The Department of Free
Years ago, a wiser man
than you or I devised a plan
to dole out goods at zero cost
to those of us whose jobs were lost.
It seemed benign, so nice and kind
the plan grew to include the blind,
the old the lame then you and me,
and they called this plan
The Department of Free.
It started as a helping hand
to needy folks across the land,
so those who could not make ends meet
would not be forced out on the street.
Unemployment benefits
were just a start, because now it’s
free food, free homes, free surgery,
rebates, bailouts, loans — all free.
Now half of us just stand in line
all day long and gripe and whine
about the stuff we feel we’re owed
the list of which has growed and growed.
The line wends hither, the line wends yon,
and by and by it comes upon
a door above which we can see
those magic words:
Department of Free.
Once inside: a shopping spree
of endless handouts: it’s all free!
Drunken on entitlement
we grab a meal, a house, a stent.
The other half? We’re all employed!
Hearing this, you’re overjoyed
to know that at least some of us
have jobs and never cause a fuss.
But one last thing you ought to know,
our economic Alamo:
The place where we all work, you see,
is in the accursed Department of Free!
I push papers,
while he counts beans.
She helps seniors
and they help teens.
It takes a village to raise a child;
it takes a nation to run hog-wild.
Paul pays Peter, and Peter pays Paul,
yet neither makes anything at all.
Round and round the money goes
but where it comes from no one knows.
It all runs out eventually,
can’t simulate prosperity.
The shopping spree was just a dream,
a baseless potlatch Ponzi scheme.
With nothing left to give away,
The Department of Free itself must say,
“We’re all laid off, the end is near.
There’s no point working, even here.”
The last employed man not offshore
has just one more remaining chore:
Switch off the lights
and turn the key
in the broke
Department of Free.
From Medicare and Medicaid
came Medicould and Medishould
now Medimust and we’ve gone bust
we’re trust-fund kids without a trust.
That gave me the chills. Wow. I have goosebumps, for real. Can’t remember the last time that happened, just from reading a poem.
Absolutely flawless, in every way. Not one syllable out of place.
This is the death knell of the welfare state, the eulogy to be read over socialism’s coffin.
[Slow clapping.......]
Spoilsport! Leave our cargo alone!
/ *grin*
There you go, clutching cargo with your pals Spinner and Paddlefoot…
Brilliant, Zombie. Poetry can sometimes communicate a chapter a phrase, and I just read a tome.
Nicely done, zombie.
E.A. Poe would be proud.
Outstanding, zombie!
Sadly, well said.
Hey, it’s all fun and games ’til you run out of other people’s money!
Ayn Rand in the style of Dr. Seuss.
Great stuff, Zombie.
“YES WE CAN” the prophet said,
Republicans to Whigs, good as dead,
I’ll give you jobs, eliminate misery,
We’ll soak the rich and have prosperity.
We are the ones Obama said,
The generation that can be led
To ease the tides and calm the wind
Hope & Change to you I send
Now, two short years gone bye
The promises expose as one big lie
Unemployment has increased big time
Extended compensation on our children’s dime
Obama Care you do not say?
The Chosen says we all must pay!!
Where are the jobs He promised thee
When all I see is misery?
Foreclosures still on the rise
Further leading to our demise
Budget budgeting, waste galore
And Obama has now become the bore
November 2nd is one last chance
Do we choose to give one more pass?
Or will our message finally stick
It’s progressive ass we now must kick?
I almost feel sorry for people who believe in “free” stuff. It’s almost Darwinian, like the “free” cheese in a rat trap.
