Of manna and rot

I heard an unexpected but decent sermon this weekend at a showing of a new film on food insecurity in American titled A Place at the Table. The "sermon" consisted of a few remarks about the issue of hunger by a state senator who is also a Lutheran minister.

He referred to the manna or bread from heaven that miraculously fed the Israelites in the desert after their liberation from slavery in Egypt. Part of the deal with the manna was that you could only gather enough for one day at a time (except on Sabbath eve, when you got a two day pass). If you gathered more than one day's worth and hoarded it, the manna would rot.

The senator suggested that the tendency of a few people in our society to hoard money and resources and keep them from the less fortunate is causing a good bit of rot in our communities.

I thought that wasn't bad for a politician.

META. Here's an effort at a conversation about the conversation about race in the wake of the George Zimmerman verdict from the Rev. Jim Lewis.

CHARITY OR JUSTICE? While we're at it, here's a thought provoking op-ed on the "charitable-industrial complex."

WONKY BUT IMPORTANT. West Virginia should end an obsolete tax break for thin seam coal.

GOAT ROPE ADVISORY LEVEL: ELEVATED

Three for the road

My word-horde, to use the language of Beowulf, is running a little low at the moment. Fortunately, that is not the case with everyone.

THE ZIMMERMAN VERDICT. Here's a response from the New Yorker.

GROWING FROM THE MIDDLE. President Obama made the case this week for growing the middle class-and thereby growing the economy. Aristotle would probably agree. So would several economists discussed here.

MORE FUN AND GAMES WITH THE WV AG discussed here.

Good weekend wishes to one and all (mostly).

GOAT ROPE ADVISORY LEVEL: ELEVATED

North Dakota dreaming

West Virginia legislators often get lots of flack for going on junkets to interesting places on the public nickel. However, when the destination is North Dakota, the flack factor seems to disappear.

That state in fact is going to be the destination of state lawmakers, where, among other things, they will study North Dakota's Legacy Fund, a permanent trust fund created from the revenue collected from industries extracting natural resources.

This will probably ring a bell with regular readers. For some time, I've been working with allies to drum up support for something similar here, where we tend to call it a Future Fund. As I mentioned in an earlier post, a political shakeup in the WV House may have helped move that issue along.

In the meantime, here's a view from North Dakota.

IN CASE YOU MISSED IT, here's President Obama's statement on the George Zimmerman verdict.

GREEN SHOOTS. Here's an encouraging story on the local food  movement in WV.

GOAT ROPE ADVISORY LEVEL: ELEVATED