Minimum wage?

Emmett J. Hoops· Minimum wage laws rigidify urban poverty. Picture this: You get $8.50/hr. in a town where you can buy a house for $60,000. You’re middle class, almost. You get $8.50/hr in Brooklyn, where the house next door just sold for $2,000,000 and your rent is going up to $2,000 a month. You’re homeless….
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The “Defense” budget

Talk about a bunch of doggerel: six hundred billion dollars for “defense.”  They used to call it the War Department, before 1945; unless there was a war, they didn’t really have all that much to do.  But defense?  Ah.  Everyone’s against war, but nobody can be against defense, or you’re anti-American. Well, the Senate just passed a…
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This Pope

Pope Francis isn’t a bad fellow at all. I know that today we’re expected to dissect every public figure to find out what isn’t all-good (such as today, the day after Nelson Mandela died, and the first voices reminding the world of Mandela’s cooperation with exploitative capitalists) but I still think this Frankie is okay….
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Well, this certainly stinks.

Pine beetles have been destroying the Pine Barrens of New Jersey.  Of course, they didn’t just recently develop an appetite for pines: they are called pine beetles, after all.  Unfortunately, our very love of trees is leading to their destruction.  Fire is a natural friend of the forest — and it’s hard for us to imagine…
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