# Can the NSA thing be explained? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [June 13, 2013, 4:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-nsa-thing-be-explained/660878 "2013-06-13T04:10:52Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 11\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Lust4Life](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/ecc23a/32.png) [@Lust4Life](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lust4Life)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2013, 11:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-nsa-thing-be-explained/660878/41 "2013-06-22T11:56:19Z")
You look but you don’t see. So they’re doing it right then. ---
**Author:** ![Musicat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/musicat/32/20189_2.png) [@Musicat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Musicat)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2013, 1:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-nsa-thing-be-explained/660878/42 "2013-06-22T13:22:54Z")
> [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#): > > I can only assume this is performance art. “What the fuck? The NSA building has a curved wall!” I think someone sat on the rolled-up blueprints. Then they built it. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2013, 1:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-nsa-thing-be-explained/660878/43 "2013-06-22T13:33:34Z")
> [@Son\_of\_a\_Rich](#): > > Just the fact that the facade is curved undoubtedly added millions to the bill. > [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > Why would it cost that much? Have you priced curved plumb lines lately? Extravagant! ---
**Author:** ![fumster](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/e9c0ed/32.png) [@fumster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fumster)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2013, 3:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-nsa-thing-be-explained/660878/44 "2013-06-22T15:45:55Z")
> [@DJ\_Motorbike](#): > > I’m sorry I didn’t realize that we couldn’t discuss politicians in a thread about how things get funded by the government. > > Marley, Obama specifically, very specifically, pushed the idea for the monstrous spending bill stating that it would be for infrastructure spending and “shovel ready projects”. So why did such a relatively small portion of it go to infrastructure spending? Is it because he’s a liar or is it that he’s incompetent, not that these are mutually exclusive. Interesting thing about that bill. Unlike most bills, it was implemented directly by Obama without being passed into law. There were no committee hearings, no compromises made so that Congressmen from different parties and regions of the country would sign on to it. ---
**Author:** ![fumster](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/e9c0ed/32.png) [@fumster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fumster)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2013, 3:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-nsa-thing-be-explained/660878/45 "2013-06-22T15:48:42Z")
> [@Son\_of\_a\_Rich](#): > > Dear NSA, > If you ego surf and find this thread, I hope you’ll accept my apology if I hurt your feelings when I criticized your new buildings. They’re just great. Sorry for the misunderstanding. > I love you. > SoaR Dear Alien Overlords, If you are searching for the existence of intelligent life on earth please use the quoted post as evidence there is none. Thanks, F ---
**Author:** ![septimus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/septimus/32/410_2.png) [@septimus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/septimus)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2013, 5:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-nsa-thing-be-explained/660878/46 "2013-06-22T17:10:02Z")
I don’t mind the government spending money to embellish its buildings. But rather than making them pretty, wouldn’t it be better to spend the money on dark gray paints, prison bars and demonic gargoyles? We need to remind the worthless government workers how despicable they are, and how much real Americans resent their suckling at the [del]taxpayer[/del] bondbuyer’s teats. > [@DJ\_Motorbike](#): > > And in what world is 787 billion dollars not enough to fix roads and bridges. Do you live somewhere they mix hunks of gold in with the asphalt? 😃 One-third of the 787 went directly to tax cuts. It is amusing that the very same tax cuts that are so delightful to Republicans morphed into “despicable Obama stimulus.” ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2013, 4:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-nsa-thing-be-explained/660878/47 "2013-06-23T04:46:38Z")
I, for one, applaud the federal government for its initiative in cost-cutting. I don’t actually know any facts but I just wildly assume that the construction project saved millions of dollars by eliminating the need to purchase straight-edges and levels. ---
**Author:** ![Wendell\_Wagner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8491ac/32.png) [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2013, 8:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-nsa-thing-be-explained/660878/48 "2013-06-23T20:46:47Z")
DJ Motorbike writes: \> And in what world is 787 billion dollars not enough to fix roads and bridges. This world: [http://www.greenbiz.com/news/2011/05/18/us-infrastructure-woes-mount-2-trillion-repairs-alone](http://www.greenbiz.com/news/2011/05/18/us-infrastructure-woes-mount-2-trillion-repairs-alone) ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2013, 8:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-nsa-thing-be-explained/660878/49 "2013-06-23T20:57:18Z")
> [@Son\_of\_a\_Rich](#): > > This first picture[here](http://www.businessinsider.com/pictures-of-the-nsas-utah-data-center-2013-6) shows the embellishments of which I speak. Ok, not much in the grand scheme of things, but needless none the less. As a taxpayer, I’d like my public buildings to be a lot prettier than **that.** Generally speaking – not in this case, it’s so out-of-the-way, but generally speaking – they’re things we all have to look at every day. Architectural embellishments are always appropriate. ---
**Author:** ![Yllaria](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/yllaria/32/3452_2.png) [@Yllaria](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Yllaria)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2013, 9:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-nsa-thing-be-explained/660878/50 "2013-06-23T21:53:20Z")
> [@DJ\_Motorbike](#): > > . . . And in what world is 787 billion dollars not enough to fix roads and bridges. Do you live somewhere they mix hunks of gold in with the asphalt? [ASCE is estimating](http://www.infrastructurereportcard.org/) that the infrastructure will need $3.6 trillion by 2020. Of course, they’re including dams, levees, water and wastewater plants, ports, railroads, etc. I keep dreaming of making a video called: Public Works - The Price is Right. Otherwise known as a million dollars doesn’t go nearly as far as you think it does. I just checked out an overlay project that’s up for bid in our city and federally funded. It will cover less than 1.5 miles of a street that’s one lane in each direction (plus left and right turn lanes at intersections and a suicide lane for left turns into retail driveways. The low bid is expected to be around $2M. [The rest of this is talk about street overlays, which is of limited interest to most people. The point is that a simple 2" asphalt overlay costs loosely $1.4M per mile for smaller projects. And, yes, you can get a better price per mile on bigger projects. But you also have to remember that the $1.4M is not including design, administration, construction management, materials testing or inspection.] Overlays are a normal and expected part of street maintenance. Streets have a lifetime and overlays extend that. Things that the average person wouldn’t expect to be included in the overlay: - Traffic Control - Base Failure Repair (if you overlay a pot hole, you get another pot hole really fast and just wasted your overlay cost) - Clearing and Grubbing (asphalt doesn’t stick well to weeds, litter, or blown dirt) - Grinding (to lower the street edge before the overlay is added, so that the curbs and gutters still work) - Adjusting utility covers and manhole covers - Replacing the striping - Upgrading wheelchair ramps to current standards (the other side of grandfathering in ADA is “you touch it, you improve it.”) - Misc. ---
**Author:** ![Yllaria](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/yllaria/32/3452_2.png) [@Yllaria](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Yllaria)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2013, 10:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-nsa-thing-be-explained/660878/51 "2013-06-23T22:13:43Z")
Sorry, the hunks of gold thing got me started. It’s the black gold that’s a major material expense. Asphalt is around $80/ton in California, depending on location and project size. A 2" overlay for the road described above will use about 180 tons per average block (intersections not included) or 3300 tons per mile. So that’s $14,400/block or $264,000/mile. Just in asphalt. Then there’s the gas or diesel needed to truck it to the site and the gas or diesel needed to run the spreaders. When the cost of oil goes up, the cost of road work goes up. Large projects, the kind that take years to complete, go to bid with the cost of asphalt indexed, so that changing oil prices won’t drive the contractor bankrupt. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-nsa-thing-be-explained/660878.md?page=2)