Re[2]: [at-l] Re: Getting OT: Gov ain't good or bad

[Bob C." <ellen@clinic.net (Bob C.)]

I guess it depends on how you measure quality of life. This nation is in the
middle of the pack among industrial nations in such matters as longevity, and
infant mortality. And ranks among the bottom in overall health care. We have a
system where the wealthy can get the best care in the world, but where most
ordinary people so  unfortunate as get sick have to struggle with medical bills
and skimp on medical care.

It's probably easier to become fabulously wealthy in this country. But the bulk
of human beings, here and elsewhere work for a wage and struggle week by week to
get along, support their families and have a little time left for leisure.

Most working people in this country do not "keep most of their earnings." Every
penny that comes in each week is expended each week on those things our culture
thinks are necessities. Now, as in Thoreau's time, most lives are spent in quiet
desperation.

I like money, but I like other things too much to have ever accumulated very
much of it. Trails and the pursuit and the preservation of wildness are my
current passion, but somehow trails and wildness have escaped the market
economy. Only governments and an occasional non-profit organization provide
places for humans to enjoy the woods and mountains.

The logical extension of Bryan's arguments are that things like the Appalachian
Trail and public parks and forests are socialist and should be banned. My query
to those who say we have enough public recreational lands is simple. Which park
do you propose we sell? And if the answer is none, to tell me by what mechanism
did we happen to hit upon the exact amount needed for now and into the future.

Weary