My Novels

Saturday, August 27, 2005

The Economy, Supernova and Religion

Sooo, life moves along as always here. DH is working on the barn this hot August Saturday. It's difficult to believe August is almost over, but as usual, I'm looking forward to Autumn and cooler weather.

My "season of discontent" continues, and I still feel unable to settle down to a writing project. When DH takes his week of vacation the first week of September we have several upkeep jobs on this house/property as well random stuff to do. That should give me plenty to do! Not happy stuff, but necessary.

Reading some news articles online, I wondered if any of us needs an economy lesson? If you're interested at all in the looming economic disaster Bush has created, here's a link to read more about that:

Experts Warn Debt May Threaten Economy

Aug 27, 12:01 PM (ET)

By ROBERT TANNER

You owe $145,000. And the bill is rising every day. That's how much it would cost every American man, woman and child to pay the tab for the long-term promises the U.S. government has made to creditors, retirees, veterans and the poor.

And it's not even taking into account credit card bills, mortgages - all the debt we've racked up personally. Savings? The average American puts away barely $1 of every $100 earned.

Our profligate ways at home are mirrored in Washington and in the global marketplace, where as a society America spends $1.9 billion more a day on imported clothes and cars and gadgets than the entire rest of the world spends on its goods and services.


~~~~~

Fortunately for us, we have NO debt at all. And save quite a lot, having now almost as much in our savings as we did when we bought this place cash. That isn't counting the amount being accumulated every week DH continues to work, delaying his retirement; he got a whopping incentive for staying a few more years. Still, I worry about medical care in our retirement years...but heck, I believe if we realized a serious illness was going to threaten us within six months, we'd just spend all we've saved, have fun at it! Otherwise, the darn medical profession would get it and I hope that won't happen.

The way I see retirement medical care shaping up for us: if you're desperately POOR, you will get care via government. If you're extremely wealthy, you'll manage fine. But if you (like most of us) are in the middle-class, you are genuinely screwed. :-(

Here's another little ditty to cheer you up about human's insignificant existence in the cosmos:

Question posed for an astronomer at: Astronomy.com

If we lived on a planet circling a star about to go supernova, would we know it was going to happen? --DEE SHARPLES, HONEOYE FALLS, NEW YORK

Astronomer's Answer: The seeds of catastrophe that will destroy a star in a supernova are buried deep in the star's heart, but all we can see easily is the surface, buffered by the stellar mass in between. There were images of SK –69°202, the star that blew up as SN 1987A, but no clue in those images of an impending eruption.


I'm going to assume you know this means that IF a star near enough to earth went supernova unexpectedly, you and I would be INSTANTLY toast! That should put our everyday mundane lives in perspective!

I'll close with a great quote about women and the "christian" religion:


Ernestine L. Rose

Atheist & America's first woman's rights canvasser

January 13, 1810 - August 4, 1892

I was a rebel at the age of five.

. . . Sisters, . . . I entreat you, if you have an hour to spare, a dollar to give, or a word to utter--spare it, give it, and utter it, for the elevation of woman! And when your minister asks you for money for missionary purposes, tell him there are higher, and holier, and nobler missions to be performed at home. When he asks for colleges to educate ministers, tell him you must educate woman, that she may do away with the necessity of ministers, so that they may be able to go to some useful employment. If he asks you to give to the churches (which means to himself) then ask him what he has done for the salvation of woman. When he speaks to you of leading a virtuous life, ask him whether he understands the causes that have prevented so many of your sisters from being virtuous, and have driven them to degradation, sin, and wretchedness. When he speaks to you of a hereafter, tell him to help to educate woman, to enable her to live a life of intelligence, independence, virtue, and happiness here, as the best preparatory step for any other life. And if he has not told you from the pulpit of all these things; if he does not know them; it is high time you inform him, and teach him his duty here in this life. (Seventh National Woman's Rights Convention, New York, Nov. 25 - 26, 1856)

No comments: