From: http://www.newsobserver.com/opinion/columnists_blogs/other_views/story/166402.html

CHAPEL HILL When I was a kid, I met my congressman for the first time. He told me a strange story: In the 1950s he got funds from Congress to help a city near my hometown move a creek into a concrete ditch, which people thought would prevent flooding. The project also created jobs and helped the congressman get re-elected.

Forty years later, the floods continued and the concrete now created water-quality problems downstream. The same congressman was forced to get even more money to move the creek out of the concrete ditch.

My congressman had used the best engineering that money could buy. So why didn’t the project work? And where was all that water coming from? [continue reading…]