Stu Bykofsky: To help the grasshoppers, Congress raises the ant-e

0 Comments | Philadelphia Daily News, April, 2008

I AM AN ANT. Are you a grasshopper?

In the fable, the industrious ant works hard in the broiling sun, collects food all summer, puts money into IRAs and prepares for winter.

The grasshopper plays his

iPod, works on his tan, maxes out his credit cards and puts his money on the casino's Wheel of Fortune.

Then, as happens annually, the sun loses its warmth and winter's icy fingers reach over the horizon.

The ant is secure in his home. He has warm clothes and food to get him and his family through the cold winter. The grasshopper is cold and hungry.

That's the moral that wise Aesop handed down in his fable, but that's not the probable outcome in our 21st-century democracy.

Hearing of the grasshopper's pitiful condition, Congress (which...