Our Theme Song
Set to Billy Joel’s “We Didn’t Start The Fire”
OBAMA SHOULD BE FIRED
Socialism, bailout,
acorn helps the pimps out
car dealers get the ax
cronys never pay their tax
Spread the wealth, cut the care
Tax the carbons in the air
Granny gets an early death,
but we pay for every breath
Obama should be fired
Well he sold us change, but he’s acting strange
BP screw up,
Pelicans washed up
Gulf business down the drain
Long vacation up in Maine
Williams Ayres, Jerry wright
Racist if you try to fight
Harry Reid, Pel-o-si
Ruling Classes Tyranny
Obama Should be fired
He may speak for Hope, but your cops a dope
Obama should be fired
He ignores the voters and bows to george Soros
Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac
Nation on the wrong track
Van Jones gets a role
Tarp money down a hole
Landrieux purchase, Husker kickback
Phony deal with Bart Stupak
GM car a no go
Secret deals with Rezko
Calls U. S. a Muslim nation
Runs away from immigration
Foreclosed homes he can’t sell
Turns his back on Israel
Obama should be fired
He can keep the change, Congress will be rearranged
It’s so . . . rhymey. Almost like a poem but without the, you know, insight and emotional impact and truth and benefit to reader and humankind. But the rhymey stuff, wow, you must have spend literally minutes on rhymezone.
Hey Sensi,
first you heard that the plane of plenty will never land. Which was already to much for a cargo cultist like you.
But that the Department of Free will be closed soon seems to bring you to the point of nervous breakdown.
Try harder to be funny and superior. Maybe it helps.
Truth hurts, huh, Sensei.
Apparently, the message is above your level of intellect?
Oh no! He missed a comma!
Seriously?
So YS, we now know that you missed all the insight, emotional impact, truth, and benefit, and focused on the rhymey parts.
To me, that’s like commenting on your filet mignon and complaining that the ketchup was too “tomatoey”…
But I digress…
You sound elitist.
Rhyme is the stuff of sagas—the stuff of heroic poetry, the poetry of love, of humor; of the consequential, and of the inconsequential. Rhyme is a mnemonic; rhyme is a pleasure. Rhyme is the dance of language, and anyone may tread the measure.
It is only the mere-meter old maids, shooting blank-verse blanks, who disapprove of rhyme. They have attempted to fence off the lush, rolling range of rhyme, and make of verse an arid academic terrarium.
Terrific effort .. brings tears of laughter to the eyes.
When you give 99weeks of UI, no one will try for a job. When 26wks. was the normal, you betcha, people would take any job. But as the small business has no idea what OslumusCare and their tax bill will be, 99wks looks pretty good to those Fanny/Freddie WalMart layoff workers. Just forclose and collect the rewards. Ranting stinks, but what can we do? Make those Swiss/Camen secret accounts, expose who owns them. Franks,Dode,Pablome,Bushes ect.ect…. Bin Ladden as the world is laughing at us. Vote an American Independant Indian in office 2012. Least we will claim to finaly give them back what ALL us color people took. And the Mexican is our new slave labor, Africans could never keep up with.
Sick of the USSofA, I’m moving to PRico since they all came here!!!
Nice poem Zombie.
I predict this will become a classic, to be quoted far and wide.
from a hymn sung at my church.
for life is not what we possess
the many tokens of our success
the goods we hoard extend their rule
become our God and we the fool
what will we do should death arrive
who will get the things for which we strive
See update above: now available in audio! Thanks to Scott Baker for the dramatic reading.
Very good, Zombie. It is kind of Dr. Seuss-like, but this poem also reminds me of “The Gods of the Copybook Headings” by Rudyard Kipling. I won’t quote the whole poem, but here are a few selected lines:
“As I pass through my incarnations in every age and race,
I make my proper prostrations to the Gods of the Market-Place.
Peering through reverent fingers I watch them flourish and fall,
And the Gods of the Copybook Headings, I notice, outlast them all.
…
“In the Carboniferous Epoch we were promised abundance for all,
By robbing selected Peter to pay for collective Paul;
But, though we had plenty of money, there was nothing our money could buy,
And the Gods of the Copybook Headings said: ‘If you don’t work you die.’
Here is a link to the full poem:
http://www.kipling.org.uk/poems_copybook.htm
Thanks! Never saw Kipling’s poem until now. Amazing historical parallel!