Welcome to Obamaburger. May I take your money? By J.J. Jackson Behind the counter is an Obamaburger employee busily filing her fingernails and who barely looks up as a young man approaches her, bypassing a longer line at another register which does not seem to be moving. "Welcome to Obamaburger. May I take your money?" she asks listlessly. The perplexed customer responds, "Don't you mean take my order?" Her response, without so much as a look is, "Sir, you're holding up the line. Don't make me call security." The customer, looks behind him and notices that he is the only one in this particular line but not wanting to cause a fuss replies hastily, "Geez, ok. Uh ... let's see. I will have –" "Sir, I need your Social Security Number first." "Excuse me?" the customer asks. "Your Social Security Number sir. You're holding up the line again." "What line?" Now, very confused the customer asks again, "What do you need my Social Security Number for?" Finally looking up from her "work" the employee gets very testy at the delay and the line of questioning. "That's it, I'm calling security –" "What? No ..." scared at what is going on the customer finally concedes to her demands, "Alright my number is 123-45-6789." Sighing at the thought of having to finally do something productive, the lady behind the counter starts punching numbers into her register, "One moment while I pull up your tax return for last year." "My tax return? What the hell are you doing?" "Sir, please – calm down or I will have to call security," she scolds. "Ah, it says here that you made $150,000 last year. That will put you in our fourth pricing tier." "Say what? What is a ‘pricing tier'?" "Sir, the price you pay at Obamaburger is based on how much you make. It's all very complicated and figured out by people smarter than me. You are lucky you are not in our fifth and highest tier, let me tell you!" Just then a scruffy looking man in the other and much longer line to his left cries out, "Hey! What's the hold up here buddy! Order already! I want my food!" Turning to this man who is standing first in line at the register next to him the customer replies, "I'm not holding you up sir. You are at the head of the line right there." He points to the where the man is standing in front of another thirty people. "It's not my fault that all of you are in that line and waiting around." The Obamaburger employee corrects his misconception. "Oh, no sir, you don't understand. That man and the others behind him are in our burger welfare line. He doesn't get anything until you order. Then we give him part of your order." "What?" "Sir are you ready to order yet?" "No, wait just a second here," now the customer is really confused as to what is going on here. "You are telling me that that man there doesn't have to pay for his food and that you are going to give him part of my order?" "That's the Obamaburger promise sir!" she chirpily replies. "Now, what would you like to order?" "Nothing!" the flabbergasted customer responds. "This is ridiculous! I am out of here!" As he turns to walk away he hears a scream from the woman behind the counter, "SECURITY! SECURITY! We've got a runner!" The cry is like a screech. But he knows he has done nothing wrong and ignores her. As he approaches the exit however, a burly security guard cuts him off and asks in a serious voice, "Sir? Where are you going?" "I'm going somewhere else for lunch. I'm not paying someone else's way." The security guard grabs his arm. "I'm sorry sir that is not allowed." "OW! What are you doing! Unhand me!" The security guard, oblivious to his pleas, hauls him back up to the counter and the lady waiting behind it with a frown on her face. "Sir, you cannot leave without ordering," she informs him. "What?" "We took a vote a few months ago. It was in all the papers. Big headlines and all. You have to order." Straightening his shirt that had been made a mess by the rough treatment of the guard, the customer indignantly responds, "Or what? Are you going to shoot me?" "You wouldn't be the first sir," the security guard spoke as he folded his arms across his chest. "Fine!" he screams and then mutters under his breath, "You're damn lucky that I can't carry my firearm anymore now that it's illegal or we'd see about that." Then he raised his voice to order. "How much for a double cheese burger and a medium fries?" The Obamaburger employee shakes her head. "I'm sorry sir but red meat is bad for your health and french fries are just too greasy. We do however have a nice lettuce and tomato sandwich on rye bread and some fresh apple slices – all government approved for your good health." "Fine then! Give me one of those so I can get the Hell out of this insane asylum!" "Sir, no need to yell. I only make the government approved living wage of $27 per hour ... I don't make the rules. Would you like a large ice water to go with that?" "Fine." "Let's see. You're total, in fourth tier pricing, comes to $24.57" "$24.75?!? Are you nuts?" The security guard grabbed his shoulder. "Sir, just pay the bill and don't make any trouble." Muttering to himself, "What a damn rip off." The customer pulls out a wad of bills but is quickly scolded by the Obamaburger employee. "Sir, worthless paper money is no good here. We only accept plastic." "Fine then!" he huffs as he shoves the money back into his pocket and pulls out a credit card. "You probably wouldn't know how to make change anyway." He swipes his card and the woman turns to grab his food being prepared behind her. On his tray she places a sandwich easily consumable in one bite and two apple sticks. "Here you go sir." "What's this?" "Your order sir, now move along." The customer looks to the scruffy man in the other line as he is handed a large sandwich and five times as many apple sticks, government approved of course. "How come that man gets more food that I do and I paid for mine?" "That's the Obamaburger promise sir!" she repeats in a programmed fashion. "Now move along ... we don't need any troublemakers. We don't like troublemakers." "What a bunch of idiots!" "That's it sir," the security guard announces as he grabs the customer by the arm. "Ouch! Let go of me! What are you doing!" "I'm placing you under arrest for being insensitive and insulting an Obamaburger employee. Plus you seem to be too much of a free thinker and are possibly a threat to the Obamaburger nation. Now come with me sir." "Unhand me! I have rights!" the customer yells as he is hauled off. "Not any more you don't." Final author's note: You think this is a little over the top? You think that this is some unreasonable screed? You haven't been paying much attention to the way America has been working as of late and definitely have not been paying attention to what Barack Obama himself said he wants for America now and in the future have you? Don't worry. Maybe your eyes will open when there are no more "customers" left to pay your way through the welfare line. J.J. Jackson is a libertarian conservative author from Pittsburgh, PA who has been writing and promoting individual liberty since 1993 and is President of Land of the Free Studios, Inc. He is the lead editor contributor to American Conservative Daily and also the founder of SignalCongress.com. He is the owner of The Right Things - Conservative T-shirts & Gifts. His weekly commentary along with exclusives not available anywhere else can be found at http://www.libertyreborn.com.
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