What does a person do with a billion dollars? I’ve been pondering this for a while now, ever since Trump took office and began making decisions and policies that largely benefit only those who already have more money than they know what to do with. I have a rather socialistic way of looking at the world, believing that it is wrong for one man to live a posh, hedonistic lifestyle while others are starving. As such, I am aghast at the current administration’s constant pandering to those who already have too much at the expense of those who are barely getting by.
It seems somehow criminal to give tax cuts to the wealthy, while the rest of us are paying about the same or even more than before. The latest news is that Trump is attempting to force the Tennessee Valley Authority to keep open a power plant that is no longer viable, simply because they buy coal from his uber-wealthy pal and supporter, Robert Murray, owner of Murray Energy of whom I’ve written before. It seems criminal that Trump is rolling back efficiency standards on light bulbs, which is estimated to carry a high cost to consumers (us).
And those are only the most recent examples. All of these decisions are made with an eye toward putting more money in the pockets of billionaires. And what do they do with it? I don’t know, but I will tell you what they don’t do with it. They don’t pay a fair portion of taxes on it – taxes that might go toward such things as taking care of people less fortunate. They don’t donate the bulk of it to worthy causes. They hoard it. It seems criminal to me, for any person to have so much money sitting around for bragging purposes while the vast majority of people in the world are truly struggling to stay alive.
I was in that frame of mind a few days ago when I stumbled upon an article by journalist Tom Scocca. The title of the piece, No Billionaires, caught my eye. Take a look for yourself …
Some ideas about how to make the world better require careful, nuanced thinking about how best to balance competing interests. Others don’t: Billionaires are bad. We should presumptively get rid of billionaires. All of them.
Does this sound like an incitement to the most dreaded kind of revolution, when people are struck down by the mob simply on the basis of some crude simple standard? It is not. The people who have a billion dollars are fine; they may go on living. It is just that, for the sake of everyone else (and, honestly, for their own sake) they must not be allowed to possess a billion dollars.
No one needs a billion dollars. No one deserves a billion dollars. There is a widespread moral and conceptual error, in a society saturated in the ideology of competition and monetary success, that the property a person has gotten does not simply belong to that person but is, somehow, itself an embodiment of their personhood—that to separate a person from property is to attack their human existence.
This is true to an extent—to the extent that property secures a person food, and shelter, and physical security, and health and futurity. Even, despite the inequities and injustices that have emerged by this level, a person’s opportunities to have leisure, to make art, etc.
None of this comes anywhere near adding up to a billion dollars.
Another error is the belief that billionaires have made their money by adding value to society, of which they take a minor share. One pictures some great industrialist inventing and manufacturing a useful item, which makes every single person’s life better, and in return receiving a small share of the price of the item.
A kindergarten teacher, teaching 25 new people a year not to bite each other and to work in occasional harmony with strangers, produces far more social good in a lifetime than an industrialist does. Even to picture the billionaire as a productive industrialist is too optimistic—read up and down the Forbes list, larded with monopolists, retailers, retail monopolists, the heirs of retail monopolies, real estate magnates, Mark Zuckerberg.
What do they do with all their extra money? They buy atrocious houses. They shut down publications. They buy politicians, over and under the table. Now a whole batch of them have moved directly into government—and we have the most corrupt and incompetent executive branch in memory to show for it.
When we speak of the better billionaires, we simply mean the ones who are not actively malignant. There are no good billionaires. There may be some relatively good people who are attached to a pile of money that stacks one billion dollars high, but the money does not improve them. It makes them worse. Their good points would be no less good if they held only, say, 500 million dollars. And their bad points would be that much less of a problem for anyone else.
Now, Ruby has already proven herself to be possessed of a huge, caring heart. When she was nine-years-old, she started a project “to promote the kindness of Harrison people and its businesses through a painted rock project, called Harrison Rocks.” Ruby gives credit for her inspiration to paint rocks to her cat, Bubba. Her first painted rock was a Bubba rock.
