Sunday, April 01, 2012

Puppets + Bert + Fart Joke = Lottery

Let's be absolutely clear here--I'm against lotteries as a fundraising mechanism, because they prey upon (to quote a good friend) "the poor and stupid." But on the other hand, I'm all for fundraising mechanisms that help keep Minnesota environmentally sound. And you know what? Few states do the environment like Minnesota does. You've got your Boundary Waters at Voyageurs National Park, where, for a small fee, bears and moose and wolves will hunt you down and kill you. You've got an amazing State Park just minutes outside of the Twin Cities that says, "Oh hi, you wanna camp here? YOU GOTTA LUG YOUR SHIT IN." God bless you, Afton State Park!

And I'm absolutely for really tight references to Emmet Otter's Jug Band Christmas, but with either Kent Hrbek or Bert Blyleven showing up. Especially when a skunk and Bert share a fart joke (even though Bert appears to be castigating said skunk for said joke). I feel, deep down in my soul, where I'm soft, soft like a woman, that Jim Henson would surely approve of this more than he would any of the marketing tie-ins the actual Muppets have been up to lately.



Let's Play For... Minnesota (Bert Blyleven) from MN State Lottery on Vimeo.

4 comments:

Muumuuman said...

I don't buy the "we use the lottery revenue for our state parks/public schools/higher education/whatever" public relations crap. It's be like me getting a second job as a gigilo and explaining to the missus "hey, I use that money for the children's college fund!" It's bullshit - each state that has picked up the lottery follows with tax cuts for the wealthy. The mob used to use the numbers scam to make money, now the rich have sold the states on lottery tickets to save their tax dollars. It's all revenue, how you claim it's allocated is arbitrary.

Retter said...

Muuum - Lotteries are government run. If you spent 30 seconds actually searching you could get a list of all expenditures from the revenue. Then again, you're probably just bitter because your state is using it's lotto cash on food stamps instead of lakes.

Muumuuman said...

Thanks Retter! Really, the governement get's money from the lottery and runs it too! OMG I had no idea! LOL!

No shit sherlock, that's the point. It's a government revenue that comes primarily from the poor and stupid. I assume your at least one of those things. The government could put any public expendature foward as "lottery funded" - generally whatever would be popular with the poor and stupid. In the state where I live I suspect it is food stamps, or the "no child without a banjo act."

price per head said...

hahaha it seemed you had so much time, I remember when my buddies and I hanged out, we almost always had a blast! I miss those days! :S