GRAFT


By Carol Fondiller

So Governor Beige was outspent by Businessman Simonize, by a few gazillion clam shells. But integrity won out and Gov. Beige won by one percent or close to.


Similar figures came out in this off-year election across our Great Nation.

But accurate figures or no, billions of bucks were spent on congressional and governors races.
Much clucking and chin wagging amongst the Punditocracy.

Oh, the cost, the terrible cost. Will we ever again get the likes of ol’ Andy Jackson, Abe Lincoln, or even Harry Truman striding from the wilderness or haberdashery to take the reins of government?
‘Fraid not unless there is a change.

The talking heads and columnists suggest TV is the villain. More debates and for free, more free air time for more gas bags.

Pooh to that say I. Let’s return to our roots.

George Washington did it, so did Grant, Zack Taylor, and Rutherford B. Hayes (another winner by the Electoral College and disputed votes).

Graft and bribery. Get ‘em drunk. Get ‘em to the polls. Get ‘em to vote early and often for your Pol and if you got your neighbor and his dead dog to vote, the local ward healer would see to it that you’d get a job as local postmaster or at the very least a free slide on your next arrest, or if you managed to get enuf dead dogs to vote for your man, a place on the local Planning Commission Board.

I say, bring it back! Bribe! Graft! Actually, it’s here already but the trickle down has dribbled out.

George W. (the one with the wig—father of our country? Yeah, that one) used to treat his constituents to jugs of rum and brandy.

Now they won’t even give you a glass of Gatorade for your vote.

I used to get cookbooks, calendars, pens, pot holders—all with the candidate’s name or motto.
I received a ruler once that had “Joe Doakes Rule of Law.”

I’m not saying I voted solely on the value of the tchotskes I received, but I kept them for a long time and thought kindly of the Republicat who sent me that smashing Jewish calendar.

I’d prefer a measly little sun visor to the plethora of thick glossy campaign so-called literature that stuffed my mail box from September—November.

Bribe me! Bribe with bagels, a cup of coffee, maybe even a coupon for a latte grande at the local Charbucks.
I have no loyalty.

Better yet if I hold a coffee or get-together, and get enough dead dogs to vote, bribe me with a neat little job as Commissioner of the Department of Water and Power. I promise I will prove myself to be incompetent after six month’s time and when threats of jail and suspension loom, I can threaten to sue, be bought off by a six-figure lump sum and forced into retirement on a pension of half of the seven figure salary I was hired at to do the work of the people.

Maybe you could see your way clear to put me on some local housing committee or other, where I could transfer funds from some for-profit housing companies like AIMCO and G and K, to funding scattered site housing for low-income families, or funding the rehabbing of the few remaining SRO (single room occupancy) hotels in urban areas so that people who are on the streets can get off ‘em, instead of being swept away to live under freeway underpasses and arrested by New-Broom Bratton, our new LA Police Chief.

Maybe I could take a leaf from Ollie North’s book, and as he testified before the Iran/Contra hearings, answer to a higher power and skim some bucks from the defense budget (not touching benefits to enlisted forces) or the Federal Bureau of Incompetency (the FBI) and devote those funds to environmental resources and health issues.

I can be bought, and if bought, not only will there be a two-lane bike path down Lincoln Boulevard and Main Street, you’ll be treated to a bowl of rum or hemp. Your choice, or both.
Ol’ George W. (the one with the wig) would have liked that.

Posted: Sun - December 1, 2002 at 04:01 PM          

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