Gasoline

The war was going to bring us cheap gas. The oil revenues would pay for the reconstruction.

For the past three days in Philadelphia, the gas stations have been out of regular and mid-grade as we switch from MTBE to ethanol and, golly gee whillikkers, Mr. Peabody, who coulda predicted this, its taking longer than expected to make the transition.

Riiiight. Someone's making some money gouging the public. And the cheap shit is hovering at $2.95 or more a gallon.

I was at an opening tonight, walked into a conversation between two black guys about slavery and white indentured servitude. Or rather, one guy ranting to his friend.

"You know the thing is," the guy was saying, "and a lot of people, white and black, don't get it.

"We're ALL niggers now. We all slaves. Dude, in France, you get 34 days vacation? What do we get here? We're all niggers now, we just have better clothes and nicer houses."

Can't disagree.

We're slaves. We're just living in better accommodations than the brothers and sisters 150 years ago.

Most of us have no, or limited, social mobility. Most of us have no, or limited, economic mobility. Nobody wants a stake in our collective future because we've been conditioned to believe that this is as good as it gets. We're all souless, selfish bitches in that regard because we're resigned to our collective fate, not future.