Monday, April 14, 2008

Give A Man A Fish

Give a man a fish, and you've fed him for a day.
Teach a man to fish, and you've fed him for a lifetime.
Then, for humanitarian reasons, pay the man for fish, no matter how many fish are rotting in the marketplace, and he'll expect to be paid the same amount for his fish next year.
You'll have lots and lots of fish.
Then restrict, tax, or ban the fish from other countries (to pertect Amurrican jobs), and the man will soon be filthy rich.
So pay the man to not fish, since we need stable fish prices, and this will limit the supply.
The man can then spend every waking hour lobbying Congress to preserve The Amurrican Fishing Industry. And not fishing.

I'm kinda proud of that. If anyone sees flaws, weaknesses, or inaccuracies, please comment below. Written in a hurry, and the syntax is shaky. I want to continue finessing it, and have it done in a Needlepoint Sampler for Christmas.

An outfit called The Badlands Journal has one of the better explanations of the current Farm Bill Fiasco that I've read.
Most of these programs and subsidies were established to support subsistence farmers during The Great Depression. Now they're entitlements for millionaires. Unbelieveable.

One subject that's gotta have further research, a topic that's I've tried to push deeper and deeper into my subconscious, but it keeps bubbling to the top:

My beloved father (now deceased) - who could go off onto some of the most memorable anti-government, anti-welfare Queen, anti-giveaway rants I've ever heard - was a farmer. And a succesful one.

But there's only one way to be succesful in a subsidized, corporate welfare industry.....and that's to be......naw, I don't even want to think about it. This is going to take some time, and a therapist. And a grief counselor.

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