These days, not too much in the news has the power to amuse me, but I laughed out loud when I read that the "Big 3" CEOs from Detroit flew into town on their private jets to make their plea for taxpayer money.
Oops. Maybe the Beverly Hillbillies pickup truck would have been a tad too far in the other direction, but don't you think the big shots might've had more luck in Congress if they had carpooled to Washington in a Ford Escape-Hybrid SUV?
Taking a private jet to ask for a handout is like wearing a 10-carat diamond ring in a soup line. It's kind of a jarring, what's-wrong-with-this-picture moment.
The planned vote on aid to the auto industry has been canceled, as of tonight. Well, too bad, but thankfully some neurons are firing in Washington. Things are tough all over, and probably will be for a very long time. The auto industry has ignored every harbinger of automotive doom in the last 35 years, starting with the 1973 oil embargo. Why should their stupidity, laziness, and/or greed get preferential treatment in the current crisis?
Like most Americans, my retirement fund is down 35%, and there's no place I can go for relief except back to work in the morning. Every morning. For many, many more years. At the rate the economy is sinking, I'll probably be carried out of the copy room one day, feet first...when I'm in my 70s or 80s.
Again like most Americans, I've managed just fine in life without stepping foot on a private jet. Money's never been much of a presence in my life, and it's even less likely to be in the future. But, unlike the Big 3 CEOs, I'm well acquainted with how to run on empty.
