Gold prices plummet!

"Mr. Jaggers" lugburzman[at]yahoo[dot]com wrote in message
...
Bruce Remick wrote:
"Mr. Jaggers" lugburzman[at]yahoo[dot]com wrote in message

[time for some major snippage]

Normally I snip a poster's tagline, but in this case I elect to
preserve it, as I do not believe it applies. Your disquisition
above is the most refreshing thing I've seen from a conservative
since the Eisenhower Administration. After all, I, too, was a
conservative until the conservative movement became poisoned by Rush
Limbaugh and the Religious Right.

It doesn't take a genius to observe that the people who show up at
the townhall meetings, teaparties, and tax protest rallies, carrying
signs with the President's image overlain with swastikas and Hitler
images and yelling about how they don't want the government in their
lives at all, seem to always be those who have a secure healthcare
plan. I have yet to see an unemployed or "pre-existing condition"
person speak out against some form of guaranteed coverage, not a
single one. It's always the "I've got mine, screw everybody else"
attitude that dominates, leaving a disgusting stink in the room
every time healthcare is scheduled to be discussed.

I might even confess to my Libertarian roots and state that, in my
view, the only legitimate role of national government is to provide
services for its citizens that they cannot possibly provide for
themselves. National defense is certainly one of these, as is some
plan for dealing with contagions that do not recognize state
boundaries. Things such as an interstate highway system certainly
need some kind of federal oversight and support. A common currency,
for better or worse, helps us avoid the crazyquilt monetary
situation that existed for hundreds of years in the Holy Roman
Empire, impeding progress as well as commerce. It should be obvious
to anyone who is not already brainwashed by the radio and tv talkers
that healthcare is rapidly fitting itself into that same category,
and that none of us, other than the legislators themselves, who can
vote themselves any benefit they wish, is really secure in his
position. In my view, politicians who pontificate about the evils
of socialism need to renounce their own government-paid healthcare
and pay their own way or go without like so many of their
constituents have to do, in order to have any credibility with me
whatsoever, and I don't care which party they represent. Median
family income in the U.S. being what it is, $12,000+ a year for
private health coverage (which neither you nor I could even get
because of our PECs) is as far out of reach for a hard-working,
struggling family as is the cost of building a road from the
breadwinner's house to his place of work. I have no problem with a
non-white family in the White House, nor do
I have a problem with your preference for DITW WASP conservatives
there, either. What I want to see from the persons and party in
power is positive results. This does not include impeachments having
to do with sex acts, half-cocked declarations of war, or
sanctimonious politicians telling us how much they love the
Constitution and Freedom and Jesus and then serving up the green
weenie to the poor schlubs who have been taxpayers all their lives
and find themselves with medical conditions that will cause them to
lose their pride and everything they have spent their entire lives
working for. If I never post here again, there will no doubt be many
readers who
rejoice, having read the above. So be it. I stand by every word of
it. James

As long as our civic guidelines are being shaped by 530-something
politicians whose primary goals are getting re-elected and channeling
as much of our tax money as possible back to their own state, I can't
see how anything of substance ever gets accomplished. The idea of
the overnight overhaul of a massive health care system that already
has had 60 years to grow is like turning the vacant lot into a
putting green in a week with garden tools. Add to that, every pol
seems to have his or her own pet ideas. I have to wonder what their
individual qualifications are to take on such an effort.

You're certainly within the mark there, good Fellow.

However, I'm not content to roll over and put four feet in the air. The
opposition to the current proposals have had over half a century to put
their plan into effect, yet did nothing. It's time to make a move. I
won't see the fruits, but my grandchildren might.

I agree there, and it does seem that our grandchildren have been assuming
one hell of a burden lately. They're due some scheduled relief before
they've even had to bite the bullet.


I will admit that there is a little bit of the "I've got mine"
attitude that you despise in my own mind. Maybe it comes with age,
but I try not to let it dominate my view of things. I'm all for
helping out those less fortunate than me, but I don't claim to know
how to do it, and I don't trust those in power to come up with a
solution either, especially one that they could agree on given the
increasing polarization.

Imagine the scenario in which your present pension and health coverage
both are suddenly taken away by political zealots. Then get back to me.
Oh, I forgot to mention, there are people in both the U.S. government and
*your* state legislature who are wetting their pants to bring that very
scenario about. And that doesn't include all the citizens who hate your
guts after being whipped into a lather by radio talkers.

