Eric:

> >>> I am referring to the people who don't have the money to take care
> >>> of themselves after they retire or lose their jobs.

Kevin:

> >> I wonder whose fault that is.

Eric:

> > Not always theirs.

Kevin:

> Yes, it is.

Kevin's wrong. The world isn't governed by notions of fair play, like a kind
of cricket match with God as umpire (actually even cricket doesn't have much
to do with fair play these days). Shit happens. Kids can get born HIV
positive, able-bodied men can step on landmines, and people can end up
destitute at the end of a lifetime's hard work. *Not* their fault.

Let's take a hypothetical scenario, just one out of thousands that might be
awaiting you. You're a go-getter. You have a million dollars in the bank and
you're pulling in another half a million every year, and you haven't hit
thirty yet. You get married to a woman you love to bits, you have two
beautiful kids. And then one day some psychopath with an assault rifle
spatters their brains all over your plate in between the soup and the main
course. You crack up, you freak out, it's three years before you even begin
to remember who you were, who you might have been (your father's kind of
senile and you have no other close relatives). By then it's too late to do
anything about the fact that your insurance company didn't cough up because
you didn't actually file a claim. You kind of remember you had money in the
bank, but it turns out it all went on "treatment" and when it ran out you
were kicked out into the street. Suddenly, you've become the kind of guy you
used to sneer at - just like they sneer at the "born-to-die" HIV+ kids in
South africa and the "dis-able-bodied" men in Cambodia - a casualty of your
society. (Hey, John Grisham, I hope you're tuned in; I've just given you the
low-down for your next novel!)

Think it can't happen? Live a little more. If even a pale shadow of that
doesn't fall on you, hey, fatcat, bully for you. And bully for all your
"it's their fault" sneering. And if it does...

Well, if it does, maybe, you'll think again. Unfortunately, you won't be in
quite the same kind of position to *influence* things as if it hadn't.

--
John
http://rarebooksinjapan.com