A Dutchman’s riot at Davos.

Rutger Bregman.

 

In Australia the worst thing one can do is to talk about paying taxes. Both major parties make people feel like pariahs whenever a policy is contemplated that might involve paying taxation. Sugar tax is one of those. Taxation raising is a mortal sin and confession to it is not likely to bring you any salvation. You will burn in an eternal hell.  But, the rich get richer and the poor poorer.

One keeps reading that 28 people own as much as half the world’s population. In the US, the richest country in the world,  workers in chicken factories  have to wear diapers because they are not allowed to have the time to go to the toilets. The chicken carcasses are strung on a moving belt so, a toilet break can’t be factored in! Profit at all cost.

It is clear that continuing giving tax breaks is aiding those 28 billionaires but not the workers, and so it goes. Its logical conclusion by governments to keep giving even more tax breaks will result in finally no taxation being paid. Back in Eisenhower’s day the taxation rate stood at 90%. That’s when the US was great, but look at it now! I have never been to the US. But… people who have been there recently are horrified of what they saw. Did anyone watch Michael Moore’s Fahrenheit 11/9? The horror of a freedom that allowed the poisoning of 100.000 people in Flint city! And that is just the beginning. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flint_water_crisis

There was quite a stir at this year’s 2018 economic forum at Switzerland Davos when a young Dutchman got up and spoke a truth that resonated around the world.  The taxation rate for those 28 billionaires stands at zero. He claims that the inequality in the world is taxation avoidance by the super rich. It is not rocket science!

I urge you to see this video of the Dutchman at Davos.

https://www.theguardian.com/business/2019/feb/01/rutger-bregman-world-economic-forum-davos-speech-tax-billionaires-capitalism

The more I hear about western democracy the more I admire my hydrangeas.

 

Boner’s Plight.

There used to be cinemas that featured news and documentaries only. At least in Holland they did. They were cheaper than movie theatres and ideally available for those with little money. School boys and girls who earned pocket money by collecting and selling rags and newspapers after school hours would be included in any audience. I did too but supplemented my meagre earnings by stripping (stealing) lead flashings from underneath windows. It would have been 1955. A year after, my parents took that five weeks voyage to Australia. Goodbye friends, goodbye school, goodbye everything including the Newsreel Bioscoop.

Back to 1955. I vividly remember getting to see my first erotic movie. I have never forgotten this since. In fact, I am only just now getting over it. Please, all of you, get a bit closer to your screen, écoutez bien! It was my first adventure in a burgeoning world of sexual awakening. My imaginings running amok. Erections were unpredictable, diabolically spontaneous and unstoppable, especially in front of the class-room. I used to feverishly fantasize being run over by the tram, all to no avail. I somehow understood ‘it’ finally had to go somewhere, but where? No one had told me yet. All I was told by my mother was ‘whatever happens, keep your hands above the blankets,’ or ‘ eat an apple, read a good book.’

I was seated in the cinema and probably watching the news with an Eisenhower urging on troops in Korea or other foreign country when out the blue came a short B/W documentary of an African nature. It was some kind of parade of young beautiful African girls WITH BARE BREASTS. My first sighting of the real soft breasts of which I had dreamt. I already had looked at some of my mother’s women magazines but they, the desired breasts, were always encaged in sturdy white or cream panzer like brassieres underpinned by steel. It wasn’t enough. I wanted the real (reel) item. This short movie of the African beauty parade was a God’s send. I somehow learnt where all this was going to finally lead to. The erection was palpable right down to the end of my shoelaces. It was my first honeymoon.

I caught the tram home, erection still in full flight while I was hanging from the leather strap. As the tram stopped and started I was jolted backwards and forwards. It was a delicious trip back home. I have seen many breasts since but none as impressionable as those first ones on the white screen back in 1955. It had to do for a long time. Australia experienced in Revesby and Bankstown a rough awakening. I am sure this would have helped me in front of the classroom.