Rev. Joe Dirt's Ramblings Archives - Page 121 of 143

The above link is an article on a different form capitalism, one that values social democratic ideals. This is not the capitalism found in the good ole USA, but it is found in Germany. Despite the bad economic times, and the raising economic power of Asia, their economy is still doing very well.

I have had some of the same thoughts as the author of this article, only mine were about farming. I have occasionally had the same thoughts about small retail shops as Wal-Mart and other big box stores kill downtowns and mom and pop operations. I have just never made the logical progression to our manufacturing base. Continue reading “Size Does Matter”

2010/11/232010/12/01

Just Imagine — No Taxes

There is personal wealth and then there is community wealth. I read this a while back in a discussion of the growing wealth gap in this country. One measure of wealth that has a lot to with the general happiness of a population is community wealth. This includes such things as parks, good roads, support of the arts, community buildings, education, etc.

I started thinking about this again as I have just come back from the Shelby County Clerks Office where I was registering my vehicle. It is not an awful government building, I’ve been in a lot worse, but neither is it grand. I still remember where they housed the County Sanitarians in Pulaski County, Arkansas. It was an old hospital that had long been past its prime when the medicos abandoned it. Now the County was trying to use it for office space. It does seem to me that many government buildings get short shrift. Continue reading “Just Imagine — No Taxes”

2010/11/232023/12/16

Donate, but give carefully

It is always hard to know when you donate money if it is being using properly. Here are some useful guidelines It also lists some charities to give to, and a few to not give to.

When Donations Go Astray – Nicholas Kristof @ The New York Times

2010/11/222021/07/27

Buying Vehicles via Internet

I’ve bought two cars via the Internet now. The first was a used car and the second was a new vehicle.

I found my 2006 Mazda MX-5 on Autotrader.com. It was 9 months old at the time. A guy about my age had it, but was marrying a younger woman with two kids. He needed a family car, and was sadly selling his sports car. She must have been quite a woman. I checked the Carfax report and that came back clean. The car was actually in Albuquerque and I was in St. Louis. However, I have a cousin in Albuquerque who is a car guy and into sports cars. He went by and took a look at the Mazda and drove it, and reassured me that it was in good condition. I made a very good deal with the gentleman because as “they” say he was a very motivated seller. That motivation and the fact that he had been having a hard time finding a buyer worked in my favor. I hopped on a plane, Continue reading “Buying Vehicles via Internet”

2010/11/192010/12/03

“Sometimes anal is good”

We had a minor crisis at work. I work on the Oracle HRMS system for a utility. After applying a patch and upgrade we could not transfer the time from the time card system over to the Payroll system. People like to get paid so we were more than a little motivated to get it fixed.

We gathered together as a team to work on the problem which took more than a few hours to fix. People were getting somewhat tense. Programmers as a group are on the OCD side and when we get stressed it tends to bring out this side even more.

Somebody wanted to double check something a different way. He apologized for being anal, but he said he needed to do this.

I remarked that, “Sometimes anal is good.”

The room all of sudden got real quite.

I realized what I had just said.

2010/11/192022/09/19

Huge concentrations of wealth corrodes the soul of any nation

A couple quotes from the Nicholas Kristof editoral linked to below:

A Hedge Fund Republic? Nicholas Kristof in the New York Times

“But there is also a larger question: What kind of a country do we aspire to be? Would we really want to be the kind of plutocracy where the richest 1 percent possesses more net worth than the bottom 90 percent?’

“I’m appalled by our growing wealth gaps because in my travels I see what happens in dysfunctional countries where the rich just don’t care about those below the decks. The result is nations without a social fabric or sense of national unity. Huge concentrations of wealth corrode the soul of any nation.”

I’ve been watching and crying over this growing problem for years. Part of me just cannot understand how in a democratic society where the vast majority of folks are in the middle and lower economic classes this happened. After all 9 to 1 should win ever time, right?

In large part it has happened because both political parties are unabashedly junkies when it comes to financing political campaigns. Continue reading “Huge concentrations of wealth corrodes the soul of any nation”

2010/11/17

Parenting – An Addiction

Well this pretty much explains why we do such a crazy thing as have kids…

“Shankar Vedantam of Slate hypothesizes that people continue to procreate, despite overwhelming evidence that parenting isn’t very fun, for much the same reason that cocaine users can’t quit: they’re addicts.”

See link below.

The Parent Trap: Addiction

2010/11/16

Oración de la Serenidad

Dios concédeme la serenidad para aceptar las cosas que no puedo cambiar.

Valor para cambiar aquellas que puedo.

Y sabiduría para reconocer la diferencia.

2010/11/152010/11/19

The Tradition Continues

When my kids were in grade school, I would occasionally have them do “book reports” for various reasons. They were never very happy when I assigned them one, but they did do them…grudgingly. My daughter is much older now and she seems to have fond memories of doing the book reports, at least a few of them.

David and his family visited us recently in St. Louis. David and Brandie were determined to not waste a moment of the weekend and we visited many of the sites in town including the Arch. In the gift shop at the Arch they had a place mat with all the presidents on it. I purchased one, I though for me. The grand-kids made such a fuss over the place mat that I gave it to them with the stipulation they give me a book report on a president whenever their report cards came out. The tradition continues.

I am still waiting for Jordon’s report. Below is Teagan’s report. Continue reading “The Tradition Continues”