Aesop, The Conservative

When did we forget this lesson?

The Classic Version

In a field one summer's day, a Grasshopper was hopping about, chirping and singing to his heart's content.  An ant walked by, grunting as he carried a plump kernel of corn.

"Where are you off to with that heavy thing?" asked the Grasshopper.

Without stopping, the Ant replied, "To our ant hill.  This is the third kernel I've delivered today."

"Why not come and chat with me," said the Grasshopper, "instead of working so hard?" 

"I am helping to lay up food for the winter," said the Ant, "and I recommend you to do the same."

"Why worry about winter?" asked the Grasshopper. "We have plenty of food right now." 

The Ant shook his head in dismay and continued his work.

The weather soon turned cold.  All the food lying in the field was covered with a thick white blanket of snow that even the grasshopper could not dig through.  Soon the Grasshopper found himself dying of hunger.  He staggered to the ants' hill and saw the ants enjoying the corn they had collected in the summer.

Then the Grasshopper knew:

It is best to prepare for the days of necessity. 

The Politically Correct Version

Big Ant worked all summer, building his house and laying up supplies for the winter.  The grasshopper, who happened to be a single mom raising five little grasshoppers, did what she could to provide for her little ones. 

Despite working long days trying to bring home food for her children, she never managed to get ahead, as she had to pay the ladybug to watch her children while she was out scavenging. 

Winter came and Big Ant was comfortable in his anthill.  Because he was bigger and could get away with it, and because he didn't "believe in no stinkin' communism," he had chased all the little ants away, leaving plenty of food for himself.  But the grasshopper had no community of ants from which she could take provisions and so as winter settled in, she had no food for her little ones. 

Not willing to let her offspring starve, the grasshopper became a community organizer and assembled all the ants who had been chased away by Big Ant.  They agreed that it wasn't fair for Big Ant to have so much, especially since the provisions belonged to all the ants, not just Big Ant. 

And so they agreed to ask Big Ant to share the great bounty that was stored within the anthill. Big Ant, annoyed that they would try to take what he had already taken, said no. 

The grasshopper and little ants then said that they weren't asking—they had come for the provisions, and Big Ant could either share or leave.  So Big Ant left, and the grasshopper and little ants had a great feast to celebrate. 

But Big Ant gathered his Big Ant cousins and uncles and brothers, and because they were bigger and stronger, they banished all the little ants and the grasshopper and her little ones into the snow, where they perished. 

And the next year, when Big Ant had no community of ants to do the work for him, he discovered that he could not survive on his own. And so he died. 

The Moral?  Might does NOT make right.

The Politically Incorrect Version

The ant works hard, in the withering heat, all summer long.  He builds his house and stores supplies for the winter.  The grasshopper thinks that the ant is a fool and he laughs, dances and plays the summer away, preparing nothing for the coming winter.

Winter comes, the ant is safe and warm.  The shivering grasshopper calls a press conference and demands to know why the ant should be allowed to be warm and fed, while others are cold and starving!

CBS, NBC, ABC & CNN show up to provide pictures of shivering grasshoppers 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 this way?

Kermit the Frog appears with the grasshopper on Oprah.  Everyone cries when they sing "It's Not Easy Being Green."

Jesse Jackson 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 pray for the grasshopper's sake, and reminds the group to contribute to his group, so that he can "continue the fight" for grasshoppers, everywhere!

In an interview with Tom Brokaw, Ted Kennedy & John Kerry exclaim: "The ant has gotten rich off the backs of the poor grasshoppers!"  Both call for an immediate tax hike to make the ant pay "his fair share!"

Finally, the EEOC drafts the "Economic Equity For Grasshoppers Act", retroactive to the beginning of the summer.  The ant is fined for failing to hire the proportionate number of green bugs, and having nothing left to pay his retroactive taxes, his house is confiscated by the government.

Hillary Clinton gets her old law firm to represent the grasshopper in a defamation suit against the ant. The case is tried in federal court, with a jury comprised of unemployed welfare recipients.

Surprise! The ant loses the case!

As the story draws to a close, we see the grasshopper finishing up the last bits of the ant's food while the government house in which he now lives (the ant's old house) crumbles around him for lack of maintenance.

The ant disappears in the snow, the grasshopper dies in a drug related incident.  The house, now abandoned, is taken over by a gang of spiders who terrorize this once-peaceful neighborhood.

The moral of this version?  Now that Obama is president, hard work is for chumps.

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