Letter from Sally Druthers — July 22, 2009

www.thornwalker.com/ditch/sally_03.htm


 

 

Dear Nick ...

An unrequired, unmandated
letter from Sally Druthers

on how Strakon was so RIGHT about Mr. Obama
 

July 22, 2009

Dear Nick —

Last year I was doubtful when you were writing about the election and came out for Mr. Obama. I thought maybe you were letting the crimes of the Republicans affect your judgment, but I see now that you were right.

We are just so lucky: Americans always seem to be able to vote the right guy into office, no matter what. And this president is more than we could ever have hoped for: intelligent, wise, far-seeing. And compassionate. What a heart he must have!

But what was not so obvious back in November and what is becoming ever more indubitable is that he has a capacity for seeing through complexity to capture that golden nugget, that shimmering kernel of simplicity, the very soul of truth.

I'm referring, of course, to his health-care plan. There are so many aspects of it that almost anyone could have come up with. But only Mr. Obama has seen the solution — the solution that was there in front of us all the time — to the problem of the uninsured: the public option and the requirement that everyone have insurance.

I think of myself as a smart person, but never in a million years would I have come up with that idea. And the brilliance of it lies not just in how it solves the problem of the uninsured: it has application to so many other social problems.

For example, think of the unemployed. This man, dare I say, this more than a man, has shown us the way to solve the centuries-old problem of poor people who can't find a job. All we need is to legislate that all the unemployed must have a job. And there will be a public option for work so that no one will ever again have to endure the embarrassment, indeed the shame, of going to an unemployment office and filling out all those forms and making up all those stories about interviews.

In fact, all the unemployment offices can now be closed, because they will no longer be needed. Of course, that means that the people who worked in them will be unemployed, but not for long. They will just obey the law and go to the public-option work center if they can't find jobs. And then ... and then ... oh, I am so excited that I can hardly breathe — that's what this president does to me — and then employers will no longer have to pay the unemployment tax.

Just think of all the money they will save! And no more unemployment benefits will ever have to be mailed out. That money alone will go a long way to paying for the health-care plan. And employers will now have more money available to them to invest. And they can use it to hire some of the people from the unemployment office. Why, I'm surprised that the economy hasn't started roaring back just at the very idea.

Then there's the homeless. They should be required to live somewhere instead of making us all feel bad and uncomfortable when we see them on grates or begging for money and you just know they're not going to spend it on anything nutritious like acai berries, but instead on something that will just give them clogged arteries in 30 or 40 years. But with their new homes, they can stay home and use blenders to make healthy vegetable drinks. And the government will just create public-option housing for the ones who can't find anything in a good neighborhood.

OMG! Nick! There doesn't have to be hunger anymore! People can at last be required to eat. If they can't afford to buy food, they can eat at the public-option cafeteria with the unemployment-office people. And some of the unemployment-office people can be working there, too! It all just falls into place, like some nifty Sudoku.

What I can't figure out, though, is why Mr. Obama hasn't mentioned any of these other applications. After all, they're all pretty obvious. He's done the hard part of coming up with the idea in the first place. Maybe it's just that there's a problem with timing. I'm always hearing that things people are doing aren't really wrong, but that the timing is just wrong.

Finally, Nick, I want to mention an application that I know will be dear to your heart. Because every election year you talk about voting, and I know that it breaks your heart that so many people aren't represented because they never manage to get out and vote. Some of them aren't sure whom to vote for, and some of them just don't like the candidates who are running and don't know where to turn. I'll bet they would all vote if there was a party for them to vote for. So we can now mandate that everyone vote, and people who don't like any of the major-party candidates or who are undecided can now vote for the Public-Option Party candidate. I'm sure there won't be any problem finding Public-Option Party candidates for all the open offices — you know, federal, state, local, and PTA. That's something else all those unemployment-office people can do.

There can be a public-option church for people who are confused about whether to worship Isis or Buddha or Kali. And public-option escort services for people who have a hard time making friends.

Now you might think that there's still the problem of people who won't sign up for the various public options, because there are always a few scofflaws everywhere. But I figure the easiest and least violent way to deal with them is to let their Bush-era tax cuts expire. That way there will be tax incentives to obey the new laws.

With all these intractable social problems solved, at last we can set about the business of making this a free country again. I'm just dizzy from the thought of it all. And I know that you'll probably be turning out other applications yourself. So I'll be popping by the Website every so often to see what you're up to.

All my love (well, not all of it,
because there has to be some for
the less-fortunate in the world.
But you know what I mean),

Sally
 

Strakon sputters a reply

I — I — I didn't — I wasn't — ahem. What I mean to say is, this is no more than I deserve for declaring a rooting interest, even a quarter-hearted one, in the late election for Emperor. These days I wonder whether a President McCain could possibly have been a worse enemy of civilization and all humanity than Barack Obama, even if der alte Feldmarschall, with Joe Lieberman and Randy Scheunemann whispering deviltry into his hairy ears, had by now set Our Boys (and Wymyn) slogging forward on the long roads to Moscow and Teheran.

I thank Miss Druthers for teaching me when, and about what, I'd better keep my mouth shut.

I thank her also for her brilliant cartography, in mapping out the road to ser – uh, freedom, rightly understood, that we have been given the opportunity to march down, dodging the occasional deposits of unicorn poop as The One rides boldly before us.

© 2009 WTM Enterprises. All rights reserved.
 

An earlier communique
from Miss Druthers

(October 2004)
 
A still earlier communique
from Miss Druthers

(October 2003)


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