Friday, October 03, 2008

Saving The Planet With Wooden Arrows, Rum, and Sheep Hair

I'm told there's a financial crisis sweeping the world and that it involves words like "distressed assets" and "mortgage-backed-securities" and "collateralized-debt-obligations" and my favorite, "unclog." Suddenly our elected officials and the omniscient ones talking to us on our television are experts in all of these words. I'm pretty sure the only one they understand is the last one. I've been meaning to write about this and you'll hear more in the coming days, (now that the US Congress is on the job I'm sure the crisis is in our read view mirrors) but I wanted to address a question sent in by another alert reader:

Dear HTF:

Why are there wooden arrows designed for use by children? This sounds dangerous and really should be addressed in the bailout plan. What do you think?

CM


CM, you should run for congress, cuz you're obviously able to "think" the way they "think." (air-quotes intended) What you're referring to are the several NECESSARY MEASURES that were included in the bailout-rescue-Save-the-World bill that passed today. Here are a few items that were key to the passage of the bill, and I am not making this up:

Wooden arrows: This tax break, backed by Oregon's two senators, would benefit an Oregon manufacturer of wooden arrows for children by $2 million over 10 years.

Racetracks: Earmark would allow auto racetrack owners to depreciate their facilities over seven years, saving the industry $100 million over two years. (cuz we ALL need to watch people turning left)

Rum: Offers rum producers in Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands a rebate on excise taxes worth $192 million over two years. (did we really need to bailout rum producers?!)

Wool: Reduces tariffs for U.S. makers of wool fabric that use imported yarn, worth $148 million over five years. The measure was pushed by Reps. Louise Slaughter, D-N.Y., and Melissa Bean, D-Ill. (I guess the US Sheep lobby isn't what it used to be)

Hollywood: Extends a tax break for film and TV companies that keep their production in the United States, worth $478 million over 10 years. The provision was originally pushed by Rep. Diane Watson, D-Los Angeles. (if we're gonna have a depression, we need entertainment more than ever!)

And it's a wonder that EVERYONE I talk to thinks the Congress is run by do-do birds (and that's me being nice to Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi). Both parties are equally do-do-ish on this one, "W" signed the thing this afternoon. Its $700 Billion, so I guess they thought they could sneak these by us out of sheer size. I wish they'd have thrown by mortgage in there. Or at least we could've bought Canada or something.

Anyway, back to your original question -

"Why do children need wooden arrows?"

To shoot at the "adults" running this country.

(click on the image below - also provided by CM, titled "October Madness")

1 comment:

JJ said...

I heard about all the "extra legislation" included in the bill last night when the local news was making fun of it (in a very serious way, of course).

I LOVED this post. A perfect way to sum of the mayhem of the last several weeks and how it came down to "wooden arrows, rum and sheep hair." Certainly we have better things to throw into the bill. Please, tell me we have bigger things to worry about?

Thank you. It's the first time I've laughed about this issue to date.

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