Looking ahead: 2014
Newspaper columnists predict the future at their peril; however, that has never prevented them from using the first column of the New Year for that purpose. And, if the past is prologue, then we can expect to see the return of certain satirical characters with whom long-time readers might be familiar.
Of course, Mr. Lew C. Furr is going to be around until January, 2017. Unless, of course, he gets caught in bed with a dead girl or even a live girl who looks like the Danish Prime Minister. The Faustian Bargain that the health-insurance company of Dewey, Cheatem, and Howe struck with Lew C. Furr has gone so badly that Dr. Faustus, the CEO of Dewey, Cheatem, and Howe, may have to ask for an auto industry-like taxpayer bailout. Otherwise, his company and maybe his entire industry could go bankrupt. Some people think that was Lew C. Furr’s plan all along.
Lew C. Furr’s health-care-enrollment web pages continue to be problematic, casting a pall of doubt as to whether applicants actually have health-insurance coverage or not. So, we can expect to see the return of Miss Sissy Fuss whose existing health-insurance policy was cancelled by Dewey, Cheatem, and Howe.
As readers may recall, Miss Sissy Fuss keeps trying and trying to enroll, albeit without success. Fearing medical bills she cannot afford to pay out-of-pocket, Miss Sissy Fuss keeps postponing a trip to see her primary-care physician. Pray she doesn’t wait too long.
Because 2014 is an election year, 2014 should prove to be a banner year for public relations/political consulting firms such as our old friends at Schmok and Meerhers. Not that they have been starving. Since 2009, Schmok and Meerhers have received a lot of political-party and even taxpayer money for handling public relations crises such as: Fast and Furious, the IRS scandal, the Benghazi spin, the NSA scandal, the Associated Press scandal, persecution of Fox News reporter, James Rosen; wild spending parties by the GSA and the VA, Solyndra and other green-energy fiascos, GM failing to repay $10.8 billion to taxpayers, Chrysler bought by Italy’s Fiat, Jeep production moving to Red China, liquidation of Bush’s gains in Iraq, the futile double-down in Afghanistan and the loss of the Middle East to Russia’s Vladimir Putin. But, if any PR firm can obscure the facts and then spin them in favor of whoever is writing the checks, it is Schmok and Meerhers.
And, looking ahead to the presidential election of 2016, a major task for Schmok and Meerhers -- aided by The New York Times -- will be to whitewash Hillary from the failure of her State Department to provide security for the U.S. Mission in Benghazi, her refusal to answer the cries of the embattled Americans for help, and for her indifference toward the loss of her ambassador to Libya, his aide, and two brave former Navy SEALs.
If Schmok and Meerhers can pull that one off, the firm is almost guaranteed its second Pinocchio Prize for Journalism.
Nationally syndicated columnist, William Hamilton, was educated at the University of Oklahoma, the George Washington University, the U.S Naval War College, the University of Nebraska, and Harvard University.
©2014. William Hamilton.
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