February 12, 2020 – davidbruceblog #2

Money

• A Rabbi who was very critical of the rich used to tell this story. When Moses came down from Mount Sinai, he was carrying the two tablets on which the Ten Commandments had been engraved, but when he saw the Israelites worshipping the Golden Calf, he broke the tablets. Because the tablets were decorated with costly jewels, the rich grabbed the largest pieces of the tablets, while the poor — crowded out by the rich — grabbed the smallest pieces. When they looked at their pieces of the tablets, the rich read, “Thou shalt … murder” and “Thou shalt … commit adultery.” However, on their pieces of the tablets, the poor read, “not … not … not.” That is why the rich can get away with everything, while the poor are allowed to do nothing.

• A wealthy merchant once offered a dervish a thousand pieces of gold; however, the dervish asked the merchant questions before accepting the money. The dervish asked if the merchant had more money at home. The merchant answered yes. The dervish then asked if the merchant wanted twice as much as the amount of money he already had. Again the merchant answered yes, adding that every day he prayed to God to give him more money. Hearing that, the dervish said, “I can’t accept your money because a rich man can’t accept from a beggar. I am rich because I am satisfied with what God gives me, while you are poor because you are always begging God to give you more.”

• During bull markets, baseball players often become fascinated with the stock market, and back when railroads were a major means of passenger travel manager Casey Stengel was pestered by players asking him for stock-market tips. The fascination with the stock market was keeping the players from being fascinated with baseball, so after a pitiful practice Mr. Stengel called a team meeting and informed his players that he had a stock-market tip for them: “Buy railroad stock. I’m going to [fire and] ship out so many of you guys that the railroads are bound to increase their profits.”

• Even early in his career, conductor Leonard Bernstein could be outspoken. After hearing a politician congratulate the city of New York for supporting such a fine organization as the New York City Symphony Orchestra, Mr. Bernstein yelled, “FRAUD!” He then explained that New York City did not contribute even a penny toward paying the orchestra’s bills.

• Al Capp became successful with the comic-strip Li’l Abner. In fact, the comic strip was immediately popular and so the Boston Globepublished an article about him. This did have one unforeseen result, however — all the art schools that Mr. Capp had studied at sent him bills for his unpaid tuition! (He paid them all.)

• A few days before he died in July of 1833, William Wilberforce was made immensely happy because England decided to free its slaves. “Thank God,” he said, “that I have been suffered to live to see this day when England is ready to sacrifice twenty millions of pounds sterling [in payments to slave-owners] to emancipate her slaves!”

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