That's too bad. I was kind of hoping the whole reparations thing would sweep the nation like the West Nile virus. I figured it could turn out like one of those Oliver Stone movies: Pretty soon the conspiracy of oppression would get so vast it might even include me among the victims.

We're all victims

        If the U.S. government caved in to the race hustlers and actually paid out a few billions to alleged distant descendants of slaves, the line outside the Capitol the next morning would stretch from “A” for aggrieved to “V” for victimized.

        Pretty soon the U.S. government would have to declare bankruptcy and turn everything over to the courts, just like Enron. Highways, national parks, F-18s and nuclear submarines would be sold at auction to pay all the bankruptcy lawyers, and we'd all get class-action settlement checks for the many years we have been oppressed by the IRS — about $1.23 after the legal fees, I suppose.

        Once the reparations slot machine started paying out jackpots, next in line would be the Indian tribes. If people who have never been closer to Africa than The Lion King can collect for something that happened 130 years ago, I'd say the Shawnees have a pretty good claim on repossessing Ohio and Kentucky, and maybe both Dakotas if we could get them to take them.

Whistling Dixie

        Then the South would rise again to claim reparations for the Civil War. The settlement could run into the billions just for punitive damages awarded to all those generations of boys named “Bobby Lee.”

        Cincinnati would get in line to claim reparations for all the damage done by the boycott, riots and the feral youths who gave the Black Family Reunion a big black eye.

        A separate lawsuit by “Victims of the Cincinnati Bengals” could recover the enormous costs for all the pain and suffering of rooting for a losing team for an entire decade.

        And that could lead to the biggest class-action lawsuit in history: Taxpayers vs. The Great Society.

        Hard-working, middle-class taxpayers have been gouged for trillions to fund failed welfare and social programs perpetrated by liberal politicians.

        Exhibit A is Richard King, the deadbeat dad sentenced to 27 months last week for having 10 kids with seven different mothers, and failing to pay more than $100,000 in child support.

        How about some reparations for being forced to support slackers like that?

        And what about reparations for all the other victims of society and circumstance: drug addicts, hookers, convicts, homeless guys and Al Gore?

        Where do they get in line for a check?

        I suppose it's insane to make people pay for something they had nothing to do with, such as slavery. But that's why we have courts to sort out the most lunatic ideas — and make them into laws.

        E-mail pbronson@enquirer.com or call 768-8301.

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