Sunday, June 19, 2011

Let the battle be joined!

The unwittingly opposed camps:

Dr. Thursday
and
Abstract Type.

confundituri te saluant!

a pilgrim programmer

Monday, June 13, 2011

Wild conjecture

Dear Pundits,

I heard that The Trump Suit isn't running; some silly people thought it was because The Barak made nasty jokes about him at that commedy show, and the Trump Suit, like a grizzly bopped on the nose, ran off into the forest. I think he was paid off.

Some other silly people thought The Trump Suit would have made an exemplary incorrupt President, because he was already so absurdly wealthy that he couldn't be bribed. Behold how ridiculous the proposition is: The Trump Suit has, by his extreme wealth and conspicuous consumption, demonstrated that he is eminently buyable; the whole premise of The Apprentice is that The Trump Suit doesn't receive you into his employ: he hands you kick-backs, if you're the toughest publican in the bunch.

So, I'm willing to bet one cold potato's digital photograph that The Trump Suit figured it was a better deal to mind his own household, and enjoy the happenstance of whatever November next year may bring.

a foreigner

Saturday, June 4, 2011

A World of Writing

Dear Lindsay,

Inspired by your reported dreams and successes in the strange-pen world, I went to that famousest internet auctions clearinghouse to see what they might have in the way of glass pens; and I've come accross something very strange!

WHY, do you suppose, are there so many venetian-made glass pens in East Asia?

That is all.

God bless,
much too tactile for six words

Wednesday, June 1, 2011

Where does money come from?

Dear Prof. Smith,

The most honest answer is, of course, that we made it up. In other words, it is a creature --- a creature of Man. As such, it certainly has no life: breath, nor sight, nor hearing --- though we may give it mouth and eyes and ears in the form of Her Majesty's likeness. And of course, we don't even pretend anymore that any money has intrinsic value. So, alright, there is paper backed by metal-stock, there are title deeds for plots of land, and so forth. But the primary business of "business" in the British Imperial Diaspora is usually conducted, measured, and reported, (for taxation purposes) in units of some local currency.

Last time I wrote, I alluded to professional and trade unions, strike and other pressure tactics, which have as final cause that "whoever has accepted responsibility for paying them [agree] to pay them more. Whatever that means." The charitable view of strike/work pressure is that for whatever reason, the workers of some trade or profession generally aren't able to live in "becoming dignity according to their state in life", and a re-negotiation of working/contracting terms is wanted so as to correct that. The charitable view of employers' not paying more than they do for needed labour would be that they honestly don't have the extra money to spend. But it's worth-while asking what does it mean to pay people more?