Ruby started spending more time with the residents, and began asking them a simple question: “If I could bring you three things in the whole world, what would those be?” The answers were surprisingly simple … fresh fruit, haircuts, snacks, or a book. And Ruby began keeping a notebook …
A visit to 
Ruby has also begun creating artwork to adorn the residents walls. Here’s a recent post by Ruby’s mom, Amanda …
In addition to local media, Ruby’s project has attracted international attention, being featured on 
“It gives me something to do. It took away a lot of my depression — because I felt worthless and couldn’t do anything to help anybody. I’ve been here so long, I was no longer useful. Every day that goes by, I get a little more excited. I go out into in the hub — the areas where people sit. I look and talk to them and ask if there’s anything they need.”
Police estimated that Beto’s rally was attended by between 10,000-15,000 people.
But that didn’t stop Trump’s eldest, Don, Jr., from speaking at the aforementioned rally in El Paso last night.
Garbage compromise? Sean Hannity, the lowest of low in the broadcast world, should be largely irrelevant. Instead, the so-called president actually listens to Sean more than he listens to his experienced, educated advisors (Sean is a college drop-out with zero experience in lawmaking or government), and therein lies the danger. Will Trump take Sean’s words to heart? Is it possible that, rather than sign the bipartisan bill, Trump will allow the government to shut down once again on the advice of a media personality?
Notice especially the differences between Republicans and Democrats — and the republicans wonder why the GOP has become known as the party of racists? The survey was conducted January 22nd to February 5th, mostly before the revelation of Virginia Governor Northam in blackface in his med school yearbook.
I wonder, if this survey had been taken three years ago, when we had an African-American president, a man of conscience and compassion, and before the ‘man’ in the Oval Office gave off racist vibes, would the results have been the same? For the record, it isn’t really a matter of opinion, but a matter of what’s right and what’s wrong. Wearing blackface is a form of mockery, a form of denigration, and it is NEVER acceptable. Period. Not for a costume party, not for a small gathering of close friends, and not for a med school yearbook picture. NEVER.
“The LGBTQ is a modern-day version of the Ku Klux Klan, without wearing hoods with their antics of hate. The LGBT is the most socialist group in this country. They do not protect gays. There are many gays they persecute if they do not line up with their social ideology. I am terrified of these people. They represent a socialist activist agenda. They are opponents of freedom.”
The resolution demands that it be taken down over safety concerns. Residents and business owners have told local reporters that it makes the town feel like a war zone — “an inquisition,” one said — and worry about the effect on its life and commerce downtown. Nogales resident Allen Zale, who served with the Army, said it reminded him of his time stationed in Berlin.
Would you want your kids walking home from school along this lethal path? Or would you want to live in one of those houses and have to see this every time you look out your window? It seems to me that Trump has made the town less safe.
The company also considered raspberry, and lemon-ginger, but after a test run of the orange-vanilla in Canada proved successful, they chose that. Said a company spokesperson …
Dating where the inside is all that counts
I hope you’ve found something to bring a smile to your face this morning, and that you’ll share those smiles with those who need them most. Keep safe & warm, and have a great week, my friends! Love ‘n hugs from Filosofa & Jolly!
Elizabeth Warren announced her entry into the 2020 presidential campaign this morning. While I respect Ms. Warren’s political views, believe she is as well-qualified as any, and while a year ago I would have considered her as my choice, I have to wonder at her decision today. Given the very public controversy that she stirred over her Native American heritage, or lack thereof, she doesn’t stand a snowball’s chance in hell of winning the democratic nomination, much less the presidency. Frankly, I don’t relish the thought of listening to Trump and his faithful followers shrieking “Pocahontas” for the next 21 months! The more candidates who throw their hats into the ring, the more it dilutes the party unity, and that unity is going to be essential to winning an election next year. I wish Ms. Warren had put country before ego.
Long time ago, July 2016, to be exact, I awarded Trump’s buddy Roger Stone (and his wife) my coveted 
His points made sense, as Will’s points most always do, and I had added her to my list of potentials. Then today comes the news that Ms. Klobuchar has a history of mistreating her staff. It is even said it caused such concerns that in 2015, then-Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid spoke to her privately and told her to change her behavior, though Reid neither confirms nor denies. Sigh. Another one bites the dust. It becomes apparent to me that there will be early and multiple attempts to discredit any and every democrat who plans to run in 2020. Somebody, republicans and/or Russians, has already begun a concerted campaign to sling as much mud, to dig up as much dirt as possible on every candidate who appears to present a challenge to Trump. It is gonna be ugly, folks. I have to wonder if there will be any whose past won’t come back to haunt them over the next 21 months. Shoot me now.
