[LINK] Party policy comparison (The upbeat Version.... The Ant and the Grasshopper)

[Tom Koltai]

I know it's not the weekend... But.... 

> -----Original Message-----
> From: link-bounces at mailman1.anu.edu.au 
> [mailto:link-bounces at mailman1.anu.edu.au] On Behalf Of Jan Whitaker
> Sent: Monday, 9 August 2010 6:21 PM
> To: link at anu.edu.au
> Subject: [LINK] Party policy comparison
> 
> 
> Have a look at this: 
> http://www.yopinion.com.au/issues/election-> 2010/?detail=11
> 
> 
> It is also a speak-out sort of website.
> 


I received this in my email the other day....

ANT AND THE GRASSHOPPER 

This one is a little different.... Two Different Versions...Two
Different Morals 

OLD VERSION 

The ant works hard in the withering heat all summer long, building his
house and laying up supplies for the winter. 

The grasshopper  thinks the ant is 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. 
MORAL  OF THE STORY:  Be responsible for yourself!   
................................................

MODERN VERSION 

The ant works hard in the withering heat and the rain all summer long,
building his house and laying up supplies for the winter. 

The grasshopper thinks the ant is a fool and  laughs and dances and
plays the summer away. 

Come winter, the  shivering grasshopper calls  a press conference and
demands to know why the ant should be  allowed to be warm and well fed
while he is cold and starving. 

Channels 7, 9 and 10,the ABC and SBS  show up to provide pictures of the
shivering grasshopper next  to a video of the ant in his comfortable
home with a table filled with food. 

Australia  is stunned by the sharp contrast. 

How can this  be, that in a country of such wealth, this poor
grasshopper is  allowed to suffer so? 

Kermit the  Frog appears on Oprah with the grasshopper and  everybody
cries when they sing, 'It's Not Easy Being Green.' 

Acorn stages  a demonstration in front of the ant's house where the news
stations film the group singing, 'We shall  overcome.' Cardinal George
Pell then has the group kneel down to pray to God for the grasshopper's
sake. 

Prime Minister Julia condemns the ant and blames John  Howard, Robert
Menzies, Capt James Cook, and the Pope  for the grasshopper's plight. 

Bob Brown  exclaims  in an interview on Today Tonight that the ant has
gotten  rich off the back of  the grasshopper, and calls for an
immediate tax hike on the ant  to make him pay his fair share. 

Finally, Labor in conjunction with the Greens  draft the Economic Equity
& Anti-Grasshopper  Act retroactive 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 retroactive taxes, his home is
confiscated  by the Government and given to the grasshopper. 

The story  ends as we see the grasshopper and  his free-loading friends
finishing up the last bits of the ant's  food while the government house
he is in, which, as you recall, just  happens to be the ant's old house,
crumbles around them because the grasshopper doesn't maintain it. 

The ant has disappeared in the snow, never to be seen again. 

The grasshopper is found dead in a drug related incident, and the house,
now abandoned, is taken over by a  gang of spiders who terrorize the
ramshackle, once prosperous and once peaceful,  neighbourhood.

MORAL OF THE STORY: 
Be careful of who you Vote For. 
I've sent this to you because I believe that you are an ant - not a
grasshopper!   
  
Make sure that you pass this on to other ants. 

Don't bother sending it on to any grasshoppers  because they wouldn't
understand it,  anyway.