Every child in Davenport gets a big chunk of a college education paid for. The city's police and fire departments get a new stream of revenue. Paying for it all is an existing tax. While property taxes would likely rise modestly for a few years, they'd be back below current levels by 2014.

And the ultimate goal is a growing community with a larger tax base, which in the long run could mean more money for schools and city services with lower property-tax rates.

Who could possibly be against that?

When it comes to domestic issues that pit the interests of large corporations against those of ordinary Americans, few equal the exploding crisis in consumer debt. Yet with the exception of John Edwards, none of the leading presidential contenders in either party has made this a serious campaign issue. Perhaps this shouldn't come as a surprise, since the same financial institutions that engage in predatory- lending practices constitute their largest contributors, as well as what is perhaps the most powerful lobby in all of Washington.

Oil, soil, copper, and forests are forms of wealth. So are factories, houses, and roads. But according to a 2005 study by the World Bank, such solid goods amount to only about 20 percent of the wealth of rich nations and 40 percent of the wealth of poor countries.

So what accounts for the majority? World Bank environmental economist Kirk Hamilton and his team in the bank's environment department have found that most of humanity's wealth isn't made of physical stuff. It is intangible. In their extraordinary but vastly under-appreciated report, Where Is the Wealth of Nations? Measuring Capital for the 21st Century, Hamilton's team found that "human capital and the value of institutions (as measured by rule of law) constitute the largest share of wealth in virtually all countries."

You won't be alone if you doubt that David Wise can turn his plans for a long-neglected part of downtown Moline into reality. Plenty of other people have questioned whether he can do it.

"I had a lot of skepticism that I could pull this off," Wise said last week. "I've been hearing that I've made a believer out of some skeptics."

One of those skeptics phrased it even more forcefully.

"He made a liar out of me," said Jim Bowman, executive director of Renew Moline. "I didn't think at first that he could pull it off. ... The odds were overwhelmingly against him to succeed."