Autumn Leaves Start to Fall

Dave wrote on Facebook today:

"I love seeing the vacuum truck come by to suck up the leaves piled at the curb. Nice to know I'm getting value for my tax dollar here in Fabulous Ferndale!"

Long story short, one of his friends commented that it was socialism. To which Dave responded, "Not at all. The proper scope and role of local government is vastly different from that of the federal government. I'm perfectly fine with paying for these services on the local level. However, I would not be at all comfortable with federalizing leaf pickup."

To wit I chimed, "Especially because at the end of the Federal Leaf Removal/Autumn Amelioration and Remediation Act of 2011 is a rider for $3Tr in subsidies to clearcut/logging companies and tariffs imposed on all leaves fallen from any tree not deemed to be indigenous to North America. It would cost each taxpayer $66.00 per year, create a new division of government as an adjunct to the Department of the Interior so that it could communicate effectively with the Department of Agriculture. And even though a tariff on a leaf is uncollectable, it will be placed on the revenue line of all future budgets. Of course, much of that income will be spent beefing up audit, enforcement and collection of said tariffs, so we will never see any of that "new money". A new Labor Union, (no doubt with a clever acronym like LEAF), would arise to make sure the people operating the dangerous machinery out there in the wilds of suburban America would be compensated properly with wages, benefits and a virtual guarantee that they could not lose their jobs as a result of ineptitude. After all that, there would end up being more leaves in my lawn and even less likelihood that I will ever feel any kind of "Social Security.""
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Listen to Eva Cassidy sing the Nat King Cole classic, Autumn Leaves... a worthwhile 4:41 seconds of your life if ever there was one. RIP, Eva.