Linton: A Shining Beacon of Prosperity

The Linton City Council announced last night at its regular monthly meeting that the City of Linton and its people are so wealthy that we do not need charity from the State in the form of measly $500,000 grants. In fact, our citizenry is so wealthy that we, as part of the abundant class of Hoosiers that we are, can afford to fork over the money to pay taxes to the State of Indiana, so other communities can do what they can with the money the State doles out in grants. We need nothing in return.

The Governor can keep his INDOT grant money, too, that we may have become eligible for with the youth center project. We simply do not need the mere millions of dollars in grants that are available to create a bike and walking pathway around this great city, as our next step in the overall plan called for. When your citizenry naturally looks like bodybuilders, well, you just don't need exercise.

Actually, speaking of plans, the Comprehensive Plan that many in our community spent countless volunteer hours on can be thrown out, too, because our citizens really have too much time on their hands. Besides, what do all of the city planners, engineers, and attorneys that put it together know? (Apart from being wealthy, you see, we're just a little smarter here than those Evansville professionals too.) After all, who needs a plan when we're obviously doing everything right?

And why should youth groups, boys' baseball leagues, girls' softball, soccer, churches all come together in our community and work together to form a youth complex for that matter? It's all nonsense to try to save money when we all have so much money and so much for our youth to do already. The youth complain all of the time that their schedules are too full and we should give them a break now and then. Let some other community host those little league tournaments and "mini world series" events in the future that some envisioned last night. Who needs vision with all of this prosperity?

Federal monies that were recently requested by the Mayor are not needed either. The Mayor goes off on these tangents asking for money back from all the taxes we pay out, and it's really silly. He goes to all of these conferences and workshops, too, but we're just a little smarter class of people here, so what's the use? We should be hosting the conference to show the world our community's wealth, muscle, and brains. After all, we're obviously doing everything right.

Some communities actually call themselves "progressive" by having the goal of three Community Block Grants open at once all of the time. To this, we say "Bah Humbug!" If they had the wealth we have, they wouldn't bother.

Perhaps, we can break them off some crumbs, so they won't need to bother either. Maybe some of our carpenters, bricklayers, and trades people can even fit in a day to donate to these communities from their busy schedules, but it will be tough since they have so much work here locally to do. They don't need yet another project to bid on anyway.

In Linton, we can all afford to pay in taxes to the federal and state governments, so that other communities may apply and get up to Linton's standards of excellence. Perhaps, we could even raise taxes, so that we can give more to our neighbors because, you know, just the other day yet another elderly social security recipient asked the City to bring down the chipper from the city barn to shred up some of the piles of money in her home that get in her way to the bathroom.

You see, while some communities plant Bradford Pear trees, all of the trees and gardens in Linton produce a different type of green: money. Yes, we have money trees all along the sidewalks. Children amuse themselves by making paper airplanes out of them, while dogs run and play in the piles that the adults have raked the pesky little things into to burn.

If you really aren't familiar with this new City of Babylon with its lush gardens and ridiculous wealth, known as Linton, the City Council invites you to their gold-leafed chambers for their next monthly meeting on Monday, April 14th at 7PM.

They just caution you that you should step over the gold bullion piled close to the doors. The signs tell people not to drop off their excess gold, but they do anyway. The City is looking at a new machine to vaporize that nuisance, though, and we'll soon have that problem solved. After all, our "City of Progress" signs as you drive in to town say it all… because when we're obviously doing everything right, the success will show.