An interesting fact I learned in Australia: US pennies would probably not exist were it not for copper lobbyists. In the land down under, the smallest denomination coin is 5 cents. They eliminated 1-cent coins and all prices are to be rounded to the nearest 5.
I wondered out loud at one point why the US doesn’t do the same thing. One of my travel mates quickly responded that the US still makes pennies because lobbyists for the copper industry have fought all such legislation. Now there’s an interesting twist on “money equals power.”
Australia also has 1- and 2-dollar coins. I wonder if there is some lobbyist for an industry supported by the US Mint keeping smaller bills instead of popularizing coins so they won’t go out of business too.
I understand the desire for an industry to do whatever they can to stay afloat, but, with a few exceptions, it seems like a bad sign when an industry has to resort to legislation and/or lawsuits in order to keep business from dying. Deal with it, folks. No industry is guaranteed to be eternal.
Fun side note: in Thailand, where 30 baht is roughly equivalent to 1 US dollar, there are 1-baht and even 1/2-baht coins, but they’re hard to find. The only people that give them out are Big C chain stores (the Thai equivalent to Walmart [blech]). And, conveniently, pretty much nobody will take a 1- or 1/2-baht coin but Big C, rendering them almost entirely useless.
It’s been a long week, and I am too tired to act as excited as I really am that I get to see Bon Iver at The Wiltern tonight, then spend the weekend with some “family” I haven’t seen for a while.
Here’s hoping I don’t fall asleep behind the wheel on my ride to LA! Have a good weekend, friends.
So who else is stoked that Ze Frank is doing videos again? Hopefully not just me. The Show may have been a spark (along with Colbert and Stewart, go figure) to me being more concerned about politics and critical thinking. I used to think it was boring. Go figure.
Anyway. Ze’s sold out and makes his videos for TIME now, but who cares? He’s still doing his thing and I love it.
I saw this movie last night and pretty much sat in the theater in wonder for two hours. Not only were the sounds these three guitar legends able to coax out of their instruments amazing, but it held up as a journey through many philosophies about creativity and artistic creation. Immediately upon leaving the theater I felt an intense urge to pick up a guitar, find my voice and play whatever comes out.
Talk about resetting the synapses. They make it look so easy, but I wonder sometimes if they are created special beings. Beings that can tap into a sense of focus and creative meandering and a freedom and confidence to put notes and words on paper and hope other people feel the same way they do about them.
I believe our nation works best with robust and civic dialogue and civil debate. For mature societal conversations to take place, at least two mature parties are required, and looking back over this summer, a second party is hard to find.
The Obama administration needs a worthy loyal opposition, just as any group in power does, and the president himself often says so. But people who shout “hitler, nazi, socialist” don’t constitute a worthy loyal opposition. Nor do the birthers (who don’t stray too far from the fictional portrait of the afterbirthers described satirically here). Nor do the nostalgics, who seem to keep waking up in the 1980’s year after year, quoting Ronald Reagan.
McLaren makes a very good observation that’s been very frustrating for me as of late. To see all the video and photos of right-leaning protesters speaking and holding signs making obtuse, uninformed, unloving and ignorant statements has been just as frustrating as it was a year ago to be an Obama supporter amidst a crowd of followers whose only justifications were “hope” and “change.”
Much responsibility does rest on the shoulders of the Republican party to become once again a worthy opposing voice, but just as much lies on those who vote conservatively to be educated and civil in their political reactions. (“You lie!” was probably not setting a very good example and I have to wonder if that particular politician has been influenced by a lack of civility in his supporters.)
More importantly, though: this is not advice for Republicans only. It’s something every voter and politician — for every party — needs to keep in mind. We all need to help buck this uncivil cycle, and that should be something we can all agree on.
Happy Friday to you all. If you get a chance, watch the live version of “Via Chicago” on Wilco’s Ashes of American Flags DVD. If not, this version will suffice. If it doesn’t bring you close to tears, something might be wrong with you.
Not only do we eat too much meat, we also eat too much of the wrong parts. We don’t know where our meat comes from, we don’t know what the animal we’re eating ate, and we sure don’t know how to get behind the stove and take control of what we put in our mouths.
We ought to start by looking at the great food cultures of the world. The traditional cuisines of Asia and North Africa, not to mention France and Italy, are based on rice, wheat, spices and smatterings of all cuts of meat. In just about every other cuisine, protein plays second fiddle to grains and vegetables. When meat appears, it does so modestly; it takes up less space on the plate, and more often than not it’s a piece of the animal — tripe or oxtail — that Americans so willingly discard.
The best advice I ever got about meat in our diets is that, more often than not, it shouldn’t be the main attraction of a meal. It’s most healthily used as a side or ingredient in a meal. You know, sauce with meat in it on spaghetti rather than steak with a side salad. Beef stew rather than a half-pound burger.
When I was in Australia, I tried pork knuckle for the first time. Sounds a bit gross, but that’s only because Americans avoid any cut of meat that resembles an actual body part (ribs aside). It’s a smaller serving of meat that is harder to get at, and if there weren’t salad, potatoes, etc. on the plate with it, you’d leave hungry. It was quite tasty and I’d eat it again if I had the chance. But since I live in a country where all these tasty parts are deemed “gross” and tossed out by everyone but a few butchers (who are disappearing at a rapid pace), that might never happen again.
I suggest a different, even darker solution to Fermi’s Paradox. Basically, I think the aliens don’t blow themselves up; they just get addicted to computer games. They forget to send radio signals or colonize space because they’re too busy with runaway consumerism and virtual-reality narcissism. They don’t need Sentinels to enslave them in a Matrix; they do it to themselves, just as we are doing today.
This is just a snippet of a great piece of writing that I suggest you all go read right now. It’s short, I promise. It kind of makes you wonder what we’re doing to the human race when the virtual economy outweighs the physical economy. Scary, thought-provoking and encouraging in a “we can catch this before it’s too late” kind of way.
Am I the only one more surprised that that much ink would only fuel one flight that doesn’t even circle the globe once? I was expecting to see something like “it would fuel a space shuttle from here to Mars three times!” But no. Just one flight that’s probably less miles than I’ve traveled by air in the last year or two. That’s depressing to me. Time to stop flying, I guess. Or start praying that those stats are grossly miscalculated.
