Louisiana Voice

By John Sachs

From everything we are hearing, Louisiana faces a terrific budget deficit in the upcoming 2011 fiscal year. The number heard most often is $1.6 billion. It makes a bigger impression when you see it numerically. So here it is. $1,600,000,000. Whew! Kinda takes your breath away, doesn’t it?

A $1.6 billion shortfall would pose quite a dilemma for most states. Most states would 1) quit spending multi-millions on state-owned golf courses, 2) reduce the number of football and basketball coaches at the junior high school through university level to something less than one coach for every player, 3) stop imprisoning for life people caught with so much as a whiff of marijuana residue in their pockets, 4) quit providing legislators with luxury housing for a pittance in rent while at the same time paying them a luxurious per diem, 5) and the list goes on ad nauseum.

Most states would look for reductions by addressing the list above before saying perfunctorily that education and health care will have to shoulder almost all of the cuts. They might, just might, even consider—are you ready for this?—restoring taxes that when cut were the primary cause for the deficit. No new taxes mind you, but just going back to tax rates previously in place that resulted in balanced, deficit-free budgets. Makes one wonder about the validity of supply side, trickle down, Reaganomics.

Cutting education and health care are the fiscal management tactics espoused by our governor. Makes me wonder if rather than majoring in some real world discipline at Oxford, he didn’t study pre-Renaissance fables and lore. I guess that explains why most legislation that he proposes begins “Once upon a time…” and ends with “… lived happily ever after.”

The time has now arrived for me to share with you some serious ciphering that I’ve done regarding this problem. Hang in there now. It ain’t too difficult.

The population of Louisiana, per the 2010 census, was 4,533,372 give or take an illegal Mexican or two rebuilding New Orleans or processing chickens in Farmerville. Therefore, the $1.6 billion deficit equates to $353 per every man, woman and child. And since the governor and legislature won’t dare even consider raising taxes or reducing expenditures on such voter-important matters as football and golf courses, the only way for us to protect our school and medical care programs is to do what we always do in Louisiana when times get rough. Have a bake sale. That’s right, a statewide bake sale. This time we will be selling Pralines and Jambalaya. And once again, Ruston will take the lead in this important endeavor.

Let me explain.

No one makes pralines better than Erma Hudson, and no one prepares better jambalaya than Bill Cox. So it will be these two “saviors” to whom the entire state will turn to bring us over our economic Rubicon. We will give Erma and Bill each a sales goal of $800 million. For Bill, this will equate to 160 million servings at $5 each. When those 160 million servings are divided among all 4,533,000 citizens, it works out to 35 servings per year each. That’s doable. It’s even doable if we exclude babies and Yankees. With them out of the mix, we can still sell enough to reach our goal if everyone will buy just one serving per week all year long.

Now, as to Erma and her goal. If Erma sells her pralines for $1 each, she will need to sell 800 million. However, we already have a problem with a large percentage—say 20%– of our population who suffer with type 2 diabetes and/or morbid obesity. We will excuse them from buying pralines. That leaves about 3,625,000 of us to buy the 800 million pralines. So if each of those folks buys 220 pralines per year, Erma can reach her goal.

I figure that both Bill and Erma will incur a cost for the ingredients of about $50 million each. But in the tradition of all bake sales, the providers of the goodies pay for the ingredients. I know these two folks. $50 million each for Erma and Bill is certainly doable. They are old school and have saved for just such rainy days.

Now I know there will be those who will want to exempt everyone making over $250 thousand per year and the top 2% making over $1 million per year from having to buy their fair share of pralines and jambalaya as they are the ones to whom the rest of us poor schmucks owe our very existence. The typical Louisiana voter will likely be duped into believing this is the case. Our recently elected moral high road U.S. Senator will see to that. But even if we exempt the wealthiest of the wealthy from purchasing their fair share of pralines and jambalaya, I think the rest of us can cover for them.

So, relax. Thanks to my sophisticated grasp of economic realities and my advanced ciphering skills, I, along with Erma and Bill, have this deficit mess pretty much covered.

You’re welcome. I do what I can.

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By John Sachs

Oh golly. What to write about? It seems unfair to ask a novice writer to come up with a commentary for publication on Christmas Eve. All the good, not so good, and just plain awful Christmas theme stories have, for the most part, already been written. At least those that any publication would dare to run. Hopefully Louisiana Voice will tolerate one more kinda off-the-wall version. Mine.

As some of you have gleaned by now, I often think about and view subjects from a somewhat different perspective than many. And the Christmas story for me is no different. I wonder why God chose when, where, how, and yes, even why He sent his son to Earth. This is my take on the matter.

First, I think God is alive in heaven seated on the 50 yard line in the plush seats reserved for college presidents, politicians, or franchise owners which gives Him a really grand view of the game being played on Earth. And He is frustrated. No, actually He is ticked-off. Things are just not going according to plan.

God is watching us on Earth playing the game and darned few of us appear to understand the rules that He gave us to play by, and even fewer are following those rules. And God mutters:

Just look at ‘em. How can they make such a mess of the few simple rules I gave them to play by? Not only that, but I told them what the rules were in every way I knew how to do it. I told them the rules in their native language—and they didn’t pay attention.

Then I got Moses to tell them in spectacular fashion what I wanted them to do. No, not just spectacular fashion, but in miraculous ways. I spoke to Moses through a burning bush that was not consumed by the fire. When Moses told folks that and used a few miracles I gave him to use for emphasis, even that didn’t seem to impress them.

Then again through Moses I gave them 10 important rules to follow that I etched in rock tablets with my own finger—and they didn’t pay attention. By this time I was getting really frustrated, even angry at them. I thought what a bunch of insensitive dolts I’ve created. Maybe the word dumb better describes them.

Then I pulled out all the stops. I went for what I just knew would get their attention. I miraculously sent my own Son to tell them what I expected of them. I named Him Jesus. His name means Salvation and I named Him that so that everyone would understand that to gain salvation they had to do as my boy Jesus instructed. I made His birth itself a miracle.

I raised Him among the very people that He was to teach so that they would feel that He really understood them and could relate to them. I told Him what to say. I taught Him to speak directly and firmly like when He confronted the money changers in the temple. I taught Him to use parables to try and get Our message across. I gave Him some really neat miracles to perform that were sure to give Him credibility at best and at least help Him draw a good crowd at His next show. Maybe I should say … at His next appearance. Whatever.

And I admit that Jesus did a pretty good job of getting My message and rules out there. He made much more progress than Moses did. Of course, I helped Jesus even more than I did Moses so I’m not faulting Moses and his efforts. But still, even to this day, too many folks on Earth either haven’t heard My rules, learned My rules, and certainly aren’t playing by My rules. And I don’t like that, not one bit.

I’m gonna give them a little while longer to hear, learn, and follow My rules. But if they don’t shape up, I’m going to send Jesus back, but not to praise and congratulate them like they think He is going to do. He is going to kick some—well, He is going to get their attention like never before.

All I’m asking is that they love Me with all their heart, soul, and mind and also love their neighbor as much as they love themselves. It’s that simple. Love one another. Quit killing each other. Take care of one another. Don’t be greedy. Smile. And from time-to-time thank Me for what I’ve done for you.

To me, that’s the real Christmas story. And I’m sticking to it!

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