It's been a long time since I sat in a school room, but I still remember many of the early lessons. It's interesting to me because my short term memory doesn't work. I can remember things I learned in grade school but can't remember what I had for breakfast? What in the hell is that all about?
A person's mind is a complex assortment of synapse links magically connected to gossamer threads of knowledge. Human beings will never figure out how or why it works the way it does. Never!
Back two steps. In my old age it finally occurred to me that the history I learned in school - isn't the history that happened. Take "Thanksgiving" for example. Grade school teachers filled it with turkeys, Puritans in black hats, blunderbusses, pumpkin pie and some nasty brown people that said "ugh". Almost none of this was true. The Puritans were not especially nice people. They were biased, intolerant, ignorant and followed dumb rules. Indians were even worse. They were dirty, had bad teeth, and the Indian women were mistreated badly. The male Indians sat around smoked whatever was handy, and told the women what to do. When the Puritans gathered round the table for Sunday dinner, the oldest of them was probably about 40. In and around 1492 the average old people had kicked the bucket by then.
In today's world we are repeatedly told how brilliant and worldly our founding fathers were. Have you noticed that we are usually not informed about some of the rotten, debased, and generally awful things they did. Their personal habits were disgusting, public sanitation unknown, and they lived with and carried around bugs of every description. Most educators tended to gloss over the bad stuff quickly.
The Indians at that time were no better. We know, for example, that Indians gathered coup. The more gathered, the more status they had with their tribe. I never found out when they started scalping their enemies- or why? Did they invent the idea?
Years ago we were also told that the American government was better than sliced bread or any other known government. I wonder how they measured that? I wonder who did it? In my early undeveloped brain it was the Romans who had the first semi- sophisticated government. They seemed to be at least as organized as any.
The idea of a common government apparently has always included "them that has" and "them that doesn't". The rich were on the "governing" side and the poor on the "governed" side. Today we incessantly hear about the increasing gap between rich and poor. You would think it's something new. Wrong again fellow student.
There has always been a financial gap between rich and poor.
Today, all around the world we see an exponentially growing gap between rich and poor. It's been growing like this since before Biblical days. Constant adjustments are made caused by discontent with the gap, but so far, nothing seems to work. No one is happy.
So, the rich beat on the poor to protect their wealth and maintain "the gap".
The poor revolt against the rich trying to gain a larger share of the wealth.
A person's mind is a complex assortment of synapse links magically connected to gossamer threads of knowledge. Human beings will never figure out how or why it works the way it does. Never!
Back two steps. In my old age it finally occurred to me that the history I learned in school - isn't the history that happened. Take "Thanksgiving" for example. Grade school teachers filled it with turkeys, Puritans in black hats, blunderbusses, pumpkin pie and some nasty brown people that said "ugh". Almost none of this was true. The Puritans were not especially nice people. They were biased, intolerant, ignorant and followed dumb rules. Indians were even worse. They were dirty, had bad teeth, and the Indian women were mistreated badly. The male Indians sat around smoked whatever was handy, and told the women what to do. When the Puritans gathered round the table for Sunday dinner, the oldest of them was probably about 40. In and around 1492 the average old people had kicked the bucket by then.
In today's world we are repeatedly told how brilliant and worldly our founding fathers were. Have you noticed that we are usually not informed about some of the rotten, debased, and generally awful things they did. Their personal habits were disgusting, public sanitation unknown, and they lived with and carried around bugs of every description. Most educators tended to gloss over the bad stuff quickly.
The Indians at that time were no better. We know, for example, that Indians gathered coup. The more gathered, the more status they had with their tribe. I never found out when they started scalping their enemies- or why? Did they invent the idea?
Years ago we were also told that the American government was better than sliced bread or any other known government. I wonder how they measured that? I wonder who did it? In my early undeveloped brain it was the Romans who had the first semi- sophisticated government. They seemed to be at least as organized as any.
The idea of a common government apparently has always included "them that has" and "them that doesn't". The rich were on the "governing" side and the poor on the "governed" side. Today we incessantly hear about the increasing gap between rich and poor. You would think it's something new. Wrong again fellow student.
There has always been a financial gap between rich and poor.
Today, all around the world we see an exponentially growing gap between rich and poor. It's been growing like this since before Biblical days. Constant adjustments are made caused by discontent with the gap, but so far, nothing seems to work. No one is happy.
So, the rich beat on the poor to protect their wealth and maintain "the gap".
The poor revolt against the rich trying to gain a larger share of the wealth.
We need a little help here do we not?
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