This is what it is all about.
bunches of money-hungry machos fighting over money:
Oil. Raw materials. Land. People.
They make up all kinds of reasons why they are fighting:
causes like religions, democracy, communism and whatever regional slights and whatever other causes they can make up.
But follow the money. Continue reading The essence of war→
I am from Germany. Germans read the obituaries.
San Francisco Chronicle newspaper has the greatest obituary page.
People who died have their pictures there. Some have recent pictures and some have pictures when they were young. The descriptions of their lives are moving and admirable.
They were great people who had great lives.
I also look at their birth years and I am amazed and heartened by the longevity of so many older people.
There was a time in the not so distant past when 70 was old and people were pretty much done.
Now I see a lot more people in their mid to late 90s. Continue reading Disrupt aging→
In the United States it has been unpopular to think of American society as divided into economic classes.
It flies in the face of what the United States of America believes it stands for and what we value:
equality and equal opportunity.
The class system is not obvious and gets obscured because the working class and the middle class are effectively pitted against each other via race, religion and sexuality. Continue reading Cut away the drama and you get the class struggle→
The shift from an agrarian culture to an industrial culture was a positive revolution for us human beings.
More food production.
More goods that could be produced and bought.
Automation to make life easier also could be viewed as progress.
Dishwashers. Washer/Dryers.
Machines to do some of the heavy job.
That was the going attitude of economists. They have been embracing efficiency and productivity growth as the panacea for the good life of us. Continue reading technical progress does not lift all boats→
We are raised to be good girls and boys and to follow the rules.
We are told that it will result in a good life living happily ever after.
But in real life it is quite different.
We regular people are the ONLY ones playing by the good-girl/good-boy rules.
Who does not follow the rules are the rulers, the power brokers, the string-pullers behind the scenes and the manipulators of various backgrounds, the ones who got their billions by manipulating the good girls and boys on every level.
Yes, it is most important to follow the rules of fairness, honesty, kindness, compassion and the common good.
But that goes for everybody. Continue reading Good girls and boys don’t get the price→
We have bigger problems than playing the cruel game of:
I am better than you because I am American.
I am better than you because I am the privileged skin color.
I am better than you because I am the right gender.
I am better than you because I am thin.
I am better than you because I am rich.
I am better than you because I am straight.
I am better than you because I am Christian/Muslim or other religions.
While we still battle deep racism and many people are unwilling to get over the fact that slavery has ended 156 years ago, we are going to be surpassed all over the world by other countries.
These countries do not get hung up on trying to suppress segments of the population because they think they are better than them.
These countries look forward rather than back.
While the various Trump supporters are still thinking that 1950s style isolationism is the way to go, this is a glimpse of what is going on in the world: Continue reading This is what “America First” is doing to our country→
Money Grubbers
delight in taking it all
laughing, laughing
As the people
who create the money
fight for the crumbs
like ducks
when someone throws them bread
biting, pushing, chasing each other
for another crumb
Racism, discrimination and sending women back into the kitchen instead of being in the workforce are not solutions to the problems facing us in the 21st century.
AUTOMATION is the problem.
The uncontrolled, unplanned purely profit-based economic system is the problem. Continue reading CAPITALISM FOR ENTREPRENEURS, NOT FOR SPECULATORS→
Every time I go to the library to write I see this little old Chinese lady sitting in a doorway. She has all her bags grouped around her and a rain hat pulled over her face to make her look invisible. There is a peace and resignation around her. I have seen her every time I go to the library to write. She has always been and seems to live in this doorway of a shuttered law office storefront.
I have started to go over and give her 3 bucks and today I added half a moon cake. I hope that she will remember that part of her earlier life. Continue reading The Forgotten Old People in San Francisco→
From the time I started understanding how life and the economy work I always had this gnawing question in the back of my mind:
If everything hinges on growth, isn’t there a limit? The earth is finite. We grow and grow and grow and then what?
Now we know; we have too many cars, too many wars, too many people, to much of everything.
And still we have to grow to keep our standard of living, our way of life. Continue reading The Growth-Based Economy has to evolve→
