The Library
Ah, the library. I was writing the other day about how I’m frequently trying to find book recommendations before I go to the library. It occurred to me that there are people (possibly even some of my 12.67 readers) that haven’t darkened the door of their local library in years.
I want to encourage you to go to the library! Statistically speaking, we’re all buying fewer books. By and large, we’ve replaced books with digital media (tv, the internet, etc)… but the quality of the content we’re consuming is definitely in a downward spiral. 30 minutes consuming even good fare on blogs is seldom the equivalent of, say, 30 minutes reading 1919, Mere Christianity, or even the King of Torts (Grisham pulp).
Libraries are these bizarre repositories of publicly owned books, available for free (well, for your tax dollars, but it feels free). You can learn a lot by spending a little time in your library’s aisles. You can expand the breadth and depth of your reading. You can be exposed to ideas you’d never otherwise come across. How is this a bad plan? Go to the library!
governments shouldn’t be building and operating book repositories, pools, ice rinks, or anything of the like.
although i think schools should have these things…so i guess it all ends up coming from the same pot anyway (my pocket).
/2cents.
Gurr… I’d agree, actually, on that principle. I think you raise an even better question: should government be operating schools? Could we instead do these things at a local level, with local taxation, and achieve better results?
The problem with all of this in 2010 is that there are few politicians of any stripe who are concerned with anything other than the status quo. We persist in electing pansies from all sides who don’t know how to debate good ideas or how to kill bad ones. /2cents + 2cents = 4cents?