My favorite 4-letter F-word is, you guessed it: FREE.
Despite the cautionary advice that “nothing is free” or “you can’t get something for nothing,” I’m a sucker for free stuff. What can I say, I’m a public school teacher, and I know better than to jump into the middle of a rabid teacher scrum when post-it pads are at stake.
If anyone has mastered giving away free stuff with an invisible price tag attached, it’s Obama, Inc. Obama the Campaigner mastered giveaway marketing during his presidential bid and has lobbed these practices into his presidential money-raising strategy. During the campaign, my addiction to free-stuff helped me procure an “Obama ‘08” bumper sticker and button, neither of which I contributed any money — despite the accompanying solicitations for donations.
Regarding the latter, I will admit that I was thoroughly disappointed when my button showed up and it was the size of a quarter and could only be seen with satellite vision. I realize size isn’t supposed to matter, but I was too embarrassed to sport my new microscopic button in public, as if the button itself symbolized my free-stuff addiction. Either that or I had an affliction of button envy and was not about to compensate for my inadequacies by sporting a flag pin on the lapel of my collared t-shirt.
More recently, Obama, Inc. was giving away free bumper stickers to help push its health care reform through the dysfunctional aisles of Congress. All I had to do was sign a petition pledging my support for President Obama’s three principles for real heath care reform.
Actual Size?
Unfortunately, I will have to wait 4-6 weeks until my free bumper sticker arrives. By then, the duct tape keeping my bumper attached to my car could become unglued, much like Obama’s health care objectives once they gets tied down with red tape and green lobby money in Congress. Although 6 weeks in Congress is a mere blink-of-the-eye in the big picture of getting things accomplished. As the old saying goes, “If you don’t like the way things are going in Congress, just wait a couple of years and you still won’t like the way things are going in Congress.”
In the meantime, I’ve decided to come up with my own bumper sticker ideas, one of which I may order from an online bumper-sticker company:
1. My Other Car Is a Health Insurance Payment
2. All I Wanted Was Real Health Care Reform, and All I Got Was This Lousy Bumper Sticker
3. Shit Cancer Bankruptcy Happens!
4. W.W.J.I.? (Who Would Jesus Insure?)
5. Coming to a Hospital Near You: Attack of the Right Wingnuts Socialized Health Scare
6. Underinsured Baby on Board
7. So it goes…!
8. FREE Obama’s Real Health Care Reform!!!
Feel F*** to vote for your favorite bumper slogan (or offer up your own, hence public option) in the COMMENTS below…
Say Something Funny 
QUIT SPENDING MONEY WE DON’T HAVE!
Are you referring to the money we gave to the wealthy through Bush tax cuts, the money dumped into the black hole of Iraq or the money we give to the insurance pirates and their big pharma partners everyday because we don’t reform the health care system?
Ibid.
LOVE IT… especially W.W.J.Insure?