I wish I had been in Schladming/Rohrmoos yesterday. Fifty thousand skiing fans were there to watch the "Night Slalom," part of the World Cup Races. I watched it on Television and kept telling myself that the poor suckers who paid a fortune to be there, see no "repeats", no "close-ups", no "Slow-motion" and certainly no "ultra slow-motion"... they are probably cold, and have no glass of Austrian White Wine to twirl between their fingers.
I had all the advantages. So why did I wish to be there ? Because there is a certain something to actually "being there", to feeling the excitement emanating from 50,000 fans, to hearing them roar their approval when one of their own came down like a Kamakazi fighter, down the steep part, hurtling himself between narrow set gates at incredible speeds.... to hearing the collective moan when one of their own "straddled" a gate or missed one altogether, or totally wiped out and "bit the snow"... and, believe me: this was a race that had everything.
If you are an Austrian, you had much to cheer about: Of the first 15 racers 5 carried the Red/White/Red into
1st, 3rd, 8th, 9th, and 13th place....
Italians were in 2nd, and 14th, there was a Croatian and many other Nationalities. 4th a Japanese in 5th, Ted Ligety of America placed 6th,... there were French, Swedish, Japanese, Canadians and many more countries.
It was, in other words, Good News for Austria.
Not so good News is coming Austria's way in other areas. The rating Agencies took away Austria's Triple A rating and gave it an AA+ with a negative outlook .
The politicians cannot agree on any measures to bring their financial house in order.
Bi Partisan Politics rules the "top heavy" Parliament.
Top heavy ?
Austria has 183 MPs, which means that they have one Member of Parliament for every 45,300 citizens, while Germany, for instance has one member for every 132.300 citizens.
At Germany's rate Austria could probably do with 63 MPs.Let us be generous and give them 83 MPs.
Thereby they would save the costs of 100 MPs.
Consider now the Salaries of 100 MPs, their Assistants, research and other service personnel, Secretaries, their office space, office equipment and so on and so forth.
Apply the same reduction ratios in all the Civil Service positions, their Commissions, Agencies and all the other duplicating Organisations and, (prove me wrong if you can) you would probably reach a "balanced budget" without increasing any taxes.
Instead of this, the Government commissions a study, finding some 24 areas in which to raise additional taxes.
What, of course, they should do is chase down the cheats on Income Tax, Sales Tax , the Tax evaders who ship their money to Liechtenstein and other tax havens. Such a move is not likely to happen, since the government officials themselves are heavily involved in such nefarious activities.
The only call for action one hears from most of the Government members is: "Tax the Rich"....
All this really proves is the abysmal poverty in ideas.
Bertstravels.
3 comments:
Wow - typical right winger! Put