Friday, October 24, 2008
No Ballpark on Martins and Market!
The Richmond Times-Dispatch newspaper had for its oversized headline "No Ballpark for Boulevard", meaning that Richmond has decided to go ahead with a plan to build a new stadium in Shockoe Bottom instead of at Boulevard. It would be bounded by Ambler St, Crane Street, Broad Street, 18th Street, and Franklin Street just to the east of downtown Richmond, Virginia, and adjacent to the railroad tracks and Main Street Station. If you get off at I-95 there, you would head straight into the ballpark. If you stop off the train at the Main Street Station, it is an easy walk. However, I find this plan unacceptable.
I find this plan unacceptable because it would destroy the 17th Street Farmers' Market, and it would destroy the roosting grounds for the tens of thousands of purple martins that converge in Richmond every August. The Farmers' Market is a good place to get locally-grown food, and destruction of this would mean more food shipped from elsewhere, using up precious oil and putting more CO2 in the atmosphere. This place needs to be kept, so we don't have to go out somewhere to a big supermarket to get food brought in from California or Chile.
The plan would also destroy the purple martins' roosting grounds. This has turned into one of Richmond's star attractions. Every August tens of thousands of purple martins descend on the city, going into a line of pear trees to roost for the night. It has become a star attraction and a magnificent spectacle. The ballpark would eliminate the trees that they roost in. Where would the martins go? Would they go elsewhere? Or would they remain there, roosting in the roof of the stadium and pooping all over the place nearby, as well as interfering with baseball games being played there (easy flyout turns into bases-loaded triple when the ball strikes a purple martin…). It would be another case of depriving a bird of its natural habitat.
Further, it would make a difficult parking situation impossible, when you add maybe 2,000 or more parked vehicles to the area.
So I say don't build the stadium there! Find somewhere where we don't interfere with entities that represent the planet or are helping it.
I find this plan unacceptable because it would destroy the 17th Street Farmers' Market, and it would destroy the roosting grounds for the tens of thousands of purple martins that converge in Richmond every August. The Farmers' Market is a good place to get locally-grown food, and destruction of this would mean more food shipped from elsewhere, using up precious oil and putting more CO2 in the atmosphere. This place needs to be kept, so we don't have to go out somewhere to a big supermarket to get food brought in from California or Chile.
The plan would also destroy the purple martins' roosting grounds. This has turned into one of Richmond's star attractions. Every August tens of thousands of purple martins descend on the city, going into a line of pear trees to roost for the night. It has become a star attraction and a magnificent spectacle. The ballpark would eliminate the trees that they roost in. Where would the martins go? Would they go elsewhere? Or would they remain there, roosting in the roof of the stadium and pooping all over the place nearby, as well as interfering with baseball games being played there (easy flyout turns into bases-loaded triple when the ball strikes a purple martin…). It would be another case of depriving a bird of its natural habitat.
Further, it would make a difficult parking situation impossible, when you add maybe 2,000 or more parked vehicles to the area.
So I say don't build the stadium there! Find somewhere where we don't interfere with entities that represent the planet or are helping it.
Sunday, October 12, 2008
Pay your Credit Card Debt!
Well, it looks like they have done it; dropped the Dow Jones average by 2400 points in a few weeks, even after the bailout package was submitted. But on 2008 October 10, some signs of a recovery or of a "bottom" emerged. Stocks soared 800 points, then they soared 800 points, although they still finished down 125 points. Financial stocks were up, indicating that maybe these institutions may be getting over the credit freeze.
But a new crisis looms. This is personal credit card debt. It seems that Americans have not learned what credit cards are for. They are for giving you enough time to pay for things you need and can afford, and as a convenience in shopping so you don't have to carry wads of bills and piles of coins. They are not for delaying payment over and over and over again so that you can live off the hog for huge periods of time. It seems many Americans have done this. The average American (including children) has accumulated $9600 of credit card debt. The debt for families is probably about $25,000. The total is nearly a trillion dollars: $950,000,000,000. Many Americans simply pay the minimum amount and let it accumulate interest; some don't even do that and accumulate penalties as well. So far the banks have handled it OK.
But sooner or later things will give out, and a new crisis similar to the mortgage crisis will break out, with a new round of credit freezes and stock market droppings. This will hurt people's retirement savings all over the place. These people are being punished for the inability of others to pay their credit card debt.
And also for the banks' actions on credit cards. It seems they have allowed people to charge all over the place so they can get the high interest rates. No matter that some can't pay. I feel the banks have been irresponsible in the way they get people to sign up. They send credit card applications willy-nilly all over the place regardless of the recipient's ability to pay. They have sent scores of applications to my mother, who is in assisted living, for instance. The worst offender seems to be HSBC, which for a while kept sending and sending and sending despite my pleas for them to stop. It makes me want to see HSBC go bankrupt. However, they are one of the largest banks in the world, so if they go bankrupt, it will really cause a calamity on the markets. Perhaps they could be bailed out if they get into trouble, but trouble or not, their CEO and other leading officials deserve to get long prison terms for what they did.
As far as you, the individual is concerned, the best thing you can do to prevent this new crisis from occurring is to pay your credit card debt. You agreed to pay the money back when you charged the items, so you need to do it, and now is the time to do it. It will help your finances, and it will help the bank who issued you the credit card. It is the patriotic thing to do, more than waving the flag or going out on a shopping spree, as President Bush in 2001 would have had you do.
So pay up and help your country and your economy.
But a new crisis looms. This is personal credit card debt. It seems that Americans have not learned what credit cards are for. They are for giving you enough time to pay for things you need and can afford, and as a convenience in shopping so you don't have to carry wads of bills and piles of coins. They are not for delaying payment over and over and over again so that you can live off the hog for huge periods of time. It seems many Americans have done this. The average American (including children) has accumulated $9600 of credit card debt. The debt for families is probably about $25,000. The total is nearly a trillion dollars: $950,000,000,000. Many Americans simply pay the minimum amount and let it accumulate interest; some don't even do that and accumulate penalties as well. So far the banks have handled it OK.
But sooner or later things will give out, and a new crisis similar to the mortgage crisis will break out, with a new round of credit freezes and stock market droppings. This will hurt people's retirement savings all over the place. These people are being punished for the inability of others to pay their credit card debt.
And also for the banks' actions on credit cards. It seems they have allowed people to charge all over the place so they can get the high interest rates. No matter that some can't pay. I feel the banks have been irresponsible in the way they get people to sign up. They send credit card applications willy-nilly all over the place regardless of the recipient's ability to pay. They have sent scores of applications to my mother, who is in assisted living, for instance. The worst offender seems to be HSBC, which for a while kept sending and sending and sending despite my pleas for them to stop. It makes me want to see HSBC go bankrupt. However, they are one of the largest banks in the world, so if they go bankrupt, it will really cause a calamity on the markets. Perhaps they could be bailed out if they get into trouble, but trouble or not, their CEO and other leading officials deserve to get long prison terms for what they did.
As far as you, the individual is concerned, the best thing you can do to prevent this new crisis from occurring is to pay your credit card debt. You agreed to pay the money back when you charged the items, so you need to do it, and now is the time to do it. It will help your finances, and it will help the bank who issued you the credit card. It is the patriotic thing to do, more than waving the flag or going out on a shopping spree, as President Bush in 2001 would have had you do.
So pay up and help your country and your economy.
