listened to a report by a fellow
on the radio sunday evening
he talked about corruption
in louisiana
lots of corruption according to him
mainly folks in elected office
trying to augment their income
that sort of thing
probably part of the
highly esteemed
tradition i keep hearing about
several billion bucks
is missing from the money sent
to fight
the wars
not much said about that
though
probably part of the highly
regarded tradition
some more
lots of the money comes back to this
country to start
companies and corporations
which get a lot of government
contracts
go figure
i went out on several jobs last week
making that gulag wage of 7 dollars
and twenty five cents an hour
one job was for some guys who
were doing some building in a city park
the supervisor wore a usmc sticker
on his hardhat
at the end of the work day we chatted
about his security work in the middle east
he said he was making two thousand bucks
a day
he said he hated all of africa
said it was all corrupt
i told him the rhinos elephants and gorillas
in africa
were being poached into extinction
i asked him if he would go back to
africa to help train the wildlife conservationists
to protect the wildlife
he asked how much that paid
i said it did not pay anything
it was volunteer work
i think he thought i was crazy
i went to another job which was ending
and the construction foreman just spent
nearly three years building a casino
a pretty nice casino
as casinos go
i suppose
i always get asked the question
why in the hell dont you get a real
job
i dont know what that means exactly
whats more real than helping to build
a casino
really
so i was wondering about what people
will tell their grand children when
they ask
grand pa did you ever see a rhino
or an elephant
or a gorilla
before they went extinct
i spent several years as an animal
keeper and i cared for three
square lipped rhinos
mondo hitari and wagasa
lovely animals
sublimely so
when they moved the two females
to a new exhibit
the male
mr mondo
whined like a puppy
until they were reunited
i was profoundly shocked
i thought these animals were
not very emotional
but they are
and very much in need of saving
everyone should be a zookeeper
at one time of their life
or another
it will likely change how one
views the lives of our fellow
inhabitants on this planet
"To despise the animal basis of life,
to seek value only at the level of
conscious intelligence and rational
effort, is ultimately to lose one's
sense of cosmic relationships."
Lewis Mumford
ultimately yours
really
mr cayetano
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