10-10-2023, 08:55 PM
Sorry to offend any oligarchs
When I lived on Maui, even farther back into the last century, I picked up mail from my PO Box and overheard this conversation:
"But you do own a lot of land." (trying to sound sympathetic and understanding)
"Yes, but we're land rich and cash poor! I can't do any of the things I'd really like to do!"
The second comment was by a family member of a clan of Maui oligarchs, who would make Oprah look like a serf compared with their land holdings, someone who lived in a mansion on Haleakala with one of the best Upcountry views low land baron real estate taxes allowed them to keep and maintain. They were speaking with a friend or good acquaintance.
We have little understanding of the difficulties oligarchs go through, vast inheritances, free lifetime room and board on a family estate, a steady source of business income should they choose to be bothered with it. And yet people like us choose to make offensive comments about their plight, their daily trials and tribulations.
Could anyone play a stanza on the world's smallest violin?
When I lived on Maui, even farther back into the last century, I picked up mail from my PO Box and overheard this conversation:
"But you do own a lot of land." (trying to sound sympathetic and understanding)
"Yes, but we're land rich and cash poor! I can't do any of the things I'd really like to do!"
The second comment was by a family member of a clan of Maui oligarchs, who would make Oprah look like a serf compared with their land holdings, someone who lived in a mansion on Haleakala with one of the best Upcountry views low land baron real estate taxes allowed them to keep and maintain. They were speaking with a friend or good acquaintance.
We have little understanding of the difficulties oligarchs go through, vast inheritances, free lifetime room and board on a family estate, a steady source of business income should they choose to be bothered with it. And yet people like us choose to make offensive comments about their plight, their daily trials and tribulations.
Could anyone play a stanza on the world's smallest violin?