"Imagine how safe we'd feel if the people who inspect and approve bridges could actually lose their jobs and their fortunes if they make a fatal mistake!"

The collapse of a bridge in rush-hour Minneapolis must be well known by nearly everyone in the United States by now. Whenever anyone dies, it's a tragedy; when many die, and expensive property (dozens of automobiles) is lost, that's obviously a tragedy. When all this loss of life and wealth happens because government bureaucrats did their jobs poorly or correctly, that's a preventable and costly tragedy — bought at the expense of many taxpayers who likely would have done other things with their money than pay those bureaucrats. Remember, those who might have done other things with their money include the dead victims.

If the bureaucrats did their jobs correctly, following the rules, observing the bridge, and properly making the decision not to repair it when decision time came, that of course heaps more tragedy on top of everything else. There's nobody we can blame, as courts won't hold the government responsible when it makes decisions that are correct by the rules yet cost innocent lives.

So there's plenty of tragic news, and we've heard about it so much lately because there are many impressive photos and movie clips. Youtube and other such websites have Americans running around every day with tiny electronic gadgets hoping for something newsworthy to record and sell, and this is a good thing: we can get facts about crimes and accidents, including crimes by the uniformed thugs our taxes pay to protect us.

And yet — and yet, with the endless coverage, commentary, video clips, and intrusive, tasteless interviews of grieving family members, nobody in the mainstream media seems to be getting the right messages from this. Rather, the messages are all self-serving government propaganda. Here are some of the correct messages we should be getting:

Part of the reason this bridge collapse is so newsworthy is that it is rare. That is good news, and a correct message. The next time I cross a concrete bridge (as they all are in Alabama), I'll feel better than I once did: A bridge collapsed somewhere, and it was such a startling event that everyone is covering it endlessly. The incorrect message everyone else is getting is that the nation's infrastructure is crumbling.

Imagine if a Wal-Mart fell in on customers, killing them. What would be the reaction? The CEOs of Wal-Mart would be strung up. Certainly there would not be any public moaning about how the roofs of our nation's shopping centers are in disrepair. The blame would be focused and intense, with no excuses tolerated.

So why do we vaguely bemoan our "crumbling infrastructure?" My conspiracy-sniffing guess is that government and the mainstream media love to frighten the masses. Frightened masses seek information for their protection, and the mainstream media make money from advertisers when frightened masses seek information. Government loves a frightened populace because such a populace is willing to hand over more power and money to the government, further entrenching government employees in their overpaid, underworked jobs.

Another wrong message: we need more government to solve this problem. President Bush is already promising more federal money to repair America's supposedly crumbling infrastructure. Remember that any federal money that goes to the states carries with it mandates that states hand over more power to the federal government. In the 1980s, remember, states were forced to hand over more police power to the feds in exchange for continued streams of federal highway money. The usurpation of states' rights came in the specific form of federally mandated drinking laws, making the legal drinking age 21 in every state, while the federally mandated minimum age at which you could be thrown into battle by your benevolent leaders remained at 18.

The correct message from the bridge collapse, which was allowed to happen with full knowledge of the bridge's structural problems, is that government cannot get the job done. The government lacks the incentive to fix problems. And even with the incentive, there is a core calculation problem associated with prioritizing the use of resources. This is where private markets excel. They are not perfect but resources are used efficiently to solve the most urgent demands as revealed in the system of profit and loss. The government lacks this mechanism, so everything becomes arbitrary at best and political at worst.

$20 "Nearly every newsworthy tragedy we see would be less common if those who could have prevented it were subject to the harsh and impartial oversight of the free market."

Too much government was the cause of the problem; adding even more government will inevitably make the problem worse. I guarantee the additional money will go to the same old government contractors — builders and engineers — some predictable percentage of whom will offer kickbacks to inspectors and bureaucrats to get favor over other builders and engineers. Once a government official is on the illegal gravy train, inspections never become more intensive.

The correct solution: get government completely out of the business of building bridges. Private engineers and inspectors, completely independent of the power of government to insulate them from the consequences of shoddy work, will inspect with the zeal of (most) private accounting and law firms, who jealously guard their reputations for excellence. Imagine how safe we'd feel if the people who inspect and approve bridges could actually lose their jobs and their fortunes if they make a fatal mistake!

We should all learn this lesson from the bridge collapse: nearly every newsworthy tragedy we see would be less common if those who could have prevented it were subject to the harsh and impartial oversight of the free market. At the same time, nearly every tragedy we see will result in endlessly broadcast exhortations that we eliminate more of that free market and replace it with more of the same government that allowed the tragedy to happen in the first place. The same counterarguments presented above will apply the next time you see a newsworthy tragedy. If enough of us begin using them, perhaps someday we'll start learning these correct lessons.

Brad Edmonds, author of There's a Government in Your Soup, writes from Alabama. See his Mises.org archive. Send him mail. Comment on the blog.