01-31-2017, 03:06 AM
What will pull the working-class people of the Midwest and South back to the Democrats? Abject failure of the Republicans to create prosperity.
I had a discussion with my brother on how much we spend on intellectual property. If you think that the most expensive appliance in your house (probably a refrigerator) is expensive, then think of how much money you might spend upon music. Divide the cost of a $700 refrigerator by fourteen years, and you are paying $50 a year for buying the refrigerator. That's as much as you pay for ten cheap CDs from the $5 bin (of stale hits) at Wal*Mart -- and surely you buy something more current and higher-priced. Got a TV? You can easily spend as much on cable or satellite TV in a year than you can on the purchase price of the TV. Or recorded movies. The only intellectual property that you are probably spending less on is books -- if you are downloading them free of charge from Project Gutenberg. I can enjoy a good novel -- but it had better be great, and in general the best ones are now public domain.
I was amazed to discover that Paul McCartney has an estimated worth of $1.2 billion... that's right -- BILLION. Fifty years later, people are still buying Beatles albums, and they are not in the $5 bin at Wal*Mart. Dolly Parton, who is practically a joke? $500 million.
The big money is now in creativity -- and not so much in making stuff.
But even if your creativity isn't commercial-grade, you can leave something to be cherished. Do your own art or music.
I had a discussion with my brother on how much we spend on intellectual property. If you think that the most expensive appliance in your house (probably a refrigerator) is expensive, then think of how much money you might spend upon music. Divide the cost of a $700 refrigerator by fourteen years, and you are paying $50 a year for buying the refrigerator. That's as much as you pay for ten cheap CDs from the $5 bin (of stale hits) at Wal*Mart -- and surely you buy something more current and higher-priced. Got a TV? You can easily spend as much on cable or satellite TV in a year than you can on the purchase price of the TV. Or recorded movies. The only intellectual property that you are probably spending less on is books -- if you are downloading them free of charge from Project Gutenberg. I can enjoy a good novel -- but it had better be great, and in general the best ones are now public domain.
I was amazed to discover that Paul McCartney has an estimated worth of $1.2 billion... that's right -- BILLION. Fifty years later, people are still buying Beatles albums, and they are not in the $5 bin at Wal*Mart. Dolly Parton, who is practically a joke? $500 million.
The big money is now in creativity -- and not so much in making stuff.
But even if your creativity isn't commercial-grade, you can leave something to be cherished. Do your own art or music.
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated Communist but instead the people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists -- Hannah Arendt.