The Modern Little Red Hen
Condensed from Nation’s Business July 1970
Once upon a time there was a little red hen who scratched about the barnyard until she uncovered some grains of wheat. She called her neighbors and said, “If we plant this wheat, we shall have bread to eat. Who will help me plant it?”
“Not I, “ said the cow.
“Not I, “ said the duck.
“Not I, “ said the pig.
“Not I, “ said the goose.
“Then I will,” said the little red hen, and she did. The wheat grew tall and ripened into golden grain.
“Who will help me reap my wheat”, asked the little red hen.
“Not I,” said the duck.
“Out of my classification,” said the pig.
“I’d lose my seniority,” said the cow.
“I’d lose my unemployment benefits,” said the goose.
“Then I will,” said the little red hen, and she did.
At last, it came time to bake the bread. “Who will help me bake the bread?” asked the little red hen.
“That would be overtime for me,” said the cow.
“I’d lose my welfare benefits,” said the duck.
“I’m a dropout and never learned how,” said the pig.
“If I’m to be the only helper, that’s discrimination,” said the goose.
“Then I will,” said the little red hen. She baked five loaves and held them up for her neighbors to see.
The all wanted some – in fact, demanded a share. But the little red hen said, “No, I can eat the five loaves myself.”
“Excess profits!” yelled the cow.
“Capitalist leech!” cried the duck.
“I demand equal rights!” shouted the goose.
The pig just grunted.
Then they hurriedly painted “unfair” picket signs and marched around, shouting obscenities.
The government agent came and said to the little red hen, “You must not be greedy.”
“But I earned the bread,” said the little red hen.
“Exactly,” agreed the agent. “That is the wonderful free-enterprise system. Anyone in the barnyard can earn as much as he wants. But, under government regulations, the productive workers must divide their product with the idle.”
And they lived happily ever after. But the little red hen’s neighbors wondered why she never again baked bread.
That is priceless! Thank you for posting it. Copying and pasting now...
The Original Version..
The ant busts his ass in the withering heat all summer long, building his house and laying up supplies for the winter. The grasshopper thinks he's a fool and laughs and dances and plays the summer away. Come winter the ant is warm and well fed. The grasshopper has no food or shelter so he dies out in the cold.
The New Liberal Version...
It starts out the same but when winter comes the shivering grasshopper calls a press conference and demands to know why the ant should be allowed to be warm and well fed while others are cold and starving. CBS, NBC, and ABC show up and show pictures of the shivering grasshopper next to film of the ant in his comfortable home with a table filled with food.
America is stunned by the sharp contrast. How can it be, in a country of such wealth that this poor grasshopper is allowed to suffer so? Then a representative of the NAAGB (The National Association of Green Bugs) shows up on Night Line and charges the ant with "Green Bias" and makes the case that the grasshopper is the victim of 30 million years of greenism. Kermit the frog appears on Oprah with the grasshopper and everybody cries when he sings "It's Not Easy Being Green."
Bill and Hillary Clinton make a special guest appearance on the CBS evening news and tell a concerned Dan Rather That they will do everything they can for the grasshopper who has been denied the prosperity he deserves by those who benefited unfairly during the summer, or as Bill refers to it, the "Temperatures Of The 80's".
Finally the EEOC drafts the "Economic Equity and Anti-Greenism Act" RECTRO-ACTIVE to the beginning of the summer. The ant is fined for failing to hire a proportionate number of green bugs and having nothing left to pay his Retro-Active taxes, his home is confiscated by the government.
The story ends as we see the grasshopper finishing up the last bits of the ant's food while the government house he's in....which just happens to be the ant's old house.... crumbles around him since he doesn't know how to maintain it. The ant has disappeared in the snow. And on the TV; which the grasshopper bought by selling most of the ant's food, Bill Clinton is standing before a wildly applauding group of Democrats announcing that a new era of "Fairness" has dawned in America.
THE END
Author Jim Quinn, www.Warroom.com.