[onlooker]

KJ, I do not see us here on PO and on this thread necessarily whining but pointing out how the 1% embody in the worse of ways what this world has done to many of us. In fairness, cruel and ignorant people have always existed. But now we have a culture of indifference and smug contentment. The US govt. wages wars overseas in our name. I for one do not seem them as just. I can talk about this and anyone can label me a hypocrite and that is fine. But, the pathology of our worldwide culture must me laid bare for all to see, this is one thing positive we are doing here. From the narratives of Ibon about indolence and disconnect, to the clamor from Dohboi about the injustice and inequality to my rantings on the Capitalism is Evil thread. It is about us humans looking squarely at what we are and what we do and have done. The 1% do not get a pass. Just like nobody else does. Their pathology is extreme and inexcusable. So much, so that they are literally helped to put humanity on the near midnight on the Doomsday clock via Nuclear Armageddon .
So, I for one am grateful to have lived in this country. My parents are from South America. The better we understand the forces that shape our collective behavior the better prepared we and our descendants can be for what lies ahead.

[Hawkcreek]

I have been wanting to speak to this subject for a long time. Please read through the end.
The average American brought home $55,773.00 in 2016. In terms of dollars, that is more money than I earned for two thirds of my life, with an undergraduate EE degree and years of experience as an electronics tech before then. My annual salary as an engineer was $15,000 in 1978. I got regular raises, the company moved me three times during my career, and I never lived or worked anywhere near my hometown. When I retired as a mid-level engineering manager in 2015, I was barely making a six figure salary.
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To call you PIGS is to insult pigs, you worthless human scum.

Looks like you are a bit of an underachiever --- I made a good bit more than double what you made, with just a high school diploma.
Now I'm retired and having a great time. Just finished cutting, hauling, splitting, and stacking 3 cords of firewood. I will not be cold next winter.
It's not about how much money you made, or make. It's about how many days that you can wake up and feel joy, just from a good cup of coffee and a clear blue sky.
Anyway, quit your money whining. It makes you look like a pig. Ok, that may be a bit uncalled for.
But I don't like being called worthless human scum. I would rather feel that I am valuable human flotsam.

[onlooker]

you worthless human scum.--- I nominate this as comment of the year on PO

[KaiserJeep]

New definition for scum: The most affluent citizens on Earth, complaining that the 1% has more than they do.

[Ibon]

If we were all bonobos we would all be rubbing our genitals together at about this point to diffuse those hurt feelings from being called human scum.

[Hawkcreek]

New definition for scum: The most affluent citizens on Earth, complaining that the 1% has more than they do.

If you look back, I think most don't complain the the 1% has more stuff than they do. They complain that the system set up by the 1% prevents the 99% from having the ability to make needed changes to an obviously flawed system.
I don't need more stuff. I have already given away most of what I had. Stuff sucks worse than gravity when you love to see the world.
Thats my favorite song, BTW. Gravity by Allison Krauss
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Je8ly78GYY

[Hawkcreek]

If we were all bonobos we would all be rubbing our genitals together at about this point to diffuse those hurt feelings from being called human scum.

Remember when someone says something hurtful, turn it around to something nice.
Valuable Human Flotsam.
KJ is just feeling old and crotchety. I get that way sometimes.

[Cog]

you worthless human scum.--- I nominate this as comment of the year on PO

It definitely made my day.

[Newfie]

"Erectric cars". See, I keep telling you it's all about sex!

Are they purple? Volkviagons?

LOL, thanks for the laugh.

[Ibon]

KJ is just feeling old and crotchety. I get that way sometimes.

Me too. Of course we forgive KJ. Because we're family. And that's what families do

[KaiserJeep]

Look, I'm not especially depressed now. The wife is away for two weeks dealing with the MIL's will, probate, and paying off her estate creditors. We have decided to keep the Nantucket house and use it as a seasonal home. I am sanding and painting and landscasping here in SJ, and deciding what I want to throw out and what to keep. We will put our SJ house on the market soon.

The wife's questioning everything now. She just buried her Mother and her Aunt, and is now the oldest female in her side of the family, as I am the oldest male on my side. Yes we are the clan's old people now - a strange feeling. The island is not the Nantucket I remember from 45 years ago, either - it's more crowded, less special, and many of my friends there are no longer alive.

I am simply in a no BS mood. I value this Forum as much as any of you, and it irks me to hear the most advantaged group of people on the Earth complaining - when the real problem is they have too much, and not that they lack for anything, aside from purpose.

I'm thinking, relocating is the change I need. I have been here for 31 years, the longest I lived in any single location. But California is not what it used to be either.

[JimBof]

KJ, The world is and always has been changing, now you are an old fart you have time to notice it. The joys of growing older are better than the pine box alternative. I know, I dodged it twice (two kidney transplants, 1976 and 1990). The happy people are those who are content with what they have, not those who know what they want.

[Cog]

Getting out of California will be a huge step in the right direction. There is a huge non-communist heartland that awaits you.

[Newfie]

KJ,
I always find it remarkable how much you and I have in common. I grew up in Southern New Jersey, back when you still had funny accents and it was a very rural place. It pains me to go there now. There is nothing of the old place, the old people, the old ways left. Excess population killed it, it's just another gigantic strip mall.

