I just got this in an email...





> The Ant and the Grasshopper
>
> There is an 'Old Version' and a 'Modern Version' ...
>
> 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 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 others are
> cold
> and starving.
>
> CBS, NBC, PBS, CNN, and ABC 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. America 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. '
>
> Al Sharpton stages a demonstration in front of the
> ant's house where the news stations film the group
> singing, 'We shall overcome.' Jesse then has the
> group
> kneel down to pray to God for the grasshopper's
> sake.
>
> Nancy Pelosi & Barack Obama exclaim in an interview
> with Larry King that the ant has gotten rich off the
> back of the grasshopper, and both call for an
> immediate tax hike on the ant to make him pay his
> fair
> share. Finally, the EEOC drafts 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.
>
> Hillary gets her old law firm to represent the
> grasshopper in a defamation suit against the ant,
> and
> the case is tried before a panel of federal judges
> that Bill Clinton appointed from a list of
> single-parent welfare recipients.
>
> The ant loses the case.
>
> The story ends as we see the grasshopper finishing
> up
> the last bits of the ant's food while the government
> house he is in, which just happens to be the ant's
> old
> house, crumbles around him because he doesn't
> maintain
> it. The ant has disappeared in the snow.
> 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 once peaceful
> neighborhood.
>
> MORAL OF THE STORY: Be careful how you vote in 2008