Ithaca is Gorges In Rear-View Mirror:tribute to the most God-forsaken hell-hole in America

Cornell Review ^ | 5/1/2003 | G. Quentin Mull

[jigsaw]

I'd like a sticker that says:

Ithaca Taxes
Gorge Us.

[friendly]

One of he funniest pieces in ages.

[mvpel]

The Ithaca Hour is fixed at 10 Federal Reserve dollars. Not sure about the specifics of businesses, but there's a web page - Google for "Ithaca Hours" and you should find it.

I think most of the rest of your questions are addressed by the fixed exchange rate between US Dollars and Ithaca Hours.

[Behind Liberal Lines]

I'd like a sticker that says: Ithaca Taxes Gorge Us.

Good idea

[lurky]

Seriesly, why are there so many suicides in those gorgeous gorges?

It seems he's disappeared "Behind Enemy Lines" again...

Here's my theory: 1. reputation for being a real ball grinder. (scuse my french), 2. quick, easy, convenient way to end it all that other schools don't have. It's been years but I remember this one gorge that cuts right thru campus, with a long foot bridge spanning it. And it was a lonnnng way down.

[CaptIsaacDavis]

The exact same moribund culture of disfunction, disease, and death can be found in Rutland VT, Somerville, MA, Boston, MA, Brooklyn, Queens, the Bronx, Berkeley, CA, Portland, OR, Madison, WI, Baltimore, Philadelphia, and on and on. THE CULTURE OF ROT THAT IS INSTITUTIONALIZED STATE SOCIALISM IS SPREADING RAPIDLY. Indeed, there are times when walking the streets of the Bronx or Newark or Philadelphia that it FEELS like walking in Leningrad or Rostov at the depth of the great decay that was Soviet socialism.

[lurky]

interesting.

[StriperSniper]

the questions are endless....

The first one that comes to my mind is, "Is this an arbitrage goldmine?"

[Fixit]

 

Had to dig out the original "Waterfall I," but here goes.

Click for sticker.

[Caesar Soze]

But why would anyone want IH, redeemable at only a few select businesses in Ithaca, when one could be payed in dollars, a currency used throughout the USA and many other places, besides? Local arbitrage or pinning should whittle away most of the difference in value between the two, leaving dollars as the superior currency for just about any use. From the sound of the article, local businesses don't provide all the services and goods that residents need, and a lot of shopping is down out of town. Wouldn't it be embarrassing to be at the head of a long checkout line, open your wallet, and find only Ithaca Hours in there?

[stands2reason]

Moving from Midland Tx to Northern New Mexico made me realize that I wasn't a "liberal/middle-of-the-roader" anymore----I headed back to Texas less than a year later a rabid conservative and much less naive about the world. :-)

[stands2reason]

I did get to meet Paul Kurtz however, which was quite pleasant.

Lucky. I 'd like to shake MG's hand before he kicks, though. I've been a fan of his since I was a little girl. (He wrote a book of poems that I still own.) I don't always take the skeptical hardline when it comes to religion, but I love it when they go after the fakes (J. Edwards, for one bad example). I chose my screenname in honor of skepticism and scientific thought.

[foreverfree]

Bump from a FReeper who drove through Ithaca in 1996.

foreverfree

[Fixit]

(From summer of 1989 or 1990)

[jigsaw]

OMG! You're amazing!

These'll make nice gifts to some local politicians.

Thanks!

[Tribune7]

Pretty good rant.

[mvpel]

But why would anyone want IH, redeemable at only a few select businesses in Ithaca, when one could be payed in dollars, a currency used throughout the USA and many other places, besides?

The online list of businesses at the Ithaca Hours homepage shows 467 different businesses, and they also mention 1,500 businesses are listed in their newsletter.

[Atticus]

Great post! During three years of graduate school at Cornell, I rarely saw a black undergraduate student. They were almost completely segregated into their own special fraternites, "Ujamma" houses, etc. The only exception was when they came out in force to demonstrate about some nonsensical grievance or another.