I'm afraid I can't imagine a scenario where my federal pension and health
coverage will suddenly be taken away. And I doubt that my Virginia reps
would dare propose or support that unless they had a political death wish.
I *can* envision a scenario where I may have to pay significantly more for
my health care than I do now in order to subsidize those 47 million
uninsured.

I haven't run into anyone yet who hated my guts simply because I once was a
career federal employee, but I don't doubt there are those out there far
from Washington who would. But we all had our choice of a career direction.
Myself, I gave up a corporate career with paid health care and attractive
retirement plan in favor of a comparable job with the Fed. Tortoise and
hare, maybe, but govt retirement security may have tilted in my favor
lately, compared to many once higher paid employees who have received
unexpected corporate "surprises".


But the thing that gripes me most is that I may not live long enough
to complete the set of National Park quarters. Perhaps a good
insurance plan will ease my mind.

Well, we certainly hope that you do live long enough to accomplish that
mission. Go ahead, buy that Dansco and start filling it. You'll be glad
you did!


It'll be my luck that I'd croak about the time the U. S. Virgin Islands Salt
River Bay National Historic Park and Ecological Preserve quarter is issued.
I wonder if they'll be putting all that stuff on the quarter in addition to
a scene of some kind. I also wonder if I'll care. I guess I'll stay with
the old coppers for now, saving a couple aside for my eyes.

Bruce Remick wrote:

[snip-cutting to the chase]

It'll be my luck that I'd croak about the time the U. S. Virgin
Islands Salt River Bay National Historic Park and Ecological Preserve
quarter is issued. I wonder if they'll be putting all that stuff on
the quarter in addition to a scene of some kind. I also wonder if
I'll care. I guess I'll stay with the old coppers for now, saving a
couple aside for my eyes.

Heh. I wonder how many readers here get the point made in those last seven
words.

In fact, all those who do get it, signify by making an "I get it" post
below. Not a contest, no prize, just the smug satisfaction of knowing.

James the Riddler

"Mr. Jaggers" lugburzman[at]yahoo[dot]com wrote in message
...

....
Having now lived 63 1/2 years here in North Lugburz and met
thousands of high school students and their parents during my
career, and most likely hundreds of others in my grocery shopping
trips to [in a soft whisper] Walmart, I was puzzled when I spent
some time at our local tax protest rally two weeks ago today,
complete with guys walking around with the obligatory "down with
socialism" signs and slurs of various kinds against the President,
and saw not a single person that I recognized. This is all the more
puzzling in the light of the observable fact that it was a planned
event, with our public townsquare having been reserved, a PA system
set up, and a lineup of presenters on the agenda (all presenting
variations of only one side of the issue). "What could possibly be
the explanation for this?" I pondered.

Our local newspaper has of late become a forum for similar
expressions of dissatisfaction with the government. I am
additionally puzzled that, whereas our government has been growing
by leaps and bounds since even before the ink of the Constitution
was dry, all-of-a-sudden we don't need no stinkin' government - one
interviewee stated that she wanted the government "totally out of
her life." Okay, Lady, lots of luck with your newfound
independence. But I think it rather naive in a country whose
population is now 75 times what it was when Washington and Jefferson
trod American soil. Just yesterday we had a letter that expressed
the view that the various states should repudiate all obligations
that they had ever made to pay pensions to their former employees,
because, after all, people are expected and able to provide for
their own retirement. That's a bit hard to do for people like me,
who had no choice about near-tithing to the state teachers
retirement coffer all those years and who, at my age, are not in a
position to embark on a second 34-year career. The letter closed
with the assertion that Social Security was good enough for most
people (I know the writer, and he has considerably more than "most"
people). How ironic! In fact, let's unceremoniously wean the
entire population from the public teat and see how things go. Yeah,
let's do that! I can protect myself against anything, damn the
government's eyes.

IOW, yep, the problem of distrust of government extends well beyond
the health care issue.

Some 10 years ago I did UseNet battle with a motor-mouth, egomanaical
anarchist/libertarian who ranted that he wanted da evil gubment gone.
Period. In all forms. He claimed he could get along - in fact, WAS
getting along - just fine without it, and those who couldn't do the
same were leeches that deserved whatever fate awaited them. In his
little universe, all taxes were just the have-nots forcibly
confiscating his property for their own benefit and only their own
benefit... period.

