Well, I hope it works Manuel Delaflor
Ideologically, I'm generally in the same camp as you.
Yet comparative history leads me to believe it might not be
possible among life forms of any sort on this planet.
Mathematically and ideologically what you suggest and what I
believe in as well, works. It appeals to every fairness and
justice emotion within me.
Yet, I am hypocritical. While my personal income is well into
poverty level, my BUSINESS and HOUSE income is not. I run a
business that does well for my family, at least enough to barely
yet successfully for 13 yrs, maintain a mortgage payment each
month, Satellite TV with all the channels [that I never watch],
DSL Internet, telephones.
I am dry when I sleep at night. We have air conditioning which
keeps the house at a temperature that people in the house like
to fight over. [I stay on the porch most of the day, because I
*like* going with the weather going up and down], but I'm weird.
Yet I STILL come inside to cool off or warm up.
I HAVE AN "INSIDE' to warm up or cool off in.
We have cars at the house. They're not great cars, but they're
cars. Brother has a truck that he uses for work with our
business. Sister-in-law has a beat up jalopy that barely runs
and wouldn't be street legal in many states, and my mother and I
share a basic $14,000 manual steering BUT 2014-new Nissan Versa
Note.
My brother has a small camper he takes out hunting every year
and we have 5 ares of land and a 40x40ft barn my brother, myself
and brother-in-law built and there's always people hanging out
there drinking beer and doing whatever they do. [I got bored of
it after 10 yrs myself but they keep doing it]
Yet, my in-laws believe they are "have nots" and don't see the
riches they have and complain about the rich here in Naples,
because the Rich here are SUPER DUPER RICH. The homes here are
richer than Beverly Hills in the rich part of town. We live in
the woods part, the rednecky part.
From the standpoint of most of the world, I AM RICH.
Am I redistributing my wealth to bring greater equality?
NO, I AM NOT.
Why?
Because other people have MORE, and I feel _as if_ I have LESS.
I do exactly what I detest by wanting to maintain the lifestyle
that feels normal to me. Up in New Jersey, I lived a MUCH
DIFFERENT normal, with far higher income and higher stress. That
felt normal then.
What's equitable? What's a base standard? What do you feel is
the equivalent of a "chicken in every pot"?
The thing is: I BELIEVE IN RESOURCE BASE ECONOMY.
But I'm not living it. I'm just struggling to keep MY OWN
resources balanced.
No matter how poor you may feel you are, SOMEBODY ELSE out there
thinks you're rich. And they will ask YOU the same thing: Why
aren't YOU sharing YOUR resources?
Of course, I want a community garden here on my land. I want a
school. I want all of the things that COULD MAKE a resource
based economy work.
But why can't I? My in-laws would never have it. Plan=dead from
the start. If I can't do it for myself, how can I shout to the
world that THEY should do it? I'm not saying you shouldn't, but
I'm just saying it's REALLY HARD to put these things into
practice, even in a single small group of people.
You'll only get agreers agreeing with you. I agree with you in
principle. But I'm highly discouraged because *I* couldn't make
it happen myself. Maybe someday? Sure.
I dare YOU Manuel Delaflor - NOT NECESSARILY PUBLICLY like me -
to put the COLD HARD MIRROR onto your own life and lifestyle and
compare your haves with the world's have-nots.
I personally _can't_ get political about this issue as much as I
want to, if a team of newspaper reporters would look at MY life
and some would go, "YEAH, WELL, LOOK AT WHAT *YOU HAVE*?" It
disturbs me because I _want_ to stand up tall and proud and say
what you're saying, and share those memes.
