Yeah, we're bigger and more diverse, but so what? It's like people give up on solving problems, and use that as an excuse, without even trying.
When I think of the conservatism that's really hurting us, it's not Fox News or any of those right-wing nitwits, it's otherwise-smart people putting out this attitude of "we can't do anything, because America!"
Ironically, it was the wide-eyed liberal optimists of their day that inflicted suburbia on us. Disrupting how we built cities to that point was supposed to make everything better.
They won, and the result was the legislation of vast suburban "residential" zones where commercial business was prohibited, with minimum lot sizes and setbacks and minimum space between houses.
I've quite often heard the "because America!" lines you refer to -- in response to the specific issues you mention -- used by Fox News and similar right-wing outlets. So, I'm not sure the two things you contrast here as sources of the issue are actually mutually exclusive alternatives, rather than closely related facets of the same thing.
Whereas conservatives focus on supposed positive exceptional attributes of America, multiple generations of leftists have now promoted and developed the inverse: the idea that America is forever fundamentally broken (due to the power of big corporations, evil conservatives, Fox News, etc.), and thus certain problems that others can solve are deemed inherently unsolveable in America.
Strange description, because pretty much every example I've seen of this has been someone on the left saying "Of course we can do better in this area, see how it works in <other country>!" followed by someone on the right saying "No, we that won't work here, because America!".
(Sometimes pointing to something that might arguably be a legitimate difference -- I'm not saying that this pattern is universally wrong, just that there doesn't seem to be anything leftist about it, if anything, it tends to be the opposite.)
The closest I've seen from the Left to this is the defeatist version "we could in theory do that here and it would work, but it isn't politically viable because America!." But, OTOH, I've seen that form from the Right, too, just on different issues.
I can't remember ever seeing any left-leaning or progressive type throw up their hands and say, "well, that just won't work here."
I will acknowledge that political conservatives or right-leaning types often do suggest that problems are solvable, but these days I only ever see right-leaning types suggesting that "the free market" will solve a problem (and, conversely, if it's one of the large class of things that the free market can't solve, then it is either not a problem or it is not solvable).
Still, the whole "it can't be done here" is, if not right-leaning, at least a conservative attitude in the sense of not trying to change anything. It just adds in an extra layer of (often irrelevant or nonsensical) defeatism, like the problem is unsolvable, and not just difficult.
It's weird, because we could put people on the moon, but a city can't adapt to a more bike-friendly way of life?
Yeah, it's always a longer process. You still gotta start at some point. 30 years behind Amsterdam and the clock is still clicking on for the process to actually start. Tomorrow it will be 30 years and 1 day without action.
(I'll just say it to be very clear here: when I say Amsterdam, really it's all of the Netherlands, to slightly varying degree.)
the latter being the kicker, most euros do not comprehend the distances that hit you in the US. plus, cali is a desert. try cycling in 40C heat, for 10miles (15km). people use cars because of the AC.
distances also hit as your work rarely is located where you live - US has planned cities with strict zones. you live here but you work there. US commute is very, very different than anything in Europe.
You know, in 1960, Amsterdam was the same car-centric hellhole. They didn't always have that transport modal share. They worked on it.