His subsistence job was as an audio technician/roadie for rock bands.
All attempts to point out how his life and work benefited from
government were dismissed with "No, you don't understand why that's
pure bull**** and doesn't violate my principles." From the roads and
safe forms of transport he used to get to his gigs, to the regulation
of the airwaves that played his employers' music so that people would
pay admission to their concerts and therefore pay his salary, to the
safety of the food and drugs he consumes (well, some of them,
anyway)... he would come to no harm if all forms of government were to
disappear overnight. He truly believed that human nature was such
that through a combination of Randian greed and enlightened
self-interest, all of these services and projects and protections -
even national defense - would arise spontaneously once the masses were
freed from all the chains of government. And he had the nerve to say
that our reliance on government was a childish parental fantasy rooted
in a childish notion of the universe! If you want to apply the
filters of psychodynamics to this issue, IMO his views were stuck in
the developmental stage of adolescent rejection of all authority...
period.

My point here is that this same immature, extremist rejection of
government "period!" seems to have crept into much of our citizens'
views and national discourse. It reflects the long-term effects of
the "take no prisoners" partisan politics ushered in by the Newt
Gingrich crowd and relentlessy pursued for the past two decades.
Their basic premise is that government is bad, period. The ranting at
town meetings and rallies and in the media over specific public policy
issues is proof that Johnny Carson's advice to comedians also extends
to politics: "If they buy the premise, they buy the bit."

As far as that slogan you quoted, I have a poster of a gnarled,
grisly old cowboy uttering that same thought. Wouldn't we all like
to go back and do some things over that were just plain stupid
unhealthy. But we can't. Many of us in this very forum would not
be here, save for medical advances. Some have certainly already
perished as the result of not having access to those advances.
Sure, we will all eventually succomb, but how many of these
naysayers will volunteer themselves to go first, instead of always
volunteering some less fortunate person to go first?

Hey, isn't that what the Death Panels are supposed to accomplish for
us?

I've seen more hypocrisy in my last 5 years than I saw in the
half-century plus years that preceded them, and it gets more
sickening by the day.

I suspect that like so many things about human nature and behavior,
the only thing that has really changed is that the proliferation of
the Internet and other communications technologies is exposing us to
more and more of what goes on every day in the normal course of
events. That, plus the fact that simple population growth means that
more of everything happens even if the incidence rates remain the
same.

- mazorj, Driving the Internet Highway at 25 mph with My Left-Turn
Signal Blinking
# # #
"I once went to a fortune teller who gave Swedish massages while she
foretold my future. When I asked her why, she smiled and said 'Haven't
you heard? The medium is the massage."

mazorj wrote:
"Mr. Jaggers" lugburzman[at]yahoo[dot]com wrote in message
...

...
Having now lived 63 1/2 years here in North Lugburz and met
thousands of high school students and their parents during my
career, and most likely hundreds of others in my grocery shopping
trips to [in a soft whisper] Walmart, I was puzzled when I spent
some time at our local tax protest rally two weeks ago today,
complete with guys walking around with the obligatory "down with
socialism" signs and slurs of various kinds against the President,
and saw not a single person that I recognized. This is all the more
puzzling in the light of the observable fact that it was a planned
event, with our public townsquare having been reserved, a PA system
set up, and a lineup of presenters on the agenda (all presenting
variations of only one side of the issue). "What could possibly be
the explanation for this?" I pondered.

Our local newspaper has of late become a forum for similar
expressions of dissatisfaction with the government. I am
additionally puzzled that, whereas our government has been growing
by leaps and bounds since even before the ink of the Constitution
was dry, all-of-a-sudden we don't need no stinkin' government - one
interviewee stated that she wanted the government "totally out of
her life." Okay, Lady, lots of luck with your newfound
independence. But I think it rather naive in a country whose
population is now 75 times what it was when Washington and Jefferson
trod American soil. Just yesterday we had a letter that expressed
the view that the various states should repudiate all obligations
that they had ever made to pay pensions to their former employees,
because, after all, people are expected and able to provide for
their own retirement. That's a bit hard to do for people like me,
who had no choice about near-tithing to the state teachers
retirement coffer all those years and who, at my age, are not in a
position to embark on a second 34-year career. The letter closed
with the assertion that Social Security was good enough for most
people (I know the writer, and he has considerably more than "most"
people). How ironic! In fact, let's unceremoniously wean the
entire population from the public teat and see how things go. Yeah,
let's do that! I can protect myself against anything, damn the
government's eyes.

IOW, yep, the problem of distrust of government extends well beyond
the health care issue.

