According to Sam and Jim Commenting on things that irk us off, make us laugh out loud or just seem too weird too believe According to Sam and Jim: Budget Needs Fewer Chiefs

Monday, July 25, 2011

Budget Needs Fewer Chiefs

The Nez Perce have a saying, “White men have too many chiefs.” (The Soul Would Have No Rainbow if the Eyes had no Tears)

The Hopi say, “A people without faith in themselves cannot survive.”

Sam and I wish all our elected mucky-mucks in Washington would take these sayings to heart because we Americans are losing faith in them and in our democratic system. Our chiefs are so busy posturing over the budget that our nation is on the brink of defaulting on its obligations. Our chiefs are so busy trying to hack things out of the budget, the old and the impoverished are going to suffer mightily.

The Navajo have another saying: “You can’t get rich if you look after your relatives properly.” Or put another way, the budget shouldn’t be balanced on the backs of those who can least afford it.

Why don’t we just fix the lottery so the government wins it once in awhile? I mean, what individual or couple really needs $200 million or $500 million? After taxes they only get about half that anyway. But almost all of our government bodies (fed, state, county, and city) could use some “found cash” and they wouldn’t have to pay taxes on it, so they would get to keep the whole caboodle.

I liked the response of the little Cambodian guy, Dung Tran, one of eight meat packers in Lincoln, Nebraska, who pooled money to buy the winning Powerball ticket worth $365 million in 2006. When asked how he felt about winning so much money (even though he had to split it with seven other guys). Mr. Tran smiled real big, looked into the camera and said succinctly, “I happy.”

If we won’t balance the budget or pay for important programs by raising taxes, letting our governments win the lottery occasionally might work. I’d rather blow $5 on some lottery tickets once in awhile to help the government than pay $100 for my car license tabs – or some similar tax - like the City of Seattle is proposing.

Besides, it would be cool if, say the State of Washington won a couple hundred million in the lottery. We could all call our neighbors and relatives in other states and say, “We happy!” We could brag, “I live in Washington. My state just won the Powerball or the Mega Millions. Now we won’t have to lay off teachers.”

We keep talking about the need to save Social Security. Why don’t we put a couple hundred million lottery winnings in that trust account – along with several deadly venomous snakes to keep people from robbing it? Does you city need a new park? Lottery winnings could pay for it. How about that new sewer plant?

Hey! Here’s a totally crazy idea. How about contributing lottery winnings to political candidates who promise in writing that they will cooperate with each other and not act like spoiled NFL or NBA greed mongers? If we had enough money we could even buy a BIG broom and sweep out all politicians who fail to reach timely accords on issues.

Is there an artist out there who could come up with a clean-sweep logo and message that could be tweeted around the country?

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