I grew up in a quiet suburb in South Texas, and loved the in-your-faceness of the East Village. In the early days, when I was still unemployed, I'd lie on a bench in Tompkins Square Park perusing the listings in the 'Village Voice' for a place to live.
Mischief springs from the power which the moneyed interest derives from a paper currency which they are able to control, from the multitude of corporations with exclusive privileges... which are employed altogether for their benefit.
Most Americans probably aren't aware that there was a time in this country when tanks and cavalry were massed on Pennsylvania Avenue to chase away the unemployed.
But the minute we went public on the stock market, which is how our wealth was created, it was no longer how many people you employed, it was how much you were worth and how much your company was worth.
As an actress, you're perpetually about to be unemployed. That fear - when you have two parents who worked 9-to-5 jobs and went through periods of being unemployed - is real. Those were not welcome times in my childhood.
In a sense, my job is auditioning. I might not be working, but I never feel unemployed.
I would probably have more in common with a whale than with a bourgeois married couple employed at worthy institutions that I would wipe from the face of the earth if it was given to me to do so.
Our businesses can't create jobs when they're losing revenue, and the unemployed can't apply for jobs when they can't pay their phone bill.
It was tough times in Ohio when we lived there. My dad was between unemployed and just selling random knickknacks at a flea market. My mom was a cashier at a Chinese food restaurant. They both had awesome careers back in Taiwan, and they came here for my sister and I.
The rule for effective governance is simple. It is one Ronald Reagan knew by heart. And one that he successfully employed with Social Security and the Cold War. When there is a problem, you fix it. That is the job you have been sent to do and you cannot wait for someone else to do it for you.
