Abundance/Poverty

A while ago on Colin Beavan's site NoImpactMan the topic of tithing (number 27 on the list) was addressed as part of "40 Steps on the Personal Path to Green".

Colin says,...
It follows, then, that part of environmental living might include tithing to help poverty, at least for the more wealthy among us, a subject that Peter Singer covered with great eloquence in the New York Times Magazine. In his article he wrote: “For more than 30 years, I’ve been reading, writing and teaching about the ethical issue posed by the juxtaposition, on our planet, of great abundance and life-threatening poverty. Yet it was not until, in preparing this article, I calculated how much America’s Top 10 percent of income earners actually make that I fully understood how easy it would be for the world’s rich to eliminate, or virtually eliminate, global poverty.”

A Simpler Bail Out

Let's give all mortgagees their homes outright. The first thing that every home owner who found himself owning his home outright would do is apply for some sort of equity loan or new mortgage. Banks would have balance sheets that balanced and people would have money to invest. Sounds good to me.

Then I found this in my email... too bad the math doesn't add up.

The Birk Bail Out

hmmmmmm............

Iʼm against the $85,000,000,000.00 bailout of AIG.
Instead, I'm in favor of giving $85,000,000,000 to America in a 'We Deserve It Dividend'.

To make the math simple, let's assume there are 200,000,000 bonifide U.S. Citizens 18+.
Our population is about 301,000,000 +/- counting every man, woman and child.
So 200,000,000 might be a fair stab at adults 18 and up.
So divide 200 million adults 18+ into $85 billon that equals $425,000.00 per.
My plan is to give $425,000 to every person 18+ as a 'We Deserve It Dividend'.

Of course, it would NOT be tax free; so let's assume a tax rate of 30%.
Every individual 18+ has to pay $127,500.00 in taxes; that sends $25,500,000,000 right back to Uncle Sam.
But it means that every adult 18+ has $297,500.00 in their pocket.
A husband and wife has $595,000.00.

What would you do with $297,500.00 to $595,000.00 in your family?
Pay off your mortgage, housing crisis solved.
Repay college loans, what a great boost to new grads
Put away money for college, it'll be there
Save in a bank, create money to loan to entrepreneurs.
Buy a new car, create jobs
Invest in the market , capital drives growth
Pay for your parent's medical insurance, health care improves
Enable Deadbeat Dads to come clean, or else
Remember this is for every adult U S Citizen 18+ including the folks who lost their jobs at Lehman Brothers and every other company that is cutting back.
And of course, for those serving in our Armed Forces.
If we're going to re-distribute wealth, let's really do it...instead of trickling out a puny $1000.00 (vote buy)economic incentive that is being proposed by one of our candidates for President.
If we're going to do an $85 billion bailout, let's bail out every adult U S Citizen 18+!
As for AIG, liquidate it. Sell off its parts.
Let American General go back to being American General.
Sell off the real estate. Let the private sector bargain hunters cut it up and clean it up.

Here's my rationale. We deserve it, and AIG doesn't.
Sure it's a crazy idea that can never work. Maybe???
But can you imagine the Coast-To-Coast Block Party!
How do you spell Economic Boom?
I trust my fellow adult Americans to know how to use the $85 Billion 'We Deserve It Dividend' more than I do the geniuses at AIG or in Washington DC .
And remember, the Birk plan only really costs $59.5 Billion because $25.5 Billion is returned instantly in taxes to Uncle Sam.

What's Going On Here?

We harvested our first radish... pretty puny, huh? We just began gardening in earnest this year. The lesson of building up the soil has hit hard and firm. So we decided not to be discouraged about what is or isn't growing and concentrate on future growing seasons.

Don't get me wrong we are harvesting a few things. Here's a picture of our first whole meal which includes new potatoes, fresh onions, home-churned butter, strawberry jam from local strawberries, red raspberries from our own patch, and whole wheat bread from home ground wheat. Delicious. Tastes better when you produce it yourself.

Dave sharpened up the Stihl to open up more sky for the tomatoes. Right now our raised bed only gets about three hours of sun a day. So while we are just getting a few baby green tomatoes, others are harvesting. When I get my techno-act together, I'll post a slide show of this year's first delimbing when Dave's son removed the large limb hanging over the house.

Life grows in other areas too. This is one day old Nicholas with Grampa. He's a real beauty. Pretty sure he has the making of a News Anchor already. There have been a series of birthdays too. Birthdays are important to celebrate especially in a large family. Every year each member of the group has a day to be the center of attention. We all just celebrated our eighteen year old granddaughter's birthday and she leaves home for an out-of-state college in two weeks. Recently Grace turned five. Yesterday Violet Elizabeth turned three. She thrilled to blow out all three candles by herself. What fun is this!

HAPPY 58th BIRTHDAY BARB!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

APottoPeein

Time for a little catchup. We're back in town, back to work, back to thinking change in life style. Although we didn't fully celebrate Crunchy's Golden Showers Garden Party, we have a new addition to our bathroom appliances. Apottopeein. This handy little "appliance" has a screw on lid and can hold up to a half gallon of liquid human fertilizer concentrate -- urine. When diluted with water ten parts water to one part urine, it offers nitrogen to garden soil. Already plants around my yard and garden are smiling with the green glow of new nitrogen. It's so easy, always available and doesn't cost a thing. (My particular pot, a former storage container, was nabbed and recycled into its new prominent position as Apottopeein.) I recommend this simple and natural way to fertilize your outside plants and shrubs. You may however prefer the upscale glass version of Apottopeein available wherever you find one.

Golden Showers Garden Party

This new challenge is right up my alley. They call me The Pee Queen at work - I deal with pee all day long (along with other bodily fluids). We humans live off the land we ought to give back to it. Normal, healthy urine is sterile. It contains the waste products of your body's metabolism. Should be a natural fertilizer. Join in the challenge. If you don't have a vegetable garden, use your diluted urine as fertilizer for your flowers, grass, shrubs, whatever. We're going to use some collected rain water to dilute - 10 parts water to 1 part urine.
See info on the Golden Showers Garden Party.

Starting from SCRATCH

By eight thirty this morning the tiller, rakes, small garden tools, gloves, fertilizer, seeds, and tomato plants crowded the back of the van. Our limited experience with gardening drove off for number two daughter's place in New Hampshire. They wanted to start a garden and we wanted to encourage them. Earlier this spring David read an article in Countryside Magazine about one gardener's Mantis tiller. Impressed with his praise and the price, we bought one. The writer was absolutely right. This tiny tiller can even pull rock!! David tilled, Janis raked rocks out of the tilled bed, the little girls and I loaded the stones into a wagon, pulled them to the designated spot and... Ready... Set... Dump.

"Well, Janis, guess you have new respect for farmers."
"I have great respect for farmers. That's why I go to the grocery store."

The tomato plants ended up in a different part of the yard but the soil, no, dirt, no, ground was water repellent! When I dug a hole, a little hand with a toy watering can filled it up. That hole held water like a pail! We waited and waited but nothing. Finally four tomato plants were sacrificed so their potting soil could be harvested and dumped into the three pails, I mean holes, where we planted the three sturdiest looking tomatoes. We'll see what happens.

Oh, by the way, we forgot our gardening hats. Don't ever forget your gardening hat. For twenty minutes I had two little girls on my lap arguing over who should hold the ice pack on Nana's left eye. The black flies preferred my left eye only. Don't ask me why.

LESSON: I'm sure there's a lesson here somewhere but my bath water is ready and I really, really need it now, right now.