Stephen H

I was curious if anyone knows the recipe for "brown slop", one of the foods they feed to prisoners in jail. I am not going to prison or anything but I have heard rumors the food in there was so bad, that I wanted to taste it for myself by making it at home.

I was curious what could happen to the economy if we did the following:

* Passed a law that bans foreclosure, bank levy, wage garnishment, and putting liens on property

* Sets the statute of limitations on debts and judgments (both) to 90 days and makes them non-renewable after that

* Raise the property and equity exemptions from judgment / bankruptcy to $1,000,000,000 per person and that is combined home equity, money, cars, boats, furniture, jewelery, and all other property of value.

* create a usury law which limits the maximum rate banks can charge to lend to 0.01% APR

* Make payment records, bankruptcy, etc private and give the people the option of not reporting negative credit information to the bureaus.

I am curious what the economic, societal, and other implications would be of such as policy passing all of these things simultaneously. I was curious if there would be more poverty, less poverty due to a cost of living change (i.e. more disposable income due to less sucked by creditors before the people can use it because of payments), or what. I was also curious if the tax revenue would go up or down, or what would happen to the currency, etc.

Also, how could an economy function in which the banking system was not the gatekeeper to what certain people can do?

I am asking because I see what we face ahead with peaking and declining of natural resources and it appears from many of the studies done on this, that a lot of debts aren't going to be paid, and I was wondering if instead of bailouts, the impact if giving the lower class a safety net to keep their belongings, homes, cars, quality of life, etc during times of economic decline would be a better policy for society overall than letting the bankers keep getting richer and more powerful while everyone else suffers.

I was curious if you think the bullying epidemic that is facing our children in our schools today is a symptom of a much larger issue, the erosion of etiquette and civility in today's society. It would seem that if schools created cultures where kids are welcomed, required kids to use proper etiquette and civility in the halls, restrooms, cafeterias, playgrounds, and classrooms, and so forth this bullying epidemic might not be as big. I also think that if schools taught this and taught kids how to speak out if something is wrong, this might help too. I wanted to hear your thoughts on this.

When I was driving from San Diego to Visalia the other day, as I was going up highway 5, I noticed that there was a pickup truck parked on the railroad tracks. At first, I thought a car had illegally driven on the train tracks but then as I got closer, I noticed that the truck had a special wheel to attach to the tracks and it had a Union Pacific logo on the truck. This made think that this might have been some kind of a track work or maintenance vehicle of some sort.

I was curious what these vehicles are used for.

I am not trying to get inside one or trespass on to railroad property but I am curious on what the controls, etc look like for a train engineer inside a modern locomotive. I was wondering if there are any websites that show this somewhere possibly. I am not asking for someone to violate their work rules of engineer or conductor by any means.

When I was stopped at a freight train crossing, I noticed that a BNSF train was pulling loads of boxcars showing its competitors logos on them (e.g. Union Pacific, CSX, Norfolk Southern, and others). I was curious why a railroad would pay its competitior for transport of its intermodal load.

When I was stopped at a railroad crossing, I saw that UPS and Fedex had shipping units, boxcars, and semi-truck trailers loaded on rail cars. These cars were being pulled by BNSF trains, I was curious if when we send a package to someone ground track if it really goes long distance by rail as opposed to track without the average customer knowing it.

I have noticed lately that some freight train companies run very long trains. I was curious how long (in feet) the average long freight train is.

It seems like today, people are incompetent and ruder than ever before. For example, when calling in to customer service to a lot of businesses I have to get through a touch tone maze, wait on hold for a long time and then get someone who hardly knows anything and sometimes cannot speak the language. I see people have less and less manners than in previous years. I feel that people are more focused on cell phone calls than paying attention to those around them. I hear news reports of bullying in schools and online. There is so much spam and phishing online today. I see that very few RSVP to things anymore. The media does not put out the truth as much in the news. A lot of people don't dress up much anymore. I see that ballrooms are used more for conferences than for dances. This is just the beginning of what I am seeing.

Do you agree or disagree with this and why or why not? Also, what can be done to reverse this trend if you agree with me?

I was wondering if social skills should be part of the school curriculum. I feel that this would benefit everyone if they learned things such as friendships, understood slang, banter, dancing, manners, rules for many social situation such as plays, concerts, playground activities, conversation skills, and more. I beleive that teaching this would help kids who don't learn this on their own, and help solve our manners crisis. What's your opinion?