Baha,
I found when my Father died that I had been living a life for him. Not that I lost my way when I lost him but that I didn't find my way until I lost him. I had no clue how powerful an influence he was on me until he was gone. It's funny how we can find out new things about ourselves even once we thought we were mature. I've come to accept I will never completly know myself, but try to do better anyway.

[Ibon]

Excess population killed it, it's just another gigantic strip mall.

Both the excess population and the nature of that population, chained to service industries that have no organic context to the place. This is the reality of tens of millions. It is frightening to me to imagine this, displaced people on displaced land. When stripped of all organic context it is the news feeds and social media which then becomes your only cultural reference points.

This is an awful way to live and many Americans today are living in hell and don't realize it because they do not even have in their memories what it is like to be in an integrated community anymore having been socialized in isolating landscapes. Let's have the courage to name this for what it is. This is not complaining or a criticism, the social fabric of American life for many many Americans is just plainly sick. And dreadfully lonely even if they don't have the ability to recognize this. This void is often filled with food, drugs, sexual perversions, aggression. This does not apply to everybody of course. There are many who have rich social lives still in America. But this does apply to tens of millions of Americans.

What does it matter if we are one of the wealthiest countries in the world if our social lives are in such poverty?

There are vast cultural desert landscapes in America with dense populations of inhabitants who are no longer integrated in any meaningful way to their communities. When I reflect on this sometimes I feel anger, sometimes disdain. At this moment I feel just sad.

And grateful of where I am.

[onlooker]

There are vast cultural desert landscapes in America with dense populations of inhabitants who are no longer integrated in any meaningful way to their communities. When I reflect on this sometimes I feel anger, sometimes disdain. At this moment I feel just sad.

And grateful of where I am.

Yes, that is very much the sad reality for millions of people in the US and yet this is where I can see Kaiser's point. People in other countries are living worse realities. Imagine many working many hours per day 6-7 days a week in monotonous factory jobs in China. Or hiding or running for their lives in war torn places like Syria. Or living a reclusive lifestyle for fear of venturing out in a crime ridden neighborhood in Mexico. Or simply living on the edge in squalor uncertain whether you will eat tomorrow or whether you will get sick with no money to pay for health services. This being the reality for billions. 1 billion live on $1 per day and 3 billion $2 per day. So, I too am grateful for what I have

[Hawkcreek]

I'm thinking, relocating is the change I need. I have been here for 31 years, the longest I lived in any single location. But California is not what it used to be either.

I think that is one of the best things that anyone can do. I relocate for about 4 months in the winter (travel around the desert states), and probably 3 or 4 times during the rest of the year when I start feeling stale. I'm going to travel Canada west to east, starting in about a month, on my motorcycle.
I like my little hilltop refuge, but I think humans really do have an instinctive urge to see the other side of the mountain. We have always been torn to either stay in the safe valley with our plow, or to grab the musket and check out the horizon we haven't seen yet.
I spent 4 months living in a van this last winter, checking out desert views, meeting some nice people (and some not so nice), taking some pretty good photographs, and in general just having a great old time.
If you hit the road you will find that the world consists mostly of nice people, and some of the nicest are constantly bitching. I kind of like that. You can't trust someone who just keeps his head down and keeps on working all the time. You never know what he is afraid of.

[Ibon]

I can see Kaiser's point. People in other countries are living worse realities. Imagine many working many hours per day 6-7 days a week in monotonous factory jobs in China. Or hiding or running for their lives in war torn places like Syria. Or living a reclusive lifestyle for fear of venturing out in a crime ridden neighborhood in Mexico. Or simply living on the edge in squalor uncertain whether you will eat tomorrow or whether you will get sick with no money to pay for health services. This being the reality for billions. 1 billion live on $1 per day and 3 billion $2 per day. So, I too am grateful for what I have

It is important to recognize this. There is however something misleading in the statistics. Relative well being does not exactly correlate with earnings or wealth. Up to a point increased income greatly enhances quality of life. That curve flattens out. Americans have gone way beyond where that curve flattens out for a couple generations of excessive consumption with little return in increased well being. In fact it can be said that well being declines after a certain point and when life becomes too easy that is when life starts being hell.

It also depends whether you are on the ascension or decline. Many Americans are worse off than a generation before but are still far wealthier than other citizens of the world but because they see decline they are in a deep funk. The loss of integrity that happens to a couple generations of suburban lifestyle causes one to fail to recognize their advantages and then they often scapegoat immigrants who arrive to the US with smiles on their faces as they happily work 50 hour work weeks in IT or cleaning your toilet.

For this reason I get sometimes weary and suspect when the deficiency of American social life is then rationalized that we are so much better off than other parts of the world where folks are worse off.

Come on, can't we hold ourselves to a higher standard than comparing ourselves to chinese factory workers.

The elite actually love this when folks rationalize their declining standard of living and deficiencies by recognizing the worse plight of others. For the elite this is just socializing the US middle class to ratchet down to a global average that is far below what Americans have been used to.

But who am I to complain, after all, I have accurately identified the global middle class as the greatest mis allocation of resources the world has ever known. Which is all of us. Which is also why I cynically support the growing disparity.

Is KJ right? Are we all scum? Oh no !