Catching Wild Pigs

[Jonette]

======Catching Wild Pigs======



There was a chemistry professor in a large college that had some exchange students in the class.  One day while the class was in the lab the professor noticed one young man, an exchange student, who kept rubbing his back, and stretching as if his back hurt.





The professor asked the young man what was the matter.  The student told him he had a bullet lodged in his back.  He had been shot while fighting communists in his native country who were trying to overthrow his country's government and install a communist government.




In the midst of his story he looked at the professor and asked a strange question.





He asked, "Do you know how to catch wild pigs?'"





The professor thought it was a joke and asked for the punch line.  The young man said this was no joke.





"You catch wild pigs by finding a suitable place in the woods and putting corn on the ground.  The pigs find it and begin to come everyday to eat the free corn.  When they are used to coming every day, you put a fence down one side of the place where they are used to coming.  When they get used to the fence, they begin to eat the corn again and you put up another side of the fence.  They get used to that and start to eat again. You continue until you have all four sides of the fence up with a gate in the last side.   The pigs that are used to the free corn start to come through the gate to eat, and then you slam the gate on them and catch the whole herd."


"Suddenly the wild pigs have lost their freedom.  They run around and around inside the fence, but they are caught.  Soon they go back to eating the free corn.  They are so used to it that they have forgotten how to forage in the woods for themselves, so they accept their captivity."





The young man then told the professor that is exactly what he sees happening to America.  The government keeps pushing us toward socialism and keeps spreading the free corn out in the form of programs such as supplemental income, tax credit for unearned income, tobacco subsidies, dairy subsidies, payments not to plant crops (CRP), welfare, medicine, drugs, etc, etc, etc., while we continue to lose our freedoms - just a little at a time.





One should always remember:  There is no such thing as a free lunch!  Also, a politician will never provide a service for you cheaper than you can do it yourself.





So, if you see that all of this wonderful government "help" is a problem confronting the future of democracy in America, you might want to send this on to your friends.  If you think the free ride is essential to your way of life then you will probably delete this email, but God help you when the gate slams shut!



In this "very important" election year, listen closely to what the candidates are promising you - just maybe, you will be able to tell who is about to slam the gate on America.





"A government big enough to give you everything you want, is big enough to take away everything you have." ~ Thomas Jefferson

[tim huntzinger]

pancakes are you kidding me? Really?  On one thread you are begging the gubmint to bail out OSUMC and over here you are calling that behavior piglike socialism or something?  Not self-loathing at all, are you? (Ha ha!  Do not be mad, just busting chops!)

[RecycleMichael]

I was walking down this country road and I see this farmer hoisting his pet pig up and down so the pig can get an apple out of a tree. The pig would grab an apple in his mouth, the farmer would put him down, then after he ate it, they would repeat the exercise.

I watched it for a while then offered some advice. I yelled over the fence, "if you got a stick and just knocked some of the apples off the tree, you would save a lot of time."

The farmer just petted his pet on the head and yelled back, "What is time to a pig?"

[waterboy]

Jonette. Thanks for comparing human consumer behavior to that of wild pigs. You'll excuse me if I take issue with it. Those are training methods any dog handler knows how to use and apparently a lot of political Libertarian types see it as useful in their quest to "free us up" from govm't.

It fails on several fronts.

First, it makes an unspoken assumption that there are "fence builders" consciously working to trap us and keep us as a manageable food source. That would be the govm't, the very people we elect utilizing the very system we instituted and worship. The conspiracy then is that there are small groups of elected/non-elected people who desire to fence us for their own interests. Maybe, hard to prove but makes interesting movies.

Secondly, it ignores religion, education and history. Pigs don't pray or believe in divine intervention. They don't take care of the weaker members of the group and thus allow predators to thin the herd. That's their freedom. Ironically, its nature's way. If you believe God is nature then God abhors the medical industry, penicillin, food banks and prosthetic limbs. Pigs are the smartest of the domesticated animals but still not at our level. Since we are blessed with self awareness, superior problem solving abilities and reverence for spirituality, one considers these as a balance to any consumer behaviors that would "fence us in". In fact, History proves that to be true. Welfare, either in corporate or human form has been in place in this country for over 175 years! The railroad system was built using corporate welfare (for the public good). Historically, America's productivity has surged in the last 20 years which included leadership by both parties. We are a working, productive society in spite of our efforts to care for our weaker elements.

Lastly, the story fails to prove its point. He was injured fighting off the hated Communists who were trying to take over his country. These "fence builders" had offered him no "corn" but merely bullets. Historically speaking, thats how governments have been changed, NOT through "fence building".