Reading Notes

The capitalists may often feel that they are plying their economic system without the rest of us noticing. It is not the case. In "The Wettest County in the World" by Matt Bondurant, a book about producing illicit liquor during prohibition, he writes, " … the rising tide of industrial greed that pushed man away from their work benches and their craft to become part of the machine. Progress. It turned them into simple parts, expendable, replaceable, cheaply made as if their hearts were constructed of tin with shears." And, talking about the newly rich salesmen of capitalism, " The ambassadors of the new America, the captains of capitalism. Peddling their cheaply manufactured wares while the craftsman stands alone in his garrett, up to his knees in wood chips and no understudy, all the young men moving out of the towns and into the urban meat grinder. The love of trade, the value of the craft; all going, all gone." A time for reckoning will come. John Ayers.