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Monica Smith
Number of posts: 144
Email address: email
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Posts by Monica Smith:
God & Taxes
Georgia Underground
First, let me assert that money, like any other tool (a hammer, for example) is worthless, unless and until it is taken in hand and put to use. To be more precise, money is a measuring tool, at the same time that it is symbolic of energy expended and value accumulated. In that sense, money somewhat resembles a mound of oyster shells or cache of flint flakes, which attest to the activities of many collectors or one collector over a long period of time. Or the collection may just be evidence of a failure to dispose of waste. Regardless, just as a collection of detritus is tangible evidence of activities which occurred in the past, so is money…
Behind the Gates
Ostentatious Crooks
The perception that modern day crooks, in addition to having figured out how to manipulate the law to their advantage, are ostentatious came to me overnight. I suppose it’s a consequence of tracing how and by whom some of our so-called “gated communities” were acquired and developed to hide what are surely ill-gotten gains.
Perhaps it is unfair to suggest that medical doctors, when they are lured into purchasing building lots on the edges of marshes and meandering streams, nature’s nurseries for crustaceans and fish, are investing ill-gotten gains.
Laundering More Than Sin
Give Unto Caesar
e IOR is, apparently, not a believer. The IOR, in case that acronym is unfamiliar, is the Istituto per le Opere di Religione, the Vatican’s bank. That’s right, the place where the Church of Rome collects money is where the work of religion originates. “In God We Trust”
Anyway, the Vatican’s bank is in bad odor with the Bank of Italy, as the Economist reports
Control
Why the Cons Need Guns
It has been reported that Congress has stymied research on gun violence since 1996 by explicitly prohibiting the spending of dollars for such research by the Centers for Disease Control. Given that one of the main Congressional obligations is to “provide for the general welfare, the wanton killing of thirty thousand persons a year, most in the prime of life, coming up with a sensible strategy to prevent that would seem a reasonable thing to do. But, the Congress taking the opposite tack is actually quite rational.
Exploitation Or Slaughter
On Sally Miller and the Rule of Law
The Australian journalist, John Bailey, came upon the story of Sally Miller while he was researching the laws of slavery in the United States. He found the story of Sally Miller, supposedly a German child who had been sold into slavery so compelling, that he decided to use her as an exemplar of what he’d discovered about the law and tell her story, which had been publicized in many pamphlets in the early 19th Century when the action took place, from a slightly different perspective. Legal principles do drive the tale.
Full Faith & Credit
The Fiscal Kerfuffle
We are agitating over figments of the imagination.
We already know Obama loves him a kerfuffle. The real issue is how to get Congress to realize that their job is to spend or dispense money. Managing the currency is one of their prime responsibilities. Scrimping and hoarding is not managing. The Congress hoarding dollars is not only unseemly, but detrimental because the federal government is the only source and without money to mediate transactions, we are left with taking things on faith.
Resolution:
Take a Hike
America’s State Parks Association is sponsoring a first day hike in which all fifty states will participate. Texas, being a big state, has forty five venues on offer, while Georgia is promoting twenty sites and Missouri is offering programs at thirteen parks. Meanwhile, poor Louisiana seems able to manage guided hikes at just two of its parks. But, they are free.
