SECTION EIGHT
sm
COLUMN
SIXTY-NINE, MARCH 1, 2002
(Copyright © 2002 Al Aronowitz)
LETTER FROM
NASHVILLE:
CORPORATE WELFARE
Subject:
Panama Comes Home to Christmas in the US of A
Date: Wed, 26 Dec 2001 04:56:52 -0800 (PST)
From: Panama Red <deramanap@yahoo.com>
To: danny finley <dannyfinley@yahoo.com>
Nashville,
TN, December 26, 2001 - - Well, I got back here to Nashville with ALL my little
extended unclear family on Christmas Eve.
Nashville
Airport was almost deserted. The
flight we came in on from Philly had about 14 passengers on a big old 737-300.
By the time we got to Nashville we had been traveling in one form or
another for about 20 hours. Got the kids to bed in a motel here and Patty and I came to
stay in the Sweetheart Penthouse at the Captain Midnight Hilton.
I had had a
letter from my daughter in Connecticut telling me that patriotism seemed to be
up about 400 points, but it didn't prepare me for the actuality of seeing
America On A Wartime Footing. In
the Captain's condo complex alone there are about 20 huge American flags and
various other red white and blue motifs being used this year as a backdrop for
the usual Yuletide decorations.
Went to
Walgreen's today, the only thing open except of course for the Holy Bible
Factory Outlet out by the now-mostly-defunct Opryland. This IS the South, I was
reminded, though why the Bible Factory Outlet would be open even on Christmas
Day must remain forever a mystery. I
am not given to hanging around Bible factories asking questions.
Anyway I went
to Walgreen's to buy some things I had missed in the Netherlands and was
reminded again of how many of my fellow countrymen are more than somewhat
rotund...personally I blame just about every problem we have as a country, from
the rotundity of more than fifty percent of us to the current war, on the
automobile. But other than getting
rid of cars altogether, I have no solution...because since we do not have a flat
country like the Netherlands, I ain't about to be pedaling no bicycle up no hill
dragging MY little rotund butt, either, so I can sympathize.
As a matter
of fact, one of the first things my
But it is very attractive: from now until March or sometime, we can buy a GM product for 0% interest. How are they able to do that? Maybe the billion-dollar
Here's what
a
billion dollars looks like: $1,000,000,000.00
cushion that your government and mine GAVE these Captains of Industry, these
wizards of finance and manufacture, has something to do with Getting America
Rolling Again.
Here's what a
billion dollars looks like: $1,000,000,000.00.
Here's what a billion dollars divided by the approximately 300 million loyal
Americans looks like: $3.33. Well,
that's not much. Right. $3.33 for every man, woman and child in the country to
GM. Then there's the 800 million
dollars ($800,000,000.00) that went to Ford, $2.66 apiece, and of course the 1.2
billion ($1,200,000,000.00) that went to IBM, which works out to a nice even
number, $4.00, for each of us. Hell, that's only ten bucks each, a small price
to pay to Get America Rolling Again.
For those
prigs out there, I realize that I might have gotten the GM and Ford figures
turned around, but the numbers are still the same. Oh, yeah: the industry whose
business could conceivably have been actually hurt by the events of 911, that
is, the airlines, received $66.66 from each of us. The VERY DAY AFTER 911, thanks to the quick-thinking efforts
of airline lobbyist, Mrs. Senator Tom Daschle.
I suppose
that when the other CEOs saw the airlines lining up at the corporate welfare
trough, they figured what the hey, it's the patriotic thing to do. I was thinking about putting my little publishing company,
Panalama Music, forward for a couple of hundred thou at least to Get America
Tapping Its Foot Again. That would
only work out to about 6 cents apiece.
But there were some pretty sharp elbows and large lowered shoulders in black suits at the feeding frenzy already. I'm surprised that a lot of small businesses didn't follow the lead of the corporate giants. Upholsterers could have put in for some bucks to Get America Sitting Again. Serta, Sealy, and Simmons could have requested a bailout to help Get America Sleeping Again. Let's Get America Fishing Again. Let's Get America Playing with Those Little Pegboard Games in Truckstops Again.
Hell, we'd all get rich. ##
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