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The concept of "money" boggles the mind -- my mind at least. It used to be that money was simply something that facilitated an exchange. Money was based on real value, gold, or even the value of goods and services. Not any more. Money has become the name of an infinitely flexible illusion. It has nothing to do even with the value of the paper it is printed on, because huge, enormous amounts of this so-called money are traded, exchanged, manipulated, on computers. We're talking about imaginary somethings, hocus pocus, and you're a billionaire. You buy an interest in a corporation that is not producing anything but exists for the sole purpose of dealing in money. And you don't pay in paper money, but transfer a number from your computer to someone else's computer. So you have bought yourself a place at the table, but the game is not even honest gambling any more, because chance is too chancy, and there are ways around it.
We used to think millions. Now everything is in billions (in America that means a thousand million). Next year we will have trillionaires. And all those trillions are not real, but figures on a computer.
We spend our lives away on money we don't have: credit, at 23% interest if we don't pay up before a certain date. Does anyone remember the word "usury?"
I wrote a thousand more words but trashed them. I don't know much about money (and I don't want to know). I keep myself debt-free, but know only too well that I am part of a System I do not understand, or like.
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Is there a reason why we drive on the right-hand side of the road? I've never read an explanation of that. I grew up in a country where we drove on the left-hand side of the road. Switching over was not that difficult, I found. It takes less than a day--and being in traffic helps. Today many countries have changed to driving on the right, but not all.
Why is the United States the only country any more where we have miles and pounds and gallons? Everybody else uses the metric system, which-- once you understand the underlying very simple premise--is much easier to use.
Reading about global warming, climate change, I wondered about the word "tonne:" so many million tonnes of carbon dioxide spewed into the atmosphere. Looked it up, a tonne is a metric ton. Different, of course, from an American ton. Either way a ton, or tonne, is a measure of a large amount of weight. Millions of either tons or tonnes is a disaster.
Has anyone really grasped the enormity of our isolation? This country is responsible for a sizable slice of all those tonnes of CO2 that pollute the atmosphere we share with all beings that need the atmosphere to survive. All six and a half billion people, all animals all over the world. Yet we are 4% of the world's population, if that, and we refuse to reduce our 20-30% share of (everyone's) pollution. How can we get away with that?
I know, I know. We are the richest, most powerful nation on earth. We can do anything we damn well please. Right?
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There is a whole book of questions I have, to do with why a government even bothers to control, prohibit, prosecute and persecute what we eat, smoke, drink, do in bed. Is that what governments are for?
I have noticed that governments that have the most don'ts are also the ones that most loudly proclaim freedom.
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And why can there be only two political parties in the United States? A few times we've had third party candidates, but it seems those votes were taken away from the Democrats, guaranteeing a win for the Republicans. Do Republicans sponsor those third parties?