The people in question have not likely ever read the Constitution, Marx,
Orwell, or the Bible to any significant extent, but always know someone who
has, and that automatically qualifies them to comment extensively on any
topic you care to name. In general, I find that the less thoroughly they
have read from those sources, the louder and more shrill they are.

Some 10 years ago I did UseNet battle with a motor-mouth, egomanaical
anarchist/libertarian who ranted that he wanted da evil gubment gone.
Period. In all forms. He claimed he could get along - in fact, WAS
getting along - just fine without it, and those who couldn't do the
same were leeches that deserved whatever fate awaited them. In his
little universe, all taxes were just the have-nots forcibly
confiscating his property for their own benefit and only their own
benefit... period.

Stick around, he'll be posting here soon, I can just feel it coming.

His subsistence job was as an audio technician/roadie for rock bands.
All attempts to point out how his life and work benefited from
government were dismissed with "No, you don't understand why that's
pure bull**** and doesn't violate my principles." From the roads and
safe forms of transport he used to get to his gigs, to the regulation
of the airwaves that played his employers' music so that people would
pay admission to their concerts and therefore pay his salary, to the
safety of the food and drugs he consumes (well, some of them,
anyway)... he would come to no harm if all forms of government were to
disappear overnight. He truly believed that human nature was such
that through a combination of Randian greed and enlightened
self-interest, all of these services and projects and protections -
even national defense - would arise spontaneously once the masses were
freed from all the chains of government. And he had the nerve to say
that our reliance on government was a childish parental fantasy rooted
in a childish notion of the universe! If you want to apply the
filters of psychodynamics to this issue, IMO his views were stuck in
the developmental stage of adolescent rejection of all authority...
period.

I sure hope he isn't a graduate of the high school where I taught all those
years.

My point here is that this same immature, extremist rejection of
government "period!" seems to have crept into much of our citizens'
views and national discourse. It reflects the long-term effects of
the "take no prisoners" partisan politics ushered in by the Newt
Gingrich crowd and relentlessy pursued for the past two decades.
Their basic premise is that government is bad, period. The ranting at
town meetings and rallies and in the media over specific public policy
issues is proof that Johnny Carson's advice to comedians also extends
to politics: "If they buy the premise, they buy the bit."

I wonder who could have put those notions into their heads. Could it
be...SATAN?
[picture James in drag, doing Kegel exercises to the tune of "Louie, Louie"]

As far as that slogan you quoted, I have a poster of a gnarled,
grisly old cowboy uttering that same thought. Wouldn't we all like
to go back and do some things over that were just plain stupid
unhealthy. But we can't. Many of us in this very forum would not
be here, save for medical advances. Some have certainly already
perished as the result of not having access to those advances.
Sure, we will all eventually succomb, but how many of these
naysayers will volunteer themselves to go first, instead of always
volunteering some less fortunate person to go first?

Hey, isn't that what the Death Panels are supposed to accomplish for
us?

That's precisely why they're so afraid. They know the politicians will
snuff every third constituent that comes into their offices, and the first
two just left.

I've seen more hypocrisy in my last 5 years than I saw in the
half-century plus years that preceded them, and it gets more
sickening by the day.

I suspect that like so many things about human nature and behavior,
the only thing that has really changed is that the proliferation of
the Internet and other communications technologies is exposing us to
more and more of what goes on every day in the normal course of
events. That, plus the fact that simple population growth means that
more of everything happens even if the incidence rates remain the
same.

One of my best friends, a Libertarian, works behind a desk and is allowed to
listen to talk radio in headphones the whole time. Long ago I helped get
him his job, in fact.
He spends his entire day tuned to RL and SH. It certainly shows. I can't
talk to him anymore. He wasn't like that back when.

- mazorj, Driving the Internet Highway at 25 mph with My Left-Turn
Signal Blinking
# # #
"I once went to a fortune teller who gave Swedish massages while she
foretold my future. When I asked her why, she smiled and said 'Haven't
you heard? The medium is the massage."

James, Retching

"Mr. Jaggers" lugburzman[at]yahoo[dot]com wrote in message
...
Bill Krummel wrote:
Bill

P.S. I have posted off topic before but I do try to stay out of
political or religious arguments, partially because I am not good at
expressing myself. I still collect classic commemorative half
dollars but I have not added to my collection in all of 2009 because
I am speculating on the lowest mintage spousal gold and have tied up
my coin hobby money on purchasing gold coins.

snipped

As far as your numismatic expenditures go, collect whatever pleases you.
That's what the hobby is all about.

