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M. Houghtaling - 2 / 28/ 2001
I'm sitting here reading the transcript of President Bush's most excellent State of the Union address, while listening to left-wing elements slamming the president's budget plan. What keeps coming to mind is...parrots.
Imagine a pet shop which specializes in selling talking birds. All the birds have been trained to say the same thing. Whenever a potential customer walks into the shop, all the birds begin talking at once, repeating the repertoire that they have been so carefully taught: "the tax cut will only benefit the wealthiest 1%!" "There's no way Bush can pay for his budget plan!" "Deficits will rise!" "He'll steal money from___ (Social Security, Medicare, whatever)!" "School vouchers will ruin our educational system!" Etc, etc.
These parrots even imitate voices. The customer can pick out the voices of Tom Daschle and Ted Kennedy. There's the voice of Jesse Jackson; in itself reminiscent of Martin Luther King Jr. ( a coincidence, of course ).
The shopkeeper expects these parrots to sell themselves - a good business practice, since who can resist the appeal of a talking head...I mean...parrot? Of course, a successful business is dependent on how many customers are buying what the shopkeeper is selling. The parrots can't tell the customer why they say what they've been taught to say. At least birds have an excuse: they don't understand politics. A well-informed customer, i.e.: a customer who makes a point of knowing his parrots, reserves the option to buy the parrot. Or not.
The same goes for politics. It is up to us, the customers to whom politicians are trying to sell themselves, to be well informed. As P.T. Barnum used to say, "There's a sucker born every minute." The customer isn't buying the product, so much as the sales pitch itself. Therefore, an uninformed customer is a good mark for a dishonest salesman. He's easily sold shoddy merchandise with even the most transparent spiel. These customers usually find out (too late) that they've been taken, and they shout angrily at the salesman and want their money...or their vote back.
A dishonest politician, like a shyster salesman, needs as many of these uninformed customers as they can gather together. So what if the customer is angry. Give 'em a free pot holder. Give 'em another speil. Let 'em walk away happy again after selling them another armload of shoddy merchandise that they'll never need.
Well informed customers, on the other hand, thoroughly research the item they want to buy. They compare quality, price tags and warrantees. These customers are harder to take for the proverbial ride than the sucker.
So, which do you want to be: the sucker bragging about the junk he bought, or the guy laughing at him because he just bought the better brand of the same product - for half the price? The choice is yours.
The next time you walk into a voting booth - or a pet shop - or turn on the TV news, remember: know your politics...and your parrots.