“If I've told you once, I've told you a hundred times; do not fan the girls when they're wet! But you'll never learn; you'll be a eunuch all your life.” -Lycus
By Mark J. Grant
There are 16 days left before we all shoot over the falls and are plunged into the freezing water. The markets are pretending it will never happen and that some magical incantation will be found to set everything right in the moments before we take the dive. The lethargy is noticeable and the apathy is like someone has thrown the wet towel of complacency over everyone’s shoulders. The crowd meanders. The mob is a headless jumble of people and the clock ticks and ticks and does not stop ticking. The unknown is recognized but like some mindless lemming staring at the cliff I do not think that many understand the gravity of the situation.
There are 16 days left before we all shoot over the falls and are plunged into the freezing water. The markets are pretending it will never happen and that some magical incantation will be found to set everything right in the moments before we take the dive. The lethargy is noticeable and the apathy is like someone has thrown the wet towel of complacency over everyone’s shoulders. The crowd meanders. The mob is a headless jumble of people and the clock ticks and ticks and does not stop ticking. The unknown is recognized but like some mindless lemming staring at the cliff I do not think that many understand the gravity of the situation.
Lycus: “Is it contagious?”
Pseudolus: “Have you ever seen a plague that wasn’t?”
In the best case scenario, according to most people,
some agreement will be reached. I hate to even agree that this is the best case
but this is what almost everyone thinks and so I will go along with it for the
moment. This best case scenario however
includes an assumption that I do not believe will be correct which is that
something formulated by common sense will be the result and it is just there
that I hold little hope. To
be quite open; I am more
frightened of what our political leaders might concoct than what we face at the
cliff. The Democrats cry for more stimulus in a time when we cannot afford
the stimulus and the social programs we now have but “more money” seems to be
the only words in their vocabularies these days. Ok, they can also say “tax the
rich” but it is a limited amount of words that they speak now.
It’s against the law of the United States
to take one’s own life. The penalty is death.
Obama claims a mandate. Who gave him this
mandate one may reasonable ask; the 47.5 million people on food stamps, the
people living on the tax benefits of those that work, the people who game the
system so that they never have to find a job and enjoy a life paid for by those
that are gainfully employed? That is one heck of a mandate isn’t it and yet
that is the basis of his claim.
Given his “claim to fame” then what is it that we should expect if some agreement is, in fact, reached? Well, boys and girls, it is going to be higher taxes, maybe taxing Municipal Bonds, perhaps some new financial transaction tax, maybe a dividend tax or an income tax on interest received but whatever it is it will be designed to make the people that work and make money poorer. It will be Nottingham and the Sherwood Forest and robbing the rich to give to the poor which is a wonderful fairy tale but hardly a logical plan to run the country or perhaps it is a fine way to run the country if your object is to run it aground.
Given his “claim to fame” then what is it that we should expect if some agreement is, in fact, reached? Well, boys and girls, it is going to be higher taxes, maybe taxing Municipal Bonds, perhaps some new financial transaction tax, maybe a dividend tax or an income tax on interest received but whatever it is it will be designed to make the people that work and make money poorer. It will be Nottingham and the Sherwood Forest and robbing the rich to give to the poor which is a wonderful fairy tale but hardly a logical plan to run the country or perhaps it is a fine way to run the country if your object is to run it aground.
Pseudolus: “Calm yourself down. I’ll tell you when it is time to panic.”
Miles Gloriosus: “I smell mischief here.”
Pseudolus: “It’s time!”
I am slowly coming to the opinion that the
best that can be hoped for is that we do plunge off the cliff. Maybe that will
wake up some of the intoxicated with themselves people we now find living in
Washington. It also might have a further benefit of waking up the citizens of
the country who seem to be traipsing around like nothing is amiss. Nothing
is amiss, of course, just ask Nancy Pelosi who will tell you that it is now “a
ms.” The other problem is that our politicians are secretly whispering in the
corridors. They have convinced themselves that even if we do go off the cliff
that there is a tourist stop about half way down where they can stop and ask
for directions. It has gotten so bad now in Washington D.C. that recently when
one of our Democratic Congressmen announced that his wife was going into labor
that the response from the floor was “well, some people have to work.”
Pseudolus: “A common courtesan in the house of Lycus?”
Hero: “Is that bad?”
Pseudolus: “There is no way to make it sound like an achievement.”
I really enjoyed this article. It's got a lot of humor and wit with it that it suits the whole setting perfectly. You always did manage to write great.
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