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Now THAT’s Progress

July 16, 2006 in Main Page | 5 comments

Well, think of all the things in life that actually have changed for the better. The food’s got better. Absolutely beyond question, the food’s got better in America. The coffee is better. Bread is better. I’ll bet you could go out from where you’re sitting in Sacramento right now, I’ll bet you could walk 500 yards and probably be able to find a decent loaf of bread. You could, couldn’t you? If I said that to you 20 years ago, you would probably have had to taken an airplane and flown all the way to France.

Now, why did this happen?

It’s because hippies in the ’60s decided they wanted to have whole-grain bread and be healthy, and then they also wanted to have properly roasted coffee. And so, they gradually got organic-food stores that actually were quite good, and the bread got better, and there were farmers’ markets. Now, all this happened in the teeth of political onslaughts by both parties who were, of course, in the pay of the food industry.

In my local town of Eureka, Calif., the other day, I went into Pierson’s, which is the main building supply place where you buy stuff if you’re redoing your house and all the rest of it. I looked at their coffee booth. They were selling coffee from nine beans from nine different countries. Nine! This is not some hippie hangout. This is where mighty men with measuring tapes in their waist belts and huge hammers hanging from their trousers

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July 16, 2006 at 1:50 pm

Anonymous

It’s not really fair to appeal to one’s taste buds, is it? Yum.

(p.s. How’s ol’ Squirrel Boy doin’? Man’s gotta a lotta nuts, that’s fer sure… ;-)

July 16, 2006 at 4:17 pm

Anonymous

I think he’s in fine fettle .. at least that’s the sense I got from my phone conversation with him last week … his coat has a healthy sheen, he’s probably dallying a bit with some squirellette or other (tho’ I wouldn’t know) , and my guess is his acorn and chestnut hamper is not too low.

July 17, 2006 at 7:46 am

Anonymous

You are on a roll these few days.

Progress is, by definition, change from the status quo, the vested interests in status quo fear all change, but most of all they fear change that they don’t understand because if they can’t understand it, they KNOW they can’t control it. And if they can’t control it they can’t profit from it.

Progress always, but always, comes from the angry, disruptive, iconoclastic pains in the ass. They are, by definition, the ones excluded from the benefits and vested interests of the status quo.

Who was it who said that if it wasn’t for dissatisfied people, nothing would ever change.

July 19, 2006 at 10:11 pm

Anonymous

My mother once told me I was dissatisfied with the delivery when I was born.

nah, just kidding.

August 17, 2006 at 8:04 am

Anonymous

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