Many Americans are maxing out on their unemployment benefits amid cries from Republicans that they're lazy bums who should get a job. Sure, there's only one job for every five applicants, but the party of tragical Lincoln is also the party of magical thinkin'.
I guess the key is figuring out the few job categories that are growing. Some that come to mind include unemployment counseling, arms manufacturing, and legs manufacturing (for the brave soldiers wounded in a pointless Afghanistan War that Barack Obama shouldn't have escalated).
Then there's temporary work, such as the Census positions that existed earlier this year and the faux-populist positions many Democrats take just prior to elections before reverting to "GOP lite" after elections. Some call it "ignoring the base, energizing the base, ignoring the base," but that might actually be a weird new sporting event at Yankee Stadium.
The only category that seems to guarantee full employment these days is being a right-wing person of color. You know, like Michael Steele, Dinesh D'Souza, Bobby Jindal, Condoleezza Rice, and Newt Gingrich (if he nicked himself shaving). America's ultra-conservatives are so eager to shield their racism that they love having a smattering of non-whites in their ranks. People of color willing to take the un-liberal plunge need never worry about jobs or money.
But how can unemployed liberal whites become qualified for jobs as right-wing people of color? In a controlled experiment last week, one scientist sent some liberal whites to a Tea Party event and other liberal whites to a Woody Guthrie concert. The latter group reported that Guthrie died 43 years ago, while the former group blamed that 1967 event on the "death panels" revealed by Sarah Palin.
Then the scientist put all the liberal whites in a room with the deeply tanned John Boehner and a hockey player from a certain side of the ice. Suddenly, becoming a right-wing person of color seemed achievable.
So no more yapping, "99ers," about your unemployment benefits running out. Become a right-wing person of color, and this land is your land ... of opportunity.
-- In the third-to-last paragraph, I meant to put the word "fictional" in front of "death panels." Because it's a fact that "death panels" are not a fact! --
Actually, I would not be so sure about this alleged fact. It is a matter of public record the U.S. Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services has scheduled a death-panel gathering -- I mean, a Medicare Evidence Development & Coverage Advisory Committee meeting -- on 17 November in an attempt to restrict access to Provenge (sipuleucel-T), a first-in-class immunotherapy for patients with advanced prostate cancer that was approved for marketing by the Food and Drug Administration on 29 April. (I doubt this would have happened to patients with either acquired immunodeficiency syndrome or breast cancer: Verily, this is "No Country for Old Men.")
MugSailingToByzantiumRuith1
P.S.: I share Dave Lieber's appreciation of "[T]he party of tragical Lincoln is also the party of magical thinkin'." So much so, I wish I had written it. But, hey, it is only a matter of time until I do . . .