I point to IntrepidLiberal's diary over at the Daily Kos:

Ninety-percent of the project was paid through a highway trust fund while the states contributed ten percent of the funding. Eisenhower believed this law vital to America's national security interests to help the military to mobilize troops more effectively in case of invasion by a foreign power. Ultimately, the investment more than paid for itself through jobs, economic growth and the development of the suburbs.

However, the Interstate Highway System also resulted in vehicle pollution and increased our dependence on foreign oil. Hence, with global warming and collapsing bridges our infrastructure requires a twenty-first century upgrade."

IntrepidLiberal goes on to talk about the '08 presidential candidates' position on the issue.  You can read the entire summary over the link, so I won't bother to repost the majority of it.  Basically it comes down to this:  Barack Obama's position on infrastructure is that the feds need to increase funding and modernize projects to repair neglected public projects like roads and bridges across the nation.  John McCain wants to finance high-speed internet systems through local community efforts and private investors.

Let's forget for a moment that McCain seems to think the word "infrastructure" refers only to those newfangled Ted Stevens' Internet Tube Things that bring The Google to your Computer Machine.  Let's even forget that all during the GOP convention last week the speakers railed against Obama's community organizing.  He wants to what?  Like, um, the cable companies that hold local monopolies and therefore can gouge their customers while providing limited, highly interruptable and privacy-violating service?

I have to wonder sometimes exactly how many common-sense brain cells this man and his policymakers possess.

Our country has for years suffered from an aging and increasingly-dilapidated infrastructure.  Companies like those mentioned above have no incentive to spend money or be competitive, so they aren't.  The technology ages, breaks down, and customers are left holding the short end of the stick.

The Hanford Nuclear Power Plant, near where I live, is a well run, accident-free, clean source of power for a significant number of people in this country.  The plant engineers recently put in a request to extend the contract life of the plant, which was scheduled to close this year.  But closing the plant would mean building another source of power to replace it.  Dams or even a newer, more efficient nuke plant is simply out of the question.  Why?  No federal financing available.  No infrastructure funding.  It's not about 3-eyed fish.  It's about a fiscally conservative government not willing to let go of the cash.  They'd rather keep the old plant running at greater expense and increasing risk of something going wrong due to aging facilities.  It makes me crazy.

Having the *dreaded* Feds, devote/regulate funds and resources to infrastructure actually saves money, time, and resources, and also creates jobs and encourages industry competition.  Numerous case studies show this, concerning everything from the German rail system DeutcheBahn to High Speed Internet in Japan.

Take my experience for example:

My hometown of about 45,000 in Eastern Washington State finances and contracts all its road construction projects to the lowest bidder, almost always a local company.  These companies can take months to do a simple project like repaving a stretch of 1 blocks of 3-lane road.  I go to school in Seattle, population about 580,000, and I have seen similar and even more complex projects done in 1/5 of that time for about the same amount of money.  Not to say the Seattle transportation authority doesn't have its foibles.  But most "domestic" road construction?  Done in 2 days, weather pending.

Another article in the Times recently went on about how local wind farms do not possess infrastructure to power as much of the country as they theoretically could.  I mean, my god, the country is different than it was 50 years ago?  Shock, horror.  Those trip-back-to-the-50's conservatives must be stunned speechless.

Any fiscal conservative who complains about red tape and earmarks in federal projects should look at the overhead costs and CEO "perks" of your average publicly traded corporation.  Federal regulations could theoretically close many of the loopholes that keep these guys in such comfy mansions, but the GOP doesn't exactly have the "fight the power" attitude that would get that accomplished, either.  Who would, if they got paid so much money to look the other way?

So in the end, it's a choice between having the costs of those runaway corporations trickle down through product pricing and wasted money in government contracts, or paying taxes.  The taxes end up being cheaper for 99% of Americans.  Who knew?*

If the McCain camp really believes that no progress needs to be made in regard to infrastructure (assuming they know what it  means), they should at least say so.  Hiding behind one element of it doesn't make you look mavricky--it makes you look ignorant.

*This, by the way, is also the theory behind universal healthcare, an insitution that in England, France and Germany has notably not become the poster boy for economic catastrophe or failing pharmeceutical research.