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Jewish World Review March 23, 2001 / 28 Adar, 5761
Julia Gorin
http://www.jewishworldreview.com -- IF, even after Bill Clinton, anyone still has any doubt about the inverse proportion between a politician’s costs to the public and his benefits, now we can be sure. Thanks to Hillary Clinton, California Senator Diane Feinstein has been bumped to second place for most useless politician with most expensive offices. Useless #1 has taken a $514,149-a-year suite in a Manhattan high rise--more than double the $209,532 taxpayers pay for senior senator Chuck Schumer’s office a block away. Useless #2’s is $424,632 a year, in San Francisco, and half the size of #1’s New York offices. All the welfare mothers combined don’t amount to the burden that these two yentas constitute. That’s why you don’t elect a woman to public office. It’s just like with credit cards: You give a woman plastic, and she goes crazy. You elect a woman to public office, and she goes wild. In both cases, you end up regretting it. Although with public office it’s actually worse than with credit cards. Because she’s not just spending money--she’s making a statement of entitlement, so she feels free to spend as much as possible to let you know just how entitled she is. Your money’s going for a good cause, after all: Symbolism. Of female triumph and empowerment. Indeed, look at what a girl can achieve: She can get an education and then an overeducation so that she might become a bigger dependant of the state than she ever was to her parents or husband. But all’s fair in the game of big spending. Since Clinton and Feinstein are there to spend even more money on everyone else, their take is just a drop in the bucket. Give a girl a break. Like everyone did for the first female secretary of state, Madeleine Albright. Blunder after blunder, she was still able to feel good about herself. Because blunder after blunder, women rushed to her defense: Aren’t there enough men in positions of power screwing up the world? It’s time to give a woman a chance! Besides, think how many obstacles she had to overcome to get to a position where she could destabilize the universe. But, according to ABCNEWS.com, Mitch Arkin, of real estate giant Cushman & Wakefield, had this to say in Hillary’s defense. "I don’t think she’s paying too high a rent for the type of building a U.S. senator should be in. She’s like royalty. She’s the ex-president’s wife. She lived in the White House for eight years for crying out loud." In other words, she’s already used to a certain lifestyle that’s already been costing us, so why cut her off now? It doesn’t seem right. And if you make the mistake of giving a dog a potato chip, you should give him the whole bag. Because he wants it. And will keep whining until he gets it. So Arkin actually got the last part right: She lived in the White House for eight years for crying out loud. Now crying loud got her into the Senate.
There are more to come, but so far Clinton’s office has 15 employees and 60
volunteers, the latter being those cost-free people. Always a thrifty way to go
if you’re someone who’s interested in keeping costs down. Especially if you
plan on your costs continuing to outweigh your
03/09/01: IS THAT ALL YOU PEOPLE THINK ABOUT!?
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