And as we stand on the edge of darkness
Let our chant fill the void
That others may know

In the land of the night
The ship of the sun
Is drawn by
The grateful dead.

-- Tibetan "Book of the Dead," ca. 4000 BC.

[A computer is] like an Old Testament god, with a lot of rules and no mercy.

The test of our progress is not whether we add more to the abundance of those who have much; it is whether we provide enough for those who have too little.

We used to think of Great Britain, with its castles and peerages, as being the epitome of a class-based society. Today, we far surpass Britain in the disparity of income. That is economically disastrous and morally wrong.

The greatest country, the richest country, is not that which has the most capitalists, monopolists, immense grabbings, vast fortunes, with its sad, sad foil of extreme, degrading, damning poverty, but the land in which there are the most homesteads, freeholds -- where wealth does not show such contrasts high and low, where all men have enough -- a modest living-and no man is made possessor beyond the sane and beautiful necessities.

With half the country in the market, the gap is no longer just between those with incomes going up and those with stagnant incomes. It's between those with a steadily escalating net worth multiplying in the market and those who have little prospect of building any net worth. It makes the separation between haves and have-nots seem more like a division between will-always-haves and won't-ever-haves.

Average wages are beginning to creep up, but beware when you hear the term "average," because the income gap is growing and the top is pulling up the average.

Robert Eaton, co-chairman of my employer, DaimlerChrysler, took home $69 million in total compensation last year. It would take an employee earning $50,000 per year 1,380 years to make that amount. Assuming Mr. Eaton works 60 hours per week, he earns $50,000 in just two and a half hours. Sound absurd? It is.

The US Justice Department reports that no fewer than 6.9 million Americans are under the control of the prison system. That represents 3.2 per cent of the nation's adult population or almost as many people as live in New York City. The US has the world's highest percentage of people in prison compared to any other nation.

First they ignore you... then they laugh at you... then they fight you... then you win.