James the Civil War Token Freak

I do collect what pleases me and always have. However I do not consider
what I have done in 2009 as collecting. Nor do I consider it investing. I
am speculating in gold coin, hoping for something similar to the record of
the Jackie Robinson gold coin although not at all hopeful for that type of
home run in escalated price. Were I to have any kind of success, whether
modest or wildly so, I would use my profits to aid my coin collecting.
James, I do have several CWTs and used to have more. I sold most of the
common, circulated/corroded ones at the local coin club auctions and have
kept two common but uncirculated ones and maybe one or two that are not so
common and a little unusual. I bought one CWT at an auction that had nice
original luster showing through the darkly toned brown and was very pleased
with my $10 win but less so when a friend pointed out an area on the reverse
at 6 o'clock where a drill bit had had a start. Not so noticeable on the
darkened coin but very obvious when you do notice it. I still like the CWT
but not quite as much. I do wonder why someone changed their mind just at
that point (pun not intended but I do see it now).

Bill

Bill Krummel wrote:
"Mr. Jaggers" lugburzman[at]yahoo[dot]com wrote in message
...
Bill Krummel wrote:
Bill

P.S. I have posted off topic before but I do try to stay out of
political or religious arguments, partially because I am not good at
expressing myself. I still collect classic commemorative half
dollars but I have not added to my collection in all of 2009 because
I am speculating on the lowest mintage spousal gold and have tied up
my coin hobby money on purchasing gold coins.

snipped

As far as your numismatic expenditures go, collect whatever pleases
you. That's what the hobby is all about.

James the Civil War Token Freak

I do collect what pleases me and always have. However I do not
consider what I have done in 2009 as collecting. Nor do I consider
it investing. I am speculating in gold coin, hoping for something
similar to the record of the Jackie Robinson gold coin although not
at all hopeful for that type of home run in escalated price. Were I
to have any kind of success, whether modest or wildly so, I would use
my profits to aid my coin collecting. James, I do have several CWTs
and used to have more. I sold most of the common,
circulated/corroded ones at the local coin club auctions and have
kept two common but uncirculated ones and maybe one or two that are
not so common and a little unusual. I bought one CWT at an auction
that had nice original luster showing through the darkly toned brown
and was very pleased with my $10 win but less so when a friend
pointed out an area on the reverse at 6 o'clock where a drill bit had
had a start. Not so noticeable on the darkened coin but very obvious
when you do notice it. I still like the CWT but not quite as much. I do
wonder why someone changed their mind just at that point (pun
not intended but I do see it now).

Very early in my return to collecting I ordered an 1877 Indian cent from a
PNG dealer out of his ad in The Numismatist. Imagine my horror when I saw,
beneath the wreath, an attempted hole. It hadn't gone all the way through,
but I certainly remembered from my high school days how impossible it is to
ever liquidate something like that, so sent it back, grrr........

I imagine that as the hole expanded to be the full diameter of the bit, the
drilling may have gotten too difficult to continue. Just a guess.

CWTs appear to be still in the early stages of research, despite all that
has been done by the Guttag Bros. and the Fulds. That's part of what makes
them so fascinating. I wish there were a specialized discussion board
having to do with both the patriotics and the store cards.

James the Exonumist

"Mr. Jaggers" lugburzman[at]yahoo[dot]com wrote in message
...
mazorj wrote:

....
- mazorj, Driving the Internet Highway at 25 mph with My Left-Turn
Signal Blinking
# # #
"I once went to a fortune teller who gave Swedish massages while she
foretold my future. When I asked her why, she smiled and said 'Haven't
you heard? The medium is the massage."

James, Retching

At my pun, or at the general condition of things?

Please say it's the latter, even if it's not. A groan is the proper and
obligatory response to a pun. Retching and kvetching is acceptable
commentary in the national discourse.

- mazorj the Opunionated

In , on 09/26/2009
at 09:19 AM, "Mr. Jaggers" lugburzman[at]yahoo[dot]com said:

[time for some major snippage]

Thanks you. Please feel free to be more aggressive here. You ARE allowed
to snip more than a single tag line. Basic Nettiquette, however lost it may
seem today, dictates much much more. But it's a start.

Thanks again.

