by his stupid actions, like taking the 20th Century as his model?

and what really makes me crazy about "feelings trump thinking" is that you can't be argued out of something you weren't argued into; conversely, if you just FEEL it, no one will ever be able to pry that feeling out of you.
grrrrr

Yes; I checked out the website! . I will buy her
something and see what she thinks of it!!! -- j

Sorry, no, I don't have word puzzles (what you describe sounds like those Word Search puzzles). Mine are colorful geometric tilings that look like art, sort of like M. C. Escher. Have a look in my Marketplace listing (click the green Market basket in front of my name). Thanks.

I'm a happy person because I don't let myself be coerced into anything. A dear friend of mine of great creativity once wrote a song that goes like this: "I don't want to, you can't make me." Suits me.

Yes! . voting with my time, my mental effort, my few
bucks, my loyalty -- that's the way I see it! . if nothing
but purely voluntary action were the rule in my life,
I would be a happier guy!!! -- j

p.s. do you have word puzzles, like the diagonal
words in a field of letters puzzles? . my wife likes
those, and others.

Only if it's voluntary on both sides. I would not knowingly accept you to live for me without a quid pro quo (not necessarily measured in money). For example, buy my games because you want them, not because I need the sale. (See the marketplace. :) )

yet when I am that "another" and I volunteer to live,
in part, for you, it can become a reasonable value
exchange, yes? . we just don't ask. -- j

The slave owners thought so, as did the kings and rulers of old. Aristocrats and peasants, knaves and nobles. It's a hard habit to break. Domination is hardwired. "Nor ask another to live for mine" is a hard concept to splice in.

you bet! . the "lowly" carry us along every day, and
we should be damn glad of it!! -- j

Exactly, taken for granted and looked down on as the lowliest rung. Yet some are college students with high IQs and interesting philosophies. By the way, didn't Galt in AS have a menial job in the railroad tunnels? Didn't Roard work in a quarry?

and it's "thankless" -- you feel like you're taken for
granted, cuz no one expresses gratitude for a great
job done. . except management, if they're good. -- j

"I would pay my busboys by the number of tables cleared, not by the hour."
Paying them based on waitresses' tips is questionable too because you want to pay them for things they control. If they find away to clear tables in some amazing way so that they're not the bottleneck anymore and they make high earnings, that's fine. The goal is to make money.

BTW, this reminds me of the book The Goal. It's a business book written like a drama. The manager is trying to get rid of bottlenecks but he realizes the *goal* is to make money, not reduce bottlenecks.

Spend three days as a busboy in a superbusy restaurant and then come back and tell me how little skill it took. It's logistics, public relations, and backbreaking work.

All jobs are important or they wouldn't exist. The busboy may be important to the machine but the low skill level required to perform the job makes the job worth relatively little on a pay scale. You wouldn't pay your best busboy as much as your manager due to the vast difference in skill and education required. If you owned a restaurant of your own, it would be perfectly acceptable for you to pay your busboy as much as every other employee in your establishment if that's what you chose to do. If you did I'd be willing to bet you'd have all the busboys you could ever want. A good manager would probably be much harder for you to find. I'm in no way belittling the his job. If he wants to be paid a better wage he should increase the skills he has to offer, not demand that everyone should be paid the same (or a "living wage").

I almost added the bodyparts story myself. Thanks!

WoW! . reminds me of the joke about the parts of
the body, where the heart and the brain are trumped
by the ....... and paying people to bus tables by the
table instead of the hour makes great sense!!! -- j

Oh, but that just points to social inequality and educational inequality and glass ceilings and black ceilings and opportunity inequality and nutritional inequality and medical inequality and transportation inequality and age inequality and on and on and on. All of our human brethren are equal and deserve their 'share of the pie'.

It doesn't assuage his idiocy.

Not quite. The most valuable is the busboy who clears tables so the 43 people standing in line to be seated can sit down and order. The faster they are served, the more business for the restaurant, the more income per hour, the more tips for the waitresses. The second most important is the dishwasher. Without clean dishes, people can't be served. Running a restaurant is a team effort, a well-oiled machine; yet the busboys only get the lowest wage plus a share of the waitresses' tips. I would pay my busboys by the number of tables cleared, not by the hour. (Yes, I was a busboy for a Memorial Day weekend in Ocean City, MD, one year. It was a philosophical object lesson for the manager.)

It makes perfect sense, although technically there should be a comma after the word decisions.

Your first sentence makes no sense again. Please complete the sentence or I will hide it.

the cook! -- j

p.s. or the door guard who keeps the trouble people out.

progressives have this "put-apon" look, like "Why are
you failing to see the obvious truth in what I'm saying?" -- j

And how do you determine what they are worth? Here's a quick quiz question for you: Who is the most valuable worker in a beach resort restaurant on Memorial Day weekend?