Getting and spending…

Just recently I was prompted to write about William Wordsworth’s famous sonnet, The World Is Too Much With Us. I now understand why this particular piece of poetry sticks in my mind.

It has much more significance than the materialist tendencies of man and the destruction of nature. One line in particular stands out for me when it comes to the ugly world of politics:

getting and spending we lay waste our powers…

But when it comes to politicians the line might as well read: getting and spending we lay waste our tax revenues.

And in South Africa, one man stands out like an ugly train-wreck when it comes to gross profligacy. He’s none other than Jacob Zuma, the President [I say the President rather than our, because he does not represent me, nor do I suspect many others as well].

We’d hardly gotten over the fact that he spends upwards of R15-million of our taxpayers money yearly, on his multiple wives and children, when we were forced to accept the cost of the bloated, fuck-useless administration he concocted just to provide employment for an assortment of sycophants and other palm-greasers’. Now we learn that he spent around R17-million of taxpayers money on wining and dining 15 African leaders [term used loosely] before and after the World Cup held here last year. This oozing slime-fest was attended by a veritable who’s who in the despot zoo; Mad Bob and Teodoro leading the display of the worst that Africa offers.

I’m not even factoring in all the other idiotic schemes that Zuma wastes our money on, on a daily basis. This one however is the most galling. To think that my taxes are being lavished on the slime of the universe…aaarrrghh.

This particular act of piracy worked out at about R1-million per Head of State [which included their wives]. Apparently Zuma invited all 53 HOS’s from Africa. Should we be pretending that we were lucky they didn’t all attend? That would have put us out-of-pocket to the tune of R53-million? Perhaps not, because as sure as death and taxes, Zuma has pissed away that saving, somewhere else…

What is even more infuriating however, is that the taxpayer doesn’t seem too concerned with these acts of lunacy. Have we become that numb to government’s extravagant misuse of our taxes?

Ok Mr. Wenger, so you dared…

Dear Mr. Wenger,

They say “who dares, wins.” So you played Bendtner anyway…and won.

I’m not going to take any credit for instilling some urgency in that lazy Dane; that was your doing. How you did it? Who cares! He played more football in that one game last night against Ipswich, than in all the games he’s played since the beginning of the season.

Let’s hope his arse stays in gear, and he performs like this for the rest of the season.

But now, I need to question your judgement with regard to the bumbling Brazilian and the radarless Russian. Denilson’s tackling is woeful, and he seems to have forgotten what his teammates look like because he has made a habit of passing the ball to the opposition. As for Arshavin; his passing is way off the mark, and I think some of that Bendtner laziness has rubbed off on him.

Can you do something about these two? How about docking them some of their pay for every boob during a game? And I’m not referring to the female supporters.

As always, in you we trust.

Lenny