CM> [.....]
 CM> a criminal to society . do you now how many times a loaf of bread
 CM> is taxed hefore you eat it ? add them up starting with the seeds
 CM> the land used to grow the wheat and farmer who bought the seed
 CM> and sold the wheat, the grainery, the baker,the deliveryman, come
 CM> on please tax tax tax and you pay a buck 25 for a dollars worth
 CM> of taxes . I'm being realistc are you ?(*food for the hungry
 CM> etc.) 
 CM> Charles
 This is interesting.  I didn't know bread was taxed this much!
 Holy toledo.  That's a lot of money going just for taxes.  That
 was my initial reaction.  
 I thought about it a little more and I'm kind of glad they've got
 these big companies and factories and assembly lines that can
 make a loaf of bread so cheaply that after all those taxes get
 added on its still only a buck and a quarter.  I know how much
 work it takes to make a loaf of bread from scratch, and I'm not
 talking about going to the store to buy a bag of flour.  
 
 I'm
 talking about gathering seed, storing it under perfect conditions
 so that it doesn't rot and praying to God it doesn't rot, or the
 rats and mice don't get it all.  I'm talking about preparing the
 earth (no big cutters here) and properly planting and irrigating.
 I'm talking about harvesting with a scythe. I'm talking about the 
 hope that after the grain is cut and bundled that it doesn't rain 
 before you get it stored.  I'm talking about threshing the grain
 by hand and how it hurts because the blisters *under* the callouses
 from scything are now broken open and you don't have a choice but
 to go on because there's no tv, no weatherman to predict when it
 might rain next.  I talking about hoping that on the day you
 do the threshing there's a good wind.  Not too strong, but not
 too light, because you need a perfect breeze to blow the chaff
 and not the grain that you just worked your hands bloody over.
 
 I'm talking about the relief that you've got a mill in a town
 a few miles away and how good it feels that you only have to
 travel a half a day or so, one way, by cow and wagon so you can
 have the grain ground quickly and not by hand.  Praise God!
 And all the while, deep down in your gut you're so scared it's 
 gonna pour and wet the grain and make it useless for milling -
 and, dear God, what are you gonna do if it does...  I'm talking
 about smiling on the outside and joking with a neighbor you
 might meet on the road back and forth to the mill when you
 darn well know he's just as scared deep down like you and his
 guts are tied in a real hard knot, too.
 I'm talking about hail storms and tornadoes.  I'm talking 
 about heavy rains that last for two weeks just before the
 harvest.  I'm talking about surviving all that and you still 
 don't have anything you can eat.
 I used to keep a quarter of an acre in vegetables when my kids
 were still little and you know, I never got an honest to
 gosh callous.  The most I ever got was some thickened skin
 even with all that hoeing and weeding.  And you know, too,
 I thought I worked *really* hard.  Go figure.
 
 I'm thinking I'm glad there's bread out there I can buy and I'm
 sure as heck thinking that I'm even gladder that I can go to the
 store, buy a bag of flour, and bake my own.  I used to.  For years.  
 A bag of flour costs about the same as a loaf of bread, but it 
 makes a lot of loaves.  
 You know something else?  After all this thinking about bread, I've
 decided to buy my favorite at the store on a regular basis now.  
 That's rye bread.  I like the hard rye.  (You know, the kind you 
 can slice yourself so's you can get a nice thick slab and slather 
 it with butter that you didn't have to milk the cow for to get and 
 that you didn't have to churn?)    
 
 As to the taxes on bread, shucks, I don't know for sure one way
 or the other, but I wouldn't mind paying a few cents more so the
 farmer could make a decent living without being subsidized by the
 government.  Kinda makes me think that would bring the taxes down,
 but I've heard that if the government *didn't* subsidize the
 farmers we'd be paying a *lot* more for bread than we are now.
 But, again, I'm not sure about that and maybe I just oughta leave
 the tax and subsidy discussions to others.
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