April 2, 1970 Shelton Mason County Journal | ![]() |
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Roll over, sheep, and be counted!
Big Brother in Boondoggle, D.C., needs your help if he is
to keep his bureaus overstaffed during the next ten years.
You can do your part by answering a bunch of questions that
are really none of his business. So be a good sheep and fill in
your census form.
The census was authorized by the United States
Constitution to determine the apportionment of
representatives and direct taxes among the several states.
Keep this fact in mind when you answer the question: "Do
you have a flush toilet?"
Also keep in mind the relationship of government to its
citizens when you provide the answers to: a) whether you
have been married more than once, b) the date of your first
marriage, and c) whether this first marriage ended because of
the death of the husband or wife.
Your government has gone to great pains and a great deal
of expense to es blish a citizenry which services its bureaus•
In order for this relationship to function properly, the public
servant (that's you) must cooperate with the bureaucrats.
) @
All bureaus were established for a worthwhile purpose
and then grew to tremendous proportions with the addition 1
of busy work. Without the busy work, the giant computers
would fall silent and hundreds of thousands of government
employees would be forced to seek gainful employment. And
the 1970 census form, dear friends, was designed to provide
busy work for at least ten years.
Take the matter of flush toilets, for instance, an
earth-shaking topic second to none, including civil rights and
law and order. Every federal department from Health,
Education and Welfare to Defense will be quivering to
evaluate the statistics on who does and who does not have a
flush toilet.
Health, Education and Welfare will determine, after
36,394,296 man-hours, that there are 6,793 school districts
throughout the nation in which the number of toilets per
1,000 students is inadequate. It will set up a massive toilet
training aid program, complete with textbooks, a crash toilet
teacher education plan and subsidies for districts which
integrate the program into their Contemporary Problems
curriculum.
\t
"He's been insufferable ever since we listed him on the census form!"
Department of Defense officials, aghast to discover that
146,310 members of the armed forces come from homes
no flush toilets, will assign a task force of 2,029 civilian
experts to find something significant in the statistics and
develop a program to meet whatever problems they can
devise.
After eight years-and the help of 300 consultants hired
by the day-they will advise the department to revise the
recruit training schedule to include the digging of an
additional small hole beside each foxhole.
By ROBERT C. CUMMINGS
During the filing season, the
number of initiative measures
filed with the Secretary of State
always looks imposing, but the
number brought in so far this year
is just about normal.
The Department of Agriculture will discover, to its
.... ~, - - Eight were filed in 1968, but
.... horror, that Moose Pimple, Montana, has only 4.1 *-t ...... h
totlerB per !0 households, and will dispatch an sil]natur 'or?tn the ballot. At
airlift to drop 100,000 pamphlets entitled "The Care and
Feeding of the Commode" on that hamlet.
The Department of Transportation will gather the best
minds from the county's leading universities for a committee
to study the effects of flush toilets, or the lack of them, on
the commuting habits of mass transit users, with special
emphasis on the suburbanites of midwest farming
communities.
The Post Office Department will request figures from the
Bureau of the Census by return mail and the letter will arrive
on January 3, 1978.
Detailed studies by the Justice Department will prove
conclusively that persons occupying homes without flush
toilets are generally subversive, so the Attorney General will
request Congress to pass legislation containing a no-knock
provision applicable to public restrooms. Law officers who
suspect that explosives or firearms may be stored in a pay
toilet will be authorized to invade such stalls without
knocking-or depositing a dime.
Other federal bureaus, of course, will make use of the
census statistics, as will state, county and city governments.
Without your cooperation in answering the questions, utter
chaos will ensue wherever bureaucrats are ensconced.
So, roll over, sheep, and be counted.
the moment it appears only one
of those filed this year will
qualify.
The only measure brought in
so far which seems to have the
necessary organization and
finances for a successful signature
campaign is the one designed to
clear the way for bingo and other
"non-profit" gambling. Though a
place on the ballot appears to be
assured, the fate of the "bingo"
initiative at the polls remains
doubtful.
Open opposition is expected
from the professional gamblers. If
successful at the polls, a court
challenge is a virtual certainty.
No Guarantee
Even after making the ballot,
the chances of winning approval
at the polls aren't much better
than even. Of the 54 initiative
measures submitted to the voters
since 1914-when the initiative
process first went into
operation-28 have been approved
and 24 rejected.
The odds have improved
somewhat since 1930, however,
with 26 being approved during
the latter period, while 18 were
being defeated. As for the odds
against getting enough signatures
to qualify for the ballot, a total of
246 measures were filed from
1914 through 1968. Only 54 of
them reached the voters.
And it has become tougher
since 1958, when ground rules
were changed to require
signatures equaling 8 percent of
the votes cast for governor in the
last preceding election to qualify
an initiative for the ballot.
Prior to 1958, only 50,000
signatures were required. The
current requirement is nearly
102,000, and it goes up after
every gnbneratorial election.
Here's some good news to take your mind off inflation
while you are making out that supplemental check to the
Bureau of Internal Revenue:
Secretary of the Interior Walter Hickel has hired a Seattle
interior decorator to redesign his office in Washington, D.C.
for a fee of $10,000. He has also installed a sauna bath in the
building for his own use and that of favored employees.
The decorator's fee and the $3,500 bill for the sauna bath
will be paid with money collected by the Bureau of Internal
Revenue.
! LL
i
If you aren't lucky enough to be making out a
supplemental check, take comfort in the fact that the money
withheld from your paycheck last year is going toward such
worthwhile projects. You aren't being left out.
Founded 1886 by Grant C. Angle
Malltnl Addfllm: Box 430, Slmlton, Wash. 98584 Phone 426-4412
PuMiIIhN at Shelton, Mason County, Washington, every Thursday.
Entered as Second