A Few Minutes with the Mayor – April 2019

Why is it, the older one gets, the more difficult it is to remember recent events while the easier it is to remember something in the distant past? I guess this is true for almost everyone except maybe politicians who, when faced with questions about the present or the past, remember none of it. They seem to wear special glasses which filter out visions of the past. I haven’t a clue where one can find these glasses but they seem standard equipment in our nation’s capital.

Then there’s broadcast television. Cable companies such as FOX, CNN, and MSNBC, all appear to operate under the assumption we’re all not only old, but senile as well. There seems to be no limit to how often a story may be repeated. I know this is true because we had one of these channels on all day when my wife was under the weather and resting at home. By nine o’clock at night my brain was blubbery and my IQ down to the level of a Neanderthal. Every channel, liberal or conservative, repeated the words Trump, Pelosi, Schumer, Sanders, and several others for what may have been thousands of times over the course of a day. It was almost nightmarish. It was so bad I actually looked forward to one of those drug commercials with a list of side effects longer than the promotion for the drug.

What a small world these broadcast people live in! And what big money they earn! Bret Baier makes 7 million a year. Morning Joe Scarborough makes 8 million per year. That’s a lot of cabbage for reading copy or spouting one’s opinion. That’s why it’s kind of odd when these pundits criticize wealthy people. I guess it all depends upon what porthole you’re looking out of. Some people are near the engine room and some few are in the top deck.

Members of Congress know all about that top deck. They fly free whenever and wherever. Just Imagine! South, North, East or West, no trip is too far. Some fly coast-to-coast every weekend… and why not? It’s on our money!

For those who just can’t get away for the weekend, there’s a free gym for workouts to compensate for all the time spent sitting with lobbyists more than willing to pick up dining tabs. For those too frail to use the gym there’s always free health care. Even with all these perks, if they’re unable to keep up with the job, there’s always one and a quarter million dollars a year to spend on whatever staff they hire. The employment rate for chauffeurs must be higher in Washington DC even when compared to Oscar nights in Hollywood.

Imagine never needing cash in your pocket! It’s as if these people had a giant debit card reaching right into the Treasury where our money is stored from all those taxes we pay. Even so, for those who may need cash to pay for activities best left in the cupboard, let’s consider their annual salary of $174,000. Everyone gets the same salary no matter how seldom they visit their office. No wonder some of them think socialism works! They have income redistribution down to a science within their own little world. Now one of them even wants to pay people for not working! In any event, add up all the income, the perks, the benefits, and the gratuities and it is indeed a lot of cabbage.

They love to stand up in front of all of us and talk about the “plight of poor people.” It’s a mystery as to what makes them “poor people” experts, given that the total wealth of the last Congress was at least $2.43 billion. That’s with a B.

Of course, we keep electing them! They can find more ways to convince us they mean to help us than a snake oil peddler promising how their oil will cure our gout. The fact that they’re worth five times as much as the average American voting for them, explains why even if we’re all sailing on the same boat, they’re the ones on the top deck. No wonder they want bigger government. My, don’t those deck chairs look comfortable in the noonday sun!