Nick

On Sep 26, 9:22*am, "Bruce Remick" wrote:
"Mr. Jaggers" lugburzman[at]yahoo[dot]com wrote in message

...

oly wrote:
On Sep 25, 9:56 pm, "Mr. Jaggers" lugburzman[at]yahoo[dot]com wrote:
oly wrote:
On Sep 25, 8:06 pm, "Mr. Jaggers" lugburzman[at]yahoo[dot]com
wrote:
oly wrote:
On Sep 25, 7:02 pm, "Bruce Remick" wrote:
"mazorj" wrote in message

et...

"oly" wrote in message
...
On Sep 25, 8:31 am, "Mr. Jaggers" lugburzman[at]yahoo[dot]com
wrote:
j-rod wrote:
oly wrote:

...
I can remember five cent first class stamps, but I might be
stretching it a bit to say that I really remember the five
cent candy bar. Even at age seven or eight (c.1967) we were
just a bit past that on the long march of U.S. monetary
inflation.

I always admired the inventor fellow in the Scrooge McDuck
series - Gyro Gearloose or some name like that???

Huey, Dewey and Louie were a little bratty, 'tho basically
good boys. They were a little bit like Popeye's "Swee' Pea"
- whose the heck kids were they, anyway???

oly

I can remember my father paying 23¢ for a gallon of gas.

When I started driving is was already up to 30¢.

I remember when vending machine cigarettes cost 23c as well.
You'd put a quarter in the machine and out would pop a pack of
Camels with 2 cents change under the cellophane. The lucky
customers got one, maybe two, 55 doubled dies.

James the Non-Smoker- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

Limited to certain upstate NY vending machines only, if memory
serves...
I wonder if the jobber who serviced those machines ever
knew...

I remember those, at a time when I had never ventured farther
north than Noo Yawk City. I also saw them locally, farther
south. The pennies
always were shiny new ones but the ones I saw were common dates.
Since we're playing the Memory Lane prices game, I remember:

Working in a store in 1964 and selling cigarettes at 17 cents,
two for 33 cents for the "regular" size (Luckies, Camels), 18
cents and 2 for 35 cents for king size and filter tips.

I rember buying "Wings" for 18¢ and some other obscure brand that
offered what looked like a Scotch tape mouthpiece. I lived in RI
where many of the 1955 DDO's were found. My dad found two for me.

Gas below 30 cents. Asking my father what "ESSO" stood for while
the attendant pumped our gas, cleaned our windshield, and
checked the oil. Dad having to specify "use the detergent oil"
if it was low.

I ran into some 15¢/gallon gas wars in Florida in 1965 when
convenience stores began adding fuel pumps.

Stamps at 4 cents, and IIRC, even the 3-cent era.

The nickel 1-oz. Hershey bar of the 1950s, and later around 1970
when they raised the price by cutting the content to 7/8-oz. -
creating a BIG stink from chocolate lovers.

My parents gave me 5¢ "babysitting money" to watch my younger
brother in the early 1950's. I was able to fill a small brown bag
with penny candies from the local mom & pop store for that
nickel.

Driving my wife-to-be's new $2,000 1968 Chevy Nova, and later
plunking down the extraordinary amount of $3,000 for an orange
1973 VW Super Beetle.

In the Army in 1962, I found that a $100 bill usually gave one
lots of choices at the local used car lots. I chose a 1951 Chevy
for $50 and drove it away.

$2000 per semester for tuition with room & board at a top-level
university.

I paid $820 for my first year at Rhode Island School of Design in
1959. Tuition there now is higher than Brown University next
door.

Blue Whitman coin folders at around 15 cents each. Banks that
occasionally had real silver dollars for wide-eyed young
collectors.

Youre' lucky with the folders. The ones I remember were 35¢. My
mom worked in a bank in the 1950's and on Fridays she would
bring home 20 silver dollars for me to date-check. I was only
able to afford a couple medium-toughies, but it was fun looking.

McDonald hamburgers at 15 cents, cheeseburgers for 19 cents.

The small 5-cent Coke bottles (around 6-3/4 oz.) from the
machine at the barber shop (75 cents for a "regular boy's
haircut") and you had to put the empty back in the partitioned
wooden case or cough up two cents for the bottle deposit.

Aren't those small bottles making a limited comeback today? I
recall the 5¢ bottles as well as the occasional high tech machine
that offered several different brand and flavor options. Tough
choice between grape and orange. Never paid more than 50¢ for a
haircut until I went into the Army.

Asking neighbors for their empty Coke and Pepsi bottles to
redeem the 2-cent deposits at the grocery store.

