A $1.7 Million Toilet and Liberalism's Failure to Build
About this episode
Klein interviews Atlantic staff writer Jerusalem Demsas about why liberals struggle to build, anchored by a $1.7 million public toilet in San Francisco's Noe Valley. Their argument: implementation matters as much as legislation — Democrats pass ambitious laws like the Inflation Reduction Act but fail at the unglamorous work of permitting, procurement, and staffing. They discuss environmental review as a veto-point machine (NEPA, California's CEQA), Philadelphia's 12-day I-95 repair under emergency powers, Minneapolis's 2040 upzoning, Denver's Park Hill fight, and New York congestion pricing. Demsas distinguishes "gray" environmentalism — building clean energy and dense housing — from "green" environmentalism that blocks development. Surprisingly, red states like Texas and Montana are outbuilding blue states on housing and renewables. The closing thought: crises like earthquakes and COVID temporarily override normal vetoes — the question is whether liberals can learn to build in normal times.