1
1
1
::::::::
"Jolly Old Saint Nick, my ass!" Mel squealed as he desecrated my lawn ornament. Try this Santa on for size!"
"What the hell are you doing?" I said. "That's a revered icon you're rutting!"
"No more corporate sled hauling for me!" Mel screeched. "Try a little of this reindeer revolt!"
"You're no reindeer!" I said. "You're a hog!"
"Hogwash!" Mel cast a malevolent eye. "Look at my harness! I've been reigned in all my life!"
"What do you mean?"
"I used to run with the big bad wolf! Now what am I?--Ball boy with a pigskin! A pointy-headed inflated soul. A metaphor for America. Mandated Medicine? That's not in the Constitution! What is this?--A dictatorship? Mandatory health care is nothing but a big pig farm. And I don't want to hear any fat jokes."
"Fat is what makes us American."
My virtue used to be my fat. Now, every American is fat! No better than cows! And Congressmen are milking us! Even though we're dry! What is our goal?--An Auschwitz full of fat people? At least Lieberman won't have to worry. He don't have an ounce of fat on his miserly frame! Some greedy banker sucked it off! He's nothing but a bitter bag of bones!"
Seriously, don't you want to be healthy?"
"Sure! So some insurance bookie can take my last cent, watch my ass go broke, and end up as bacon bits for the big boys!"
"That's a little cynical. At least we have freedom."
"Don't jingle my bells. America is nothing but a factory farm. First the fast food, next fleece the rubes, then grease the chutes to the slaughter house! Young and old! Everybody goes! Whether they like it or not! It's big money!"
"You're just bitter because you're not a one per-center."
"I played by the rules! I played the game! I stayed in my pen! Now what am I?--Government guinea pig? The health insurance companies are laughing all the way to the bank. We're like aphids on some ant farm!"
"What "s a poor pig to do?"
"Shake this damn corporate monkey off my back!"
"Didn't you used to flog that monkey?"
"Sure, it was easy back then! But this is now! Look around! Nothing but bought-off politicians! Money has corrupted everything! We are basically a banana republic!"
"Mel, I hate to tell you. That's a pineapple."
"Well excuse my downsized, Del Monte, corporate offshore conglomerate fruit! Why don't you go mandate a melon!"
"Mel! Get off that melon! Santa knows who's been naughty!"
"Sorry about Santa's luck!" Mel screeched. "I'm taking the corporate runners off this sled! Ho! Ho! Ho!"
"Mel! You are deplorable! That is revolting!"
"It's a whole new game!" Mel shrieked. "We got the numbers! Hut, hut! We're going long! Whoops!"
I turned away in horror. Democracy, no, revolution can be untidy. But once the dagger is unsheathed, there is no turning back. Justice will prevail, pig in a poke (Congressional Health Plan), or otherwise. Sic semper tyrannis.
Pig in a poke
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Pig-in-a-pokeis an idiomthat refers to a confidence trickoriginating in the Late Middle Ages, when meat was scarce but apparently rats and cats were not.
The scheme entailed the sale of asuckling pigin a poke(bag). The wriggling bag would actually contain a cat (not particularly prized as a source of meat) that was sold to the victim in an unopened bag.
