Seems to me we expect better behavior from our governments than we
expect from ourselves. They're supposed to be perfect: to know all the
risks and fix them, to be totally honest, to always make the right
decisions before everyone else has the benefit of hindsight, to never
procrastinate, to never be self-serving, and so on. We even expect them
to spend lots of money on our pet projects without raising our taxes.
However, since these people are elected, appointed or employed from
among the rest of us, they're no different. Until the population as a
whole takes personal responsibility seriously and stops trying to blame
everyone else for their individual problems, and starts thinking for
themselves instead of letting the media do it, nothing will change.
People will still build in dumb places and governments will approve.
People will take risks because they're fun and sue someone when they
get hurt. People will vote for governments that promise them things
that make no sense the long term and will cost the next generation a
lot of money and cause headaches.

Dan