Tuesday, September 13, 2011

Cabbie Wisdom

Back in the day that New York City still had English speaking cab drivers, I was en route from my Central Park neighborhood hotel to a Wall Street investment bank office when my driver responded to a radio news report with an emphatic bull s--t expletive.

It was early April because the cabbie was taking issue with a comment by the head of the Internal Revenue Service that followed the annual approach to the tax filing deadline report about the prosecution of an alleged tax cheat -- in those days they prosecuted such people rather than appointing them to the cabinet. The IRS commissioner's comments to which my driver was taking offense consisted of the usual blather to the effect that those who fail to comply with the tax code increase the burdens of those who do comply with the law and meet their payment obligations.

My "deese" and "dem" speaking cabbie's full comment was:

Didja even hear such a pile of B.S.? 

When I inquired about why he disagreed with the tax collector's statement, the response was surprising in two respects:

First, because the cab driver who appeared on the surface to be unsophisticated patiently explained that the statement was based on -- no kidding, get this -- a faulty premise.

Second, because of the depth of understanding reflected by his substantive explanation of his reaction:

The claim is phony 'cause it assumes the government will spend only some fixed amount of money and when taxes in that amount are paid everything will be in balance and nobody will have to pay any more. But that's not the deal. The bastards will never be satisfied . . . they'll just go on spending no matter what . . . they'll spend every dollar they can get their hands on . . . and then they'll borrow and tax and spend some more, and borrow and tax and spend still more . . . forever without any end or limit. They'll bleed every one of us dry no matter how much or how little anyone pays.

It took me back to an even earlier time when I spent a summer doing construction work on a large housing project. When I endeavored to get my fellow workers -- all of whom were older than me and most of whom were immigrants from Germany -- to take an interest in politics, I was rebuffed gently and politely, and told:

Hey kid, 'der all teeves!

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