And last but quite possibly the best - the store clerk
automatically throwing a free churchkey into the bag with every
purchase of a $1.10 six-pack. If you didn't buy any beer they
were 5 cents but everyone already had a drawer full of them.

I always carried one of my own, as did most kids (er, young men)
who drank beer. A couple of Giant Imperial Quarts (GIQ's) of
Narragansett at 50¢ each were usually enough to do the trick,
whatever the trick might have been.

Oh, one more... In the 1950s, hearing from our elders that the
1950s, which we now regard as the "good old days," actually
sucked and the good old days of 5-cent bread, 10-cent gas, and
75-cent steak dinners with all the trimmings already were
behind us.

For my parents, starting out during the Depression, there weren't
as many "good old days" memories as I had.- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

Tuition for my first two semesters at the University of Illinois
in '77-'78 was $450 each semester (books another $150 or so). My
dad was a grain farmer who was doing very well in those days and
I had no money worries. The cost of everything plus some monthly
allowance $$$ was $3,000 per year. I bought several nice 1904
Liberty $20s for under $250 in the winter of 1977-78 and sold them
about eighteen months later for a triple. That was my beer and
pizza and personal library/books money for several semesters plus
a new color TV.

While that tuition price may sound stiff to those who went through
15 years earlier, I can regale my many nieces and newphews with
that number nowadays.

My youngest sister (nine years younger) attended Illinois Wesleyan
(sic) University and my dad said that her 1st year costs more or
less totaled my entire four years at U of I.

Some of my earlier financial memories involve Nixon's horse****
"Wage and Price Controls". By then, I was old enough to notice
that lots of little things popped in price after the controls were
lifted.

No matter how much anyone here, including myself, waxes nostalgic,
I will continue to proclaim that "THESE are the good old days."

James the Libertine- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

Inasmuch as this country may need to depreciate the present value of
the currency by 95% or so, in order that we can have a fair chance
of servicing our collective public and private debts - I fear you
may be correct.

There are many good things today IF you can pay the freight or get
somebody to pay for you. For instance, the doctors worked on my
heart again earlier this week (two more stents on Wednesday AM and
I walked out of the hospital on my own less than 30 hours later)
and forty years ago I probably would have had a heart attack or two
by now.

Three cheers for the team that made you whole again!

Your survival has obviously benefitted from medecine's state of the
art, but only as the result of your access to it. Now that you have
been spared and live on, I hope you will gain an appreciation for
what the President is trying to accomplish in health care reform. I
have heard all I can tolerate from the smug who have health coverage
toward those who have it not.

James- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

I am lucky enough and my stent placer is one of the very best to be
found anywhere - and sadly, there will have to be a lot fewer pork
products and fried chicken in my future.

As for the politics - you know me, I am a deeply cynical Republican
operative who prefers the traditional center & right-wing folks in the
seats of power. *Dyed-in-the-wool Conservative yes, but pragmatically
wanting the traditional WASPs and their fellow travelers in the
positions of power. *Dogma is O.K., but holding the office counts even
more.

If the GOP had any political sense (and they don't seem to have much
electoral sense at the top at this moment), they would advocate
"Medicare for Everyone" (well, not for people who are in the country
illegally) and throw the health insurance/HMO/ Health Maintenance
industry *******s wholesale to the wolves.

My midwestern populist sense is that "Medicare for Everyone" is what
most people truly want. *Americans want the equivalent of the English
"National Health Service", MOL. *I say give it to 'em.

But this go around, I also believe that Mr. Obama isn't going to get
much farther than Billary did in 1993-94. *The grid is very very
locked-up and the USA is ****ing away mucho dinero elsewhere with two
wars going on. *Mr. Obama can't seem to make the obvious choice
between guns and butter, so I don't think he's gonna get a lot of
butter this year or next (and then there is the less than one year-old
"No-fault Wall Street 12 trillion dollar Monster Bailout" which he
didn't make but that he won't repudiate either).

If you ever have a heart complaint, get in to the doctor right away.
They can do a ton to help you, on a minimally invasive basis. *One of
my cousins has had rather more severe problems than me, and his view
is that "the decision to get help is the hardest part - after you make
the decision, it is all easy after that". *Don't wait to see a
cardiologist for the first time until after you've had that first
heart attack.

oly
The Deeply Cynical

Normally I snip a poster's tagline, but in this case I elect to preserve
it, as I do not believe it applies. *Your disquisition above is the most
refreshing thing I've seen from a conservative since the Eisenhower
Administration. *After all, I, too, was a conservative until the
conservative movement became poisoned by Rush Limbaugh and the Religious
Right.

