900,000 jobs for Kintyre

[bill]

but you could also say someone is poor who doesn't have a car and he stays in Crosshill and he has to walk his girlfriend home to say the other side of the town. Maybe John Street for example.

Anyone in particular Bubbly, or just a random example

[bubbly jock]

Bill

Poverty in any society is wrong but it's not fair to expect the same people all the time to fork out to charity.

You save very hard for the things you want or to put your child to college or university. They could be sitting beside wee jeanie fae Drumchapel who can go home every night to her own home and not stump up for rent heating etc. but wee Jeanie is still able to apply for the same grants that students from rural areas get but these loans don't cover the rent in the city so the rural student is poor, temporary poverty for some maybe but hardship all the same.

Inyourface may have the answer to all the different variations of poverty in his rantings but as I can't understand them we'll leave the jury out in the meantime

and no yacht......so by your reckoning Bubbly I must be poor.

Three holidays a year No wonder you can't afford a yacht.

[bubbly jock]

Anyone in particular Bubbly, or just a random example

Purely random............ Purely random

bubbly

[ionnsaigh]

Bubbly,


It can be argued that we are all workers, the artist, brickie, surgeon, etc etc. That each person has an inherent need to produce. This need is not fully met, merely by financial compensation. All workers have a need to self appreciate their contribution in terms of ascetic value. The writer admires the sentence, the artist stands back and admires the finished work, that feeling of having done a good days work is a fundamental ingredient of reward. All workers who appear happy and successful have this ascetic dimension to them.
So.....who is the poor one out the two.

[ionnsaigh]

See Bobbie you've done it again. In order to obtain a clear analysis, you have to look at things in terms of comparative evaluation. Can you imagine a medical journal, the articles written without some form of evaluation?.

"Before capitalism none of the people of the Soviet Union were poor".
The question should be. Before communism none of the people in Russia were poor.
Before, during, and after, are the main aspects to be considered before jumping blindly to a wrong conclusion.

[Beachcomber]

Three holidays a year No wonder you can't afford a yacht.

I'd settle for just one !

[Bobbie En Tejas]

I don't quite understand your post. I wasn't asking a question in my post, it was a bit of sarcasm.

Obviously, there were poor people in the soviet union during communism and rich people, with the poor people less able to get ahead and out of their lot in life unless they somehow got on the government wheel. I would rather put my own buck in my pocket than the buck from the sweat of someone else's brow.

Are you serious that you think no one in communist countries are poor or flee for a better life? And is the former soviet union the example of what you would like to see in Scotland?

[Dunc]

Possibly as one of the few who have actually spent a while in Northern Russia
or USSR as it was in the 60's, Murmansk,Archangel and Igarka...We were fed all sorts of stories before we left UK of being followed by gun toting military policemen also you can't use cameras... don't mix with the locals etc a bad lot ....well read on.
We asked if we could take photos in Murmansk.... certainly you can ..even the battleships??...certainly.Can we go where we want?? certainly why not??
At that time they had wooden roads in Archangel could not make a plastic raincoat or a Biro pen (big trade in them)but had just put up Gargarin into space!!!The people we met were great..very friendly among the most friendly we ever met and DID,NT give a S$it for politics of any party.All the school kids carried books on Rabbie Burns in English and could speak it well albeit with an Ayrshire accent!!
The people we mixed with seemed happy with their lot I would not say they were poor either and seemed to have plenty Vodka to offer us.I think they knew as much about their Prime minister as we knew of ours!!.There was only friction between the guys and gals we knew and the Mongolian type police who had different uniforms to the normal guy.They were hated.
We had a guard on the gangway who made a big show of looking at our passes whether we gave him it the correct way up or not (enough said)Also the uniforms which looked nice from a distance were really very rough.We reckoned all the trousers were the same length but all tucked into jackboots so they looked the same!!!The guns they had incidently had no ammo in them.
Kids from the local school had to spend their holidays on the docks counting loads of timber...which they did with a small hammer their pal counting the hits!!As we also had to tally with them we always agreed with them or the complete hold could be emptied and done again!!Those kids shared the rest-room with us and had never ever seen an orange or banana before.As for racism there were plenty of posters about showing white Russians in arms with Africans but they were just as racalist as we were!!!
Only thing I was not happy about was the continual Joan Sutherland operatic arias all day thru the speakers on the dock.At night we used to put Radio Luxemburg on the speakers for them which was much more to their taste .
Nothing political should be taken from this but we certainly were surprised.We were often in the theatre's where really first class companies came up from Moscow and all for free!!!.Those things would have cost us a fortune in UK at that time.
As far as we could gather Communism meant very very little to them. Our skipper however who was in the same area as a boy in the 30's remembers them dressed in animal skins so you could say it worked in some sort of way for them.....

