CONGRESS TERMINATES SALARIES

(Washington) The Senate yesterday passed legislation that effectively ends the practice of paying salaries to elected officials in Congress. The bill, approved by the House Thursday will go to the President’s desk where it is expected to be signed into law before the weekend.

“The only hang-up now could be White House fears that the new approach may affect salaries there,” said Senator Oral Noise (Unitarian-CA), “but we figure Don will go for it. He’s fat and illiterate in Chinese and doesn’t need Congress. Counting evil campaign contributions and keeping an eye on the family are fulltime gigs.”

Although the final stages of negotiations went well the beginnings were a bit shaky.
“At first the Senate was quite willing to ban salaries in the House and likewise that governing agency supported a cessation of pay for Senators,” explained Noise, heir to several dog food fortunes. “Then, after a tedious expose’ on one of those pinheaded network news programs, the public got wind of the goings on and the entire Congress had no other choice than to support the legislation.”

A retraining program, like so many conducted by the benevolent gov’ment, aimed at  placing displaced people in functional positions, has already begun with just two politicians signing up for the gratis program. A large OSHA signs now hangs in the Senate where a painting of Thomas Jefferson was once on display.

A hastily hung OSHA information poster instructs former Congressional freeloaders to buck up and find a real job.  Bi-lingual and a bit blue-collar in nature, the graphic is part of a post-gravy train program that hopes to retrain unskilled workers for a more productive future.

Noise admitted that the media had delivered the death blow and added that he hoped that journalists, especially TV news anchors, would follow suit and end the practice of taking home exorbitant salaries just for looking pretty on the screen.
Washington insiders insist that a sagebrush revolt is already in the works which may result with the abolishment of salaries for any and all elected officials and most appointed ones.

“We could see this wave wash away years of procedure at the state and local level too,” said one analyst. “Then we might even undress the cash cow issue of campaign finance reform.”

Already 80% of the Congress has quit claiming economic hardship.

“Ridiculous!” popped Noise. “These people are all millionaires! What would they be doing if they didn’t sit around in the House or Senate all day, play video games? Play tennis? Drink? I’m staying right here until I see how the lobbyists react to all this.”
The freed-up funds, formerly earmarked for Congressional pockets and exhumed from tax coffers, will now be spent on agricultural research and social rehabilitation programs with a healthy percentage going toward paying off the national debt.

“All this talk about a surplus is a lot of crap,” said Noise, “It’s just more party propaganda like the jaded pledges to fight the drug trade and stale blueprints for upgrading the schools.”

– Kashmir Horseshoe