Overheard Starbuck

"There wouldn't be a gay rights movement in America if prostitution was legal."
---"You mean gay activism would be different?"
"No. I'm saying prostitution is the fuel and prostitutes are the front-line soldiers for every major social advance gays (and many women) have made in America during the past sixty years."
---"You're nuts, you know that?"
"The idea came to me first thing in the morning."
---"And you thought I could decipher it?"
"Gays are a small group with a huge media presence. The number of news items and reports about gay issues rival the Israelis."
---"Gays are passionate about their rights."
"And most everyone I know gay, Jewish or otherwise are passionate about wages, job benefits and affordable medical insurance."
---"Do you know what editorial bias is?"

"Do you have the feeling that because of America's special relationship with corporations that more of our country's controlled by foreign interests then the smaller European countries and former Asian kingdoms where for thousands of years people fought and died over their rights and the land? America's founding fathers, after killing off the local residents like vermin, had stolen the land created a massive slave economy and began trading and selling every natural resource in sight--including the places on which they stood?"
---"'Bang the drum slowly'". ...And hundreds of years later you imagine hookers are playing a role? ---You're fantacizing people are now being exploited, like Amerca's natural resources!"

"She's not demented, she's more likely going deaf."
---"Is there medication for that? She's getting pills for alzheimers--they're expensive."
"You should get a second opinion; maybe take her to an ear specialist?"
---"She's already got a doctor. Medicare's paying for most of the costs."
"Idiot."
---"She's my Grandmother and we want nothing but the best for her."

"Her art pieces were so exquisite, so perfect she could call them anything. Her latest work she titled 'Protest'. --And everyone went, 'Yes! Yes. Protest. We see it--excellent.'"

"When Native American and other spokespeople appear on tv and use the phrase 'our people', you ever stop to think what's involved in the use of that term? How does the media know he or she speaks for the people?"

"How has a system failed you today? --Lately I've noticed that shop-keepers, clerks, messengers, repair-people, waiters and other service workers have gotten more efficient, more reliable, less cringeworthy. The stereotype of the no-nothing/care-less corporate lackey has all but disappeared."
---"You've been working customer-relations for how long now?"
"It's the machines, the devices I expect trouble from. The hand-held electronics everyone now uses are the causes of more problems, more anxiety, then the people using them."
---"You've become a people-person!"

"How have you failed to efficiently use a system today?"

"It's almost like not being in a cult at all."