It doesn't take a genius to observe that the people who show up at the
townhall meetings, teaparties, and tax protest rallies, carrying signs
with the President's image overlain with swastikas and Hitler images and
yelling about how they don't want the government in their lives at all,
seem to always be those who have a secure healthcare plan. *I have yet to
see an unemployed or "pre-existing condition" person speak out against
some form of guaranteed coverage, not a single one. *It's always the "I've
got mine, screw everybody else" attitude that dominates, leaving a
disgusting stink in the room every time healthcare is scheduled to be
discussed.

I might even confess to my Libertarian roots and state that, in my view,
the only legitimate role of national government is to provide services for
its citizens that they cannot possibly provide for themselves. *National
defense is certainly one of these, as is some plan for dealing with
contagions that do not recognize state boundaries. *Things such as an
interstate highway system certainly need some kind of federal oversight
and support. *A common currency, for better or worse, helps us avoid the
crazyquilt monetary situation that existed for hundreds of years in the
Holy Roman Empire, impeding progress as well as commerce. *It should be
obvious to anyone who is not already brainwashed by the radio and tv
talkers that healthcare is rapidly fitting itself into that same category,
and that none of us, other than the legislators themselves, who can vote
themselves any benefit they wish, is really secure in his position. *In my
view, politicians who pontificate about the evils of socialism need to
renounce their own government-paid healthcare and pay their own way or go
without like so many of their constituents have to do, in order to have
any credibility with me whatsoever, and I don't care which party they
represent. *Median family income in the U.S. being what it is, $12,000+ a
year for private health coverage (which neither you nor I could even get
because of our PECs) is as far out of reach for a hard-working, struggling
family as is the cost of building a road from the breadwinner's house to
his place of work.

I have no problem with a non-white family in the White House, nor do I
have a problem with your preference for DITW WASP conservatives there,
either. What I want to see from the persons and party in power is positive
results. This does not include impeachments having to do with sex acts,
half-cocked declarations of war, or sanctimonious politicians telling us
how much they love the Constitution and Freedom and Jesus and then serving
up the green weenie to the poor schlubs who have been taxpayers all their
lives and find themselves with medical conditions that will cause them to
lose their pride and everything they have spent their entire lives working
for.

If I never post here again, there will no doubt be many readers who
rejoice, having read the above. *So be it. *I stand by every word of it.

James

As long as our civic guidelines are being shaped by 530-something
politicians whose primary goals are getting re-elected and channeling as
much of our tax money as possible back to their own state, I can't see how
anything of substance ever gets accomplished. *The idea of the overnight
overhaul of a massive health care system that already has had 60 years to
grow is like turning the vacant lot into a putting green in a week with
garden tools. *Add to that, every pol seems to have his or her own pet
ideas. *I have to wonder what their individual qualifications are to take on
such an effort.

I will admit that there is a little bit of the "I've got mine" attitude that
you despise in my own mind. *Maybe it comes with age, but I try not to let
it dominate my view of things. *I'm all for helping out those less fortunate
than me, but I don't claim to know how to do it, and I don't trust those in
power to come up with a solution either, especially one that they could
agree on given the increasing polarization.

But the thing that gripes me most is that I may not live long enough to
complete the set of National Park quarters. *Perhaps a good insurance plan
will ease my mind.

Then why not limit politicians to one term in office so politics do
not get in the way and then maybe they will be able to make rational
decision. Then we should make it illegal too take any bribes from
lobbyist and the such. Maybe our politicians need baby setter too
watch they're every move?

mazorj wrote:
"Mr. Jaggers" lugburzman[at]yahoo[dot]com wrote in message
...
mazorj wrote:

...
- mazorj, Driving the Internet Highway at 25 mph with My Left-Turn
Signal Blinking
# # #
"I once went to a fortune teller who gave Swedish massages while she
foretold my future. When I asked her why, she smiled and said
'Haven't you heard? The medium is the massage."

James, Retching

At my pun, or at the general condition of things?

Please say it's the latter, even if it's not. A groan is the proper
and obligatory response to a pun. Retching and kvetching is
acceptable commentary in the national discourse.

Actually, what you said was two-thirds of a PUN. 8)

OK, it's the latter.

James the Accommodating