Money for Nothing....

“Look at that, look at that, money for nothing and chicks for free, easy, easy…." Dire Straits, Grammy Winner, 1985

“Cash for Clunkers”…what a concept, money for nothing!

America, c. 2009, and the ugly regime of totalitarianism has flung the closet door open and invaded the psychic body politic. No more work, just show up with your clunker, get $4,500 free.

You know the drill: limp your gas-guzzler down to the local Government Motors showroom, swap that perfectly debt-free junk for a big note payment for a sissy-looking hybrid that emasculates your gender. That’s right, trade off that big, wide front seat with precious memories for hands-off bucket seats. I dare you…lose your identity and look like everybody else. Is that what you really want?

Think of what you’re giving up for a measly pittance…a real 8-cylinder, fuel-injected five-in-the-floor 0-60 in 5 seconds engine with straight pipes and 112 octane testosterone ~ a ride that will burn Mr. Firestone’s rubber off the tires before you hit the County line or third gear. Will you give this up?

This insidious stimulus program, dreamed up by the Orwellian Congressional androids, seems harmless on the surface, just like its relatively insignificant cost of $2 billion when compared with the $6.6 trillion of debt The Treasury has printed this year. Read between the lines here. Allow me to explain a contrarian’s cynical viewpoint.

First, the real definition of “clunker” is “an old, run-down vehicle or machine, a thing totally unsuccessful and irrelevant.” Think of the applications here! A clunker-owner for the “bad-enough-for-cash” list has to be eligible…the gas-guzzler for “clunker-cutoff” is 18 mpg. Over that, you get lucky.

The calculus used to make these determinations is as imprecise and useless as algebra is to a country boy. Government statisticians can only get to a plus-minus 92.11567% standard of accuracy, having reduced the possibilities down to what an 18 mpg equivalency is, reductio ad absurdum.

What is it? Well, a 6” movement is .0001 mile. At 18 mpg it will burn ½ drop of petrol, and there currently are 117,064 billion gallons of recoverable oil reserves on the African continent alone. The US population is 307,085,556 (oops, now 557). Knock yourself out with the multiple algorithmic iterations this will produce.

This hypocrisy is like “straining at a gnat and swallowing a camel.” Yet this is what we seem to be doing in the US. We throw good money out to incentivize a short-lived sugar high. Will the country benefit from an aura of affluence while living under the veneer of verisimilitude? Plus, there’re significant downside effects.

Your clunker will soon end up with the other 250,000 rusting carcasses in the car graveyard. The junkyard mortician will have administered a lethal slug of sodium silicate which, like acid, will eat the guts and memories of the once-proud reminder of America’s automotive prowess. Moreover, 164,000 “shade-tree” mechanics will be on welfare, or dope, and 4.5 million people in the auto-repair trade will be homeless and on free health care and food stamps ~ angry, armed and dangerous! Really, do you want to be part of that?

Of course, only a scoffer of on-the-surface panaceas can find real meaning written between the lines of this stimulus bill. Word is that in the proposed universal health bill there’s a requirement that all citizens 65 and older be required to consult with a physician regularly for some sort of “health assessment.” Is it becoming clearer now?

Soon you’ll be evaluated by contrived statistical analysis to determine what treatment, if any, will be available for your clunker body. And believe me, if you are not relevant, you can kiss your new hip, knee or heart goodbye. No, you will be offered some derisory stipend to take “early retirement” with some sodium silicate on the side. The economic highway has no room for irrelevant Medicare blood suckers.

No sir, I’ll not sell the soul of my ‘88 Benz, that Thoroughbred 560 SL! It will die of natural causes, sitting in its proverbial pasture, lookin’ good, grazing on its own memories and speaking always of its glory days.

Money for Nothing? I don’t think so. May you have the same courage!


Bud Hearn
August 6, 2009