New York city citizens were treated to the country's first display of a performing monkey.
For the paltry sum of one cent, New Yorkers could watch an exotic animal do amazing tricks never before seen in the colonies.
In the New World, this passed for entertainment, because the hardships of everyday living kept folks focused on survival, not frivolous pasttimes.
Their lives bordered on desperate, as they fought to become viable settlements competing with each other while still subjecting themselves to the reign of the English.
As history has recorded, the settlers had their stark, difficult lives made even harder by the confiscatory iron hand of the british tax man, who insisted on getting the King's share whether there was anything left for the people or not.
So, the performing monkey served as an enjoyable distraction, often suffering favorable comparisons with the King.
When times are tough, any diversion, however small, irrelevant, or short lived, can be a source of amusement.
And so it was today, when the O-man and his disciples gathered with the Republican infidels.
In a show befitting a performing monkey, the O-man extolled the virtues of his healthcare plan.
A plan so critically ill that he couldn't get it passed when he had a full complement of political capital combined with a 60 vote majority.
Sitting around a squared table, appropriately reminiscent of the squared circle of boxing, the two sides duked it out while establishing their positions once more for the cameras.
Without accomplishing anything of substance for their constituents, who are facing the toughest times this generation has ever seen.
While it will undoubtedly be portrayed as something of substance --- a productive meeting of the players --- a keystone event in moving the healthcare bill along, the electorate will regard it with the same gravity as those New Yorkers viewed the performing monkey this day in 1751.
Unfortunately, this time, it will cost a good bit more than one cent to be admitted.
"It does not take a majority to prevail... but rather an irate, tireless minority, keen on setting brush fires of freedom in the minds of men." ----Samuel Adams
"To me, the technique was almost irrelevant; it was what was coming across that mattered." ---- Bill Sienkiewicz
"To me, the technique was almost irrelevant; it was what was coming across that mattered." ---- Bill Sienkiewicz
