If you are as old as I am, you either remember these comments from 1955-ish, or just forgot:

"I'll tell you one thing, if things keep going the way they are, it's going to be impossible to buy a week's groceries for $20.00."

"Have you seen the new cars coming out next year? It won't be long before $2,000 will only buy a used one."

"If cigarettes keep going up in price, I'm going to quit. Twenty five cents a pack is ridiculous."

"Did you hear the post office is thinking about charging ten cents just to mail a letter?"

"If they raise the minimum wage to $1 an hour, nobody will be able to hire outside help at the store."

"When I first started driving, who would have thought gas would some day cost 29 cents a gallon? Guess we'd be better off leaving the car in the garage."

"I'm afraid to send my kids to the movies any more. Ever since they let Clark Gable get by with saying 'damn' in 'Gone With The Wind', it seems every new movie has either hell or damn."

"I read the other day where some scientist thinks it's possible to put a man on the moon by the end of the century. They even have some fellows they call astronauts preparing for it down in Texas."

"Did you see where some baseball player just signed a contract for $75,000 a year just to play ball? It wouldn't surprise me if someday they'll be making more than the President."

"I never thought I'd see the day all our kitchen appliances would be electric. They are even making electric typewriters now."

"It's too bad things are so tough nowadays. I see where a few married women are having to work to make ends meet. It won't be long before young couples are going to have to hire someone to watch their kids so they can both work."

"I'm afraid the Volkswagon car is going to open the door to a whole lot of foreign business."

"The drive-in restaurant is convenient in nice weather, but I seriously doubt they will ever catch on."

"There is no sense going on short trips anymore for a weekend, it costs nearly $15.00 a night to stay in a hotel."

"No one can afford to be sick anymore, at $35.00 a day in the hospital, it's too rich for my blood."

"If they think I will pay 50 cents for a haircut...forget it!"

Ring any bells?

I was taught by my parents to: Live simply so others may simply live. Our society has become greedy. Much of how people are judged depends upon the material things they possess.

If my small company can pay a fair wage, furnish insurance, and give profit sharing to the people who actually did the work, why can't the big corporations? If I stopped any one of these, I could raise my profits considerably. I make a good living not fantastic but good. I do not wish to succeed at the expense of others.

I have been blessed with employees who work very hard. However, I see in some a sense of entitlement. I will not reward the person who does not do his job by taking away from the person who does.

A few years back I was faced with a possible lay off. I called the bean counters that work for me. I could lay off some employees or cut hours back to 30. I called a meeting of all my employees. I explained we had an order which would make this a temporary situation. They voted to cut hours for two months so no one lost their job. When things picked up I gave all these wonderful people a raise. It was their choice and they chose to help each other. There are still people in this world that put their fellow man ahead of greed. You just don't hear about them.

You keep repeating 'it's about seeing everyone has a fair chance to seek what others have'...But you refuse to define how that outrageously subjective concept is defined.

I asked you about this and you didn't answer.

Let me ask it another way...when, exactly and under what circumstance is an American robbed of the opportunity to fairly "seek what others have?" I really, really want to understand this from your perspective.

If you cannot articulate a definition and direct answer, your entire argument is fallacious at best and purposefully disingenuous at worst.

Without defining clearly how the alleged injustice occurs you are simply parroting an ancient and bovine liberal argument supporting massive taxation in a communistic welfare state.

The government is charged with the responsibility to maintain a standing military to protect it's citizens from foreign invasion and a judiciary to resolve disputes among ourselves. Charity is the responsibility of local communities, churches, synagogues and mosques. Our Forefathers sought to limit the over-reach of government, via The Constitution, but career politicians, big business lobbies with special interest and Socialists have subverted and perverted the intent of that founding document.

WHAT WE OWE OUR NEIGHBORS & COUNTRYMEN IS CIVILITY and nothing more. Everything beyond civility, should be freely given, not taken by force of "BIG GOV".

Serenity, great subject. Patty in her first post had some excellent points. And MCJ is spot on.

Solar power becomes larger and more practical every year, both in America and the rest of the world.

We are see the formation of coops for towns and areas which build a local grid and generate solar power of the members.

China basically put Solar panels out of biz. At this time Congress will not add tariffs or halt imports in anyway. But we still have a number of small business doing well in the solar field. I tried to post an artical the other day, but could not get the cut and paste to work.

Old gringo list shows how much we need oil based products. While a number can be provided by other means, by reducing our fuel needs we could use that oil more for manufacturing purposes.

I think we are developing the replacement we need, and we will manage in time. Conservation combined with natural gas as a stop gap will git us to combinations of power we hardly think of now.

Fission, methane, solar, wind, tidal, Geo-thermal. We need them all and they can be developed faster than we have been doing.

If "clean coal" had become a reality, we could take our time but that was technically impossible. Now we all need to work on our own usages and rush the time line.

If I remember right, the Jews had a system where every 50 years all debts were canceled. Everyone had a new start.
That seems interesting.

I have always thought just every once in a while, those who have should make adjustments to receive just a little less and give a little more to those who actually do the work. I understand investment cost, all of the incidentals that go with being in business.

At some point in time a successful business makes more money than the owner requires. When that point is reached, why not spread the wealth with those who produced. Not on a permanent basis, but like the Jews every so many years. Just saying.

Thanks - but to belabor the point once again - I'm concerned that more and more people seem to vote for a living and by that I don't mean welfare people - but lawyers who get more business every time a new law or regulation is put on the books, accountants every time a new line is added to the tax code, lobbyists each time a special interest group is identified, many at the large corporations who seek some form of rent seeking advantage - and the growing bureaucrats whose numbers increase as well as pure power with each and every government "solution" to a problem.