I grew up in Southern West Virginia in the 1950s to the mid 60’s. Out houses were more common than indoor facilities. They were freestanding buildings sitting on top of a hole in the ground and prime for Halloween pranks. Inevitably, our roving band of 10-12 year olds would tip some of them over on Halloween night. More deviously, however, for those who truly deserved our attention, we would pick some up and move them behind the hole. Late night or early morning visits by the deserving, yet unsuspecting, could be an adventure – a breath taking adventure. If you were ornery with us sometime during the year, we remembered you on Halloween night. I guess we were the stinking terrorists of our time.
The difference between us kids and Washington politicians is that we did not pretend that our intent was something other than causing people to step into a crap filled hole in the ground. We wanted them to do that otherwise there was no point to our mischief. Washington’s collection of con-artists try to convince the people that the hole is filled with rose petals and rolling around in it is nothing short of blissful utopia, unlike anything the senses could possibly imagine. What is in the hole, they insist, is so wonderful that all Americans must take a voluntary dip into it because it is simply what is best for them and the country. This is how we end up with government run health care and other grand social chicanery.
In the steep hills and hollows of Southern West Virginia, you can find generations who are enslaved by this kind of thinking. Political shenanigans keep the voting block on the public dole. It is not unlike some of our nation’s liberally run cities with which you are probably more familiar. They too have generations living on the public dole. It is an industry that takes, but does not return anything to the society that supports it. Its benefactors then are told to demand that the rest of us pay a fair share. Clearly the 53 percent of us who actually pay do not pay enough. The television cameras do not show up to broadcast the plight of Southern Wild and Wonderful to the nation as they might do with run down and dilapidated dumps like Detroit. Even if they did, greedy rich people would be blamed and not the guilty corrupt, quasi communist politicians and people who refuse to take charge of their own lives.
What little prosperity there is in that part of my beloved state is now threatened by the liberal war on coal production, which is also a war on the payrolls that support the state’s economy and provides tax revenues. Not surprisingly, the Democrat politicians from our state’s political families, whose unshakable loyalty to the party and its leaders who have worked hard to increase the size of the dung hole, now run public service ads declaring how hard they are fighting against the people who want to destroy the coal industry. When you hear it, it is enough to make you shoot the coffee you might be drinking right out of your nose. On the enslaved who continually vote them back into office, it is a con that obviously works well.
Obama Tightens Screw on America’s Coal Supply
Nearly half of Americans do not pay any taxes now. More are also on food stamps than ever before. There appears no end to unemployment benefits – for those who actually had a job once. Our major entitlement programs cannot continue in their current form. Your government check is underwritten by red China. There is your rose-petalled utopia – maybe trimmed in Chinese jade. Swell, is it not? Just for a bonus here in wild and wonderful there is a lawyer advertising on the television during every commercial break. Let us sue a car insurance company for you. Let us sue your doctor for you. Let us sue the company or coal mine that gave you a job. Let us sue the government entitlement programs, just choose one. “Let us get you the money you deserve.” Just call Dewie, Cheatem and Howe, Attorneys at law. Yes sir. Let us fill your hole up with rose petals.
Well mountain people and the rest of America, you are not getting any rose petals. Sorry, it just does not work out that way. Those go to the politicians and leach lawyers, which are interchangeable. You may get the thorny stick that the rose was on and possibly a spot in the dung hole. If I were you, I would just go occupy something and make some people pay, but not the outhouse. It is Halloween after all. Or, you can pull yourself up out of that hole. Your choice – for now.
Trick or treat?
©2011