You know, I say, "All hail the cranks of America, who are willing to put almost anything they encounter in the world on trial and find it guilty of destroying society!" But if I could offer a word of advice: maybe stop short of actually yelling at children, to make them feel bad about themselves. But that's exactly what Chicago Sun-Times columnist Terry Savage has done, and she apparently wants a medal for it.
See, Terry was driving around her "upscale neighborhood" over the holiday weekend, when she encountered some of the upscale neighborhood children at a lemonade stand. And apparently, she has some sort of personal "rule" that compels her to always stop and get some lemonade, because of her unquenchable thirst for citrus or something. But, as it turned out, the three little girls at the stand were just straight up giving away the lemonade for free. And thus began the tirade!
I sat in the back seat in shock. Free? My brother questioned them again: "But you have to charge something? What should I pay for a lemonade? I'm really thirsty!"
His fiancee smiled and commented, "Isn't that cute. They have the spirit of giving."
That really set me off, as my regular readers can imagine.
"No!" I exclaimed from the back seat. "That's not the spirit of giving. You can only really give when you give something you own. They're giving away their parents' things -- the lemonade, cups, candy. It's not theirs to give."
So that's when Savage decided the time had come for her to "set them straight."
"You must charge something for the lemonade," I explained. "That's the whole point of a lemonade stand. You figure out your costs -- how much the lemonade costs, and the cups -- and then you charge a little more than what it costs you, so you can make money. Then you can buy more stuff, and make more lemonade, and sell it and make more money."
Anyway, the little girls, undeterred by the confusing anger being thrown their way because they decided to do something nice, held to their argument: "On the other hand, here's some lemonade, for free, growling stranger!" And so, Savage's conclusion is that "America is getting it all wrong when it comes to government, and taxes, and policy" and that the "children of America" now "think there's a free lunch waiting," and now "our country has larger problems ahead."
Indeed, that these three children might grow up willing to give someone a lemonade is just terrible! The world is ruined! It makes me wonder what I was thinking, all those times I've used my own jumper cables to help people get their car started, for free. I could have been earning a living, I guess!
Anyway, what's Savage doing riding around in the "back seat" of her brother's car? I bet she just thinks someone is going to show up at her whim and give her a free ride everywhere! (Maybe she was just really, staggeringly soused? Which would explain the whole yelling at random little girls like a maniac thing?)
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