Swearings in and Romanian Curses, the Cauldron BubblesIn Romania, where you like to think someone is always playing gypsy violin, witches are using dead dogs and cat excrement to cast spells on the government. In a measured response, Romanian President Traian Basescu and his aides are said to be wearing purple on Thursdays, allegedly to fight off evil spirits. The cause of witch-government friction in Romania? The government wants to tax the earnings of witches, in whom many Romanians believe. Boo! In America, where we uphold our reputation for modernity by purchasing electronic crap from China, we do not believe in witches, though a group of crazy Christians may show up at the local school board meeting to stop a high school Halloween dance. It's pagan, you know. When Americans feel overtaxed, we do not huddle in our huts, casting spells. No, we gather in large groups, chanting slogans and calling forth the spirits of the "Founders," who were not mythical beings — at least not to people from, say, Iowa. And our politicians do not robe themselves in purple. Nay, they paper themselves over in green — the green of lobbyist money. Poor simple Romanians! Do not huttle in your huds or huddle in your huts, casting blood-red spells at the moon. Come out into the light. Look upon the werebama, the shape shifter, now a socialist, now a centrist, now black, now white, now Kenyan, now Hawaiian, now Illinoisan! Behold The Boehner, tanned — tanned in the fires of hell. See how he takes the gavel from Nancy Pelosi. Hear the newly ascendant Republicans howl. Hear the Social Security tax fall! See the local-option sales tax rise! Goodbye to the cop on the beat and to regular trash collection. Begone, teachers of middle school English! Hear the words of The Boehner as he defeats Pelosi in the roll call for speaker. "No longer can we kick the can down the road," he howled in Churchillian cadence. That's an actual Boehner quote, though I bet it sounds better in Romanian. Oratory is dead in this country, a casualty of journalism.
And the can goes flying down the road, bewitched, seeming to move without help, though two wars and tax cuts for the rich hurry it along. So do social welfare programs that have never worked, not even in the days when sociology was not a laughable college major. Democrats. Republicans. Two sides of the same dirty shirt. Two different spells. Same result. And you and I huddle in our damn-near-foreclosed condos and gather the sacred objects. Unemployment check. Paycheck from the wife's day job. Paycheck from the wife's night job. Note from the kid's school, saying that it now costs money to play football. Chinese-made iPod. A dog-eared copy of "The Contract With America." A box of that supermarket macaroni and cheese. We light generic cigarettes with the dismal year-end 401(k) statement. Poor Romanian witches! They will pay taxes no matter how hard they cast their spells. And in America, we cast the Republican spell for a while, then we cast the Democratic spell for a while. We mumble to the tea party gods, or we chant the chant of "change." How the Romanian witches must be laughing at us! They know it's better to pray to the same devil all the time than it is to pray to a different devil every four years. To find out more about Marc Munroe Dion and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit www.creators.com COPYRIGHT 2011 BY CREATORS.COM 
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