complicated project. We should all take pride in our work. Perhaps I can shed some light on the public's indifference.

I know I'm not alone in considering the new $160-million federal courthouse building in Cedar Rapids just another expression of our excessive, obscene, financially bankrupt government, which I'm required to pay for, just like I pay for bank bailouts, stimuli, domestic spying programs and foreign, undeclared wars.

Few people know that one-sixth of America's labor force is employed directly by government (source: www.newgeography.com/content/00607-deconstructing-meltdown-national-job-losses-sector).

It is the five-sixths of the labor force, the voluntary sector of our economy, that grows food, sells coffee, trims lawns and produces all the goods and services society voluntarily consumes.

Taxes on them pay for the projects, salaries and health care benefits of the government one sixth, including the new federal building's eventual occupants, all of whom will have better health care than me.

The architect is right. My jaw will drop when I see the finished, arching, stone, glass-covered whatever, but not for the reasons he thinks. I will see only $160 million worth of goods and services that never came into existence because money was taken from the voluntary economy to build yet another gratuitous monument to our rulers in Washington D.C.

Roman Skaskiw

Iowa City