A Modest Proposal for preventing the poor people in Pennsylvania from being a burden on their Commonwealth
by Governor Tom Corbett, with apologies to Jonathan Swift
It is melancholy for people who drive through this great Commonwealth when they see the streets crowded with women and children in a line for a food pantry. These breeders and their children add to the deplorable state of Pennsylvania. Therefore whoever could find a fair, cheap and easy method of making these children useful would deserve to have his giant statue set up as the preserver of the Commonwealth.
I find it amazing that we have allowed these wretched families to receive Federal food assistance even if they have $2,000 of assets to pay for their medical bills, burial expenses, tax bills, car repairs or other emergencies. This food assistance must stop in May.
I shall now therefore humbly propose these proposals, which I know will not experience the least objection from our huge majorities in the Legislature.
I have been assured that a young healthy child well nursed is, at a year old, a most delicious nourishing and wholesome food, whether stewed, roasted, baked, or boiled; and I make no doubt that it will equally serve well in a fricasie.
continued
I propose that the youngest children be offered for sale to the persons of quality and fortune, after advising the mother to let them suck plentifully in the last month so as to render them plump and fat for a good table. A child will make two dishes at an entertainment for friends. When the family dines alone, the fore or hind quarter will make a reasonable dish, particularly seasoned with a little pepper and boiled.
Those who are more thrifty may dress the skin, which will make admirable gloves for ladies, and summer boots for fine gentlemen.
Some persons of a desponding spirit are concerned about that vast number of poor people who are aged, diseased, or maimed. I have thought deeply about what actions should be taken to ease the Commonwealth of so grievous an incumbrance. However, I am not pained by that matter because every day they are dying by cold and disease as fast as can be reasonably expected.
My intention is to not only address children, the hungry and the aged, but all persons who have benefitted from our charity. I wish to continue several schemes.
Firstly, thanks to the most burdensome of new paperwork, we have had great success in reducing the numbers of these poor who receive medical assistance. We have ended the burden of low cost insurance for health expenses, which now allows us to use tobacco settlement money for more prisons to house the resulting thieving refuse.
Secondly, I had found it amazing that children of these wretched breeders were able to attend our public universities for less than $15,000 a year. That continues to be my priority to make this education only fit for the priviledged.
Thirdly, we have done everything in our power to divert monies from the public schools that serve these poor, so that we can fully fund for-profit cyberschools run by our most generous benefactors.
Fourth, we will soon have a law in effect that will turn away many of the darker, wretched, carless, disabled and aged from voting if they do not have a current state-issued photo identification card.
I know that no wise man will find other solutions to these dilemmas that are equally cheap, easy, and effectual.
I profess that I have no other motive than the public good of my Commonwealth, by avoiding taxes upon gas extraction, preserving the Delaware loophole, reducing Democratic voter turnout, and giving some pleasure to the rich.