France, Food, Scooters and More: RANDOM THOUGHTS #11 - SPANKING, BIBLICAL MARRIAGE, GREEK EXIT

SPANKING
A Massachusetts court ruled that spanking is OK.

The experts disagree.

The experts need a good spanking.

BIBLICAL MARRIAGE
The Texas Attorney General has told county clerks that they can refuse to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples on religious grounds. He then provided definitions of the differing roles of wives, concubines, and slaves; issued edicts requiring victims of rape to marry their attackers and requiring widows who failed to produce a male heir to marry their brothers-in-law; and provided guidance to barren women who were willing to have their husband impregnate the family's slave girls.

GREEK EXIT
I will be surprised if the Greeks don't vote for telling the bankers and the oligarchs who control the bankers to go jump in a lake. Having done so, Greece will create its own currency, forgive all public and private debts, and guarantee every citizen who works at least 15 hours a week an income equivalent to the German average, 90 days of paid vacation annually, 40 acres, and a mule.

I kid Greece. Because I love Greece.

Whether or not a NO vote leads to Greece exiting from the euro and the Union will depend on whether or not those same bankers and oligarchs decide which outcome will be most critical to their bottom line, a massive forgiveness of Greek debt or the uncertainty of the consequences of a Greek exit, taking into account the value of the euro and the effect on countries like Italy and Spain whose politicians are watching these events closely and could join Greece if they believe that doing so would solve their internal political and economic problems.

Is a YES vote possible? Of course. But I would be disappointed if the Greeks, having thumbed their noses at the European elite up to this point, settled for going out not with a bang, but a whimper.

Whatever the outcome of the vote, there's more to come. The question of what to do about a burdensome public debt juxtaposed with a corrupt government and an unproductive workforce in a socialist society is not a simple one and it's without simple answers.