We then went to USA and the first person I met was a drunk bumming ciggies or a dime off me in the docks.......funny world ????

Ramble finished (must be bored!!)

Dunc

[bubbly jock]

As far as we could gather Communism meant very very little to them. Our skipper however who was in the same area as a boy in the 30's remembers them dressed in animal skins so you could say it worked in some sort of way for them.....


Your post is very interesting dunc but a bit difficult to read and I'm just curious, who was dressed in animal skins?? Was it the dock workers or the people in general? and what worked in a different way?

bubbly

[Dunc]

The general people ,workers etc according to the Skip.

Well from walking about in skins to what we saw them dressed in Archangel the Communist system worked for them.Albeit they mostly wore blue suits white shirt & blue bunnets.
The only place I hated was East Germany where the "police" were the Eastern Russian/Mongolian guys.They were also in Poland and the locals hated them as did the Germans.That area was great for "trading" thou.In fact poland still had the death penalty in law if you were caught exchanging foreign money as had Russia .Funny when the first thing people wanted was Dollars after you came thru the docks.Some of those "traders" were however "planted".Never use the first guy I was told.

In Murmansk we were told to give the skip all our foreign money to be locked away and we could only sub. local money and yet when we went to some state shops they would only take foreign money.Just to get the dollars etc.Knowing full well we had some hidden.
In Poland it was the same the amount of Polish money you took ashore was written on a pass they gave you.Of course you always smuggled some ashore as the black market rate was three times the official rate. I had 10 Dollars in the toe of my shoe and my pal had money under his collar.We also used to put money inside a football and kick it thru the gates...even giving the guards a go.
However the guards always checked you going out and looked under my collar and in my pals shoes!!!!Siberia here we come with a small shovel.
When you came back they counted the money and compared it with the amount on your pass and were curious how you could be bluttered and still have more money than what you had when you left!!! Many kids done well on the way back I assure you.

Happy times.

Dunc

[4th gen Suthen']

Aye, very interesting Dunc.

I was talking to your buddy Bill this morning!

[Dunc]

Usually run into him in Tesco's or when he comes to get his photo in Courier.

Cheers

Dunc

[Bobbie En Tejas]

Very interesting Dunc. Enjoyed reading it.

[Bobbie En Tejas]

I know a little bit about "poor." When I was young, I have mentioned that I went to 12 schools and also lived with 5 different families at one time or another. At one point, my brother and I were left to our own devices as my mother worked nights. The lady upstairs was supposed to keep an eye on us, but I don't think she saw well Anyway, besides the normal trouble a 10 or 11-year-old can get into, I spent a lot of time on my own at the Albright-Knox Art Gallery, the Science Museum, the Historical Society Museum, the botannical gardens (although I'm not sure smoking in the bushes would count as a great cultural experience) and the library. I didn't have much as a kid, my mother kept a spotless house, we didn't eat steak, and many times it was spam, spam, spam, spam, spam, spam, spam, spam (uck), but we ate. We didn't live in the best part of the city. Some would look at that part of my life and consider me poor, but I look back and consider myself rich. There were some experiences I would have preferred not to have had, but I always considered myself a very lucky person.

As long as people have food in their stomach, a roof over their head, warmth and people who love them, rich and poor is very subjective. It isn't just about money.

[Dunc]

Poor is relative depending where you live and who you are.
We used to show the Russians pix from various mags we had ...beautifull fridges,washing machines and cars. Not one was jealous of them simply cos they never had them., but they were not "poor".Politicians are the main problem between countries I think.
I think the USA are the most generous people on earth but seem always to get stick for it somehow. Those that chastise them should remember that if it was not for USA then just 60 years ago we would have been in some mess. Stalin would probably have liberated Paris and our PM would be driving about in the "state Lada".Short memories...

Dunc