LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

Limbaugh's Daily Droppings

Having grown up on a Nebraska farm in the 1940s and '50s, I experienced first-hand the good, the bad and the ugly of Midwestern farm life. My father, among other lessons, taught me something about finances.

As acknowledgement of my annual "labor contribution" to the farm (he would be sued today for working me so many hours for so little pay), I was given my own little pig - no stock options, no golden parachutes, just a roof over my head, food to eat and one little pig a year. Oh, and an old galvanized tub to bathe in once a week and an outdoor privy, complete with an old Sears & Roebuck catalogue. (It wasn't for reading.)

As bad as that might sound to today's younger generation, lessons were learned, and one I found particularly interesting. To maximize the farm's cash flow from grain production, our feed yard always had 50 or so cattle in it being fattened for slaughter. They were fed the home-grown grain in large quantities in hopes of maximizing weight gain.

Well, this is where my little pig comes in. Pigs are born with a natural instinct to find food value by rooting around in things with their nose. My little pig was no different, and within days after being put in the fat cattle barnyard was sticking his nose in "daily cow droppings" that contained numerous non-digested hot kernels of corn.

Like clockwork, this was a daily routine. Cow eats corn, little pig waits for droppings, little pig rushes up, sticks his nose in and finds hot kernels and comes up licking his chops and smiling.

It was a way of life, and eventually I cashed out when my little pig became fat and was shipped off to the slaughterhouse.

Perhaps in a strange way, the aforementioned scenario is very similar to what's happening in our society today.

To explain, elected representatives at all levels spend an enormous amount of time at the political feed trough. They consume large amounts of political munchies, get politically fat and, of course, just like the barnyard scenario, droppings are generated on a daily basis.

Lying in wait for those droppings is this generation's version of the fat little pig. Even though this fat little pig appears to be ready for market, he keeps on searching for hot kernels of corn.

The fat little (actually big) pig I refer to is none other than Rush Limbaugh. You'll find old Rush roaming the political barnyard waiting for new droppings. Once dropped, Rush rushes up, sticks his nose in the hot political dung and, from the hot kernels, creates his daily Tokyo Rose-type presentation.

Rush has created an enormous listening audience and to show its appreciation, the kudos crowd gives a collective cheer, buys a tie, a book, a tape and can't wait for tomorrow's daily dose of political droppings.

This munchies to droppings, to spin, to ears cycle has become a way of life for millions of "someone please think for me" folks, and has deprived a whole generation of the pleasure of an independent thinking experience.

With all due respect, it could be called "Lush Slimebaugh Dialogue." Translated, it's LSD and everyone knows LSD is habit-forming and not good for an individual or a country. So if one day "Old Lush" asks you to go to your fridge, get your Kool-Aid and proposes a Jim Jones-style LSD toast, you just say no.

It's not good for you.

Jim Gries

Weeki Wachee

Continued Stupidity

Mr. Weaver, your letter "Buy The Houses" shared your thoughts of a government buyout to reinforce the weakening housing market and provide affordable rental property. Though idealistic, is also very much naive.

The government's trigger-happy approach to spending was what helped contribute to the real estate bubble in the first place. Our own little Hernando County is guilty of it, too.

How many times has government purchased land to build a new school or public works building or even just a park and paid five times its market value?

Their excuse was it was located on prime real estate. Then why was government buying it? Only to take it off the tax rolls?

Then government went about buying up "future sites." Their excuse was they were planning for future growth and expecting prices to go even higher, so they must buy now before they do.

Here's the real deal, they were using our tax dollars to buy land at many times the market value so our property appraiser could come behind and jack up everybody's assessment. Thereby, they raised taxes without having to vote for a tax increase. That gave them increased revenue and enabled them to spend more of our money buying up even more property at inflated prices. All the while, crying that, with the current inflationary cycle and additional costs attributed to planning and developmental research, it required them to increase impact fees and building permits and expand code enforcement.

Government single-handedly and artificially stimulated the market beyond what individuals and developers were willing to pay so they could make a quick buck.

Now that it has burst, we all want government to step in and do more of the same stupid, half-witted measures that got us into this mess in the first place?!

Lorne DeWitt

Brooksville