Does America Need a Little More Robert Moses?

Robert Caro says no. He does not want another Robert Moses, a builder who is ruthless and who disregards public opinion. A city still needs someone who will find a way to get things built when many people do not want them built.

Such a person appears only every once in a while. Decades can pass when everything is stalled and it looks as if nothing big will ever be built again. Then someone comes along, and things get built. He calls that political genius. The two he is writing about are Lyndon Johnson on civil rights and Robert Moses on public works. People said those things could not be done, and they did them.

Dwarkesh Patel heard this as a case for a little Moses today. Caro sometimes wonders about that reading, and the answer is still no: not the ruthlessness, and not someone who ignores the public, but someone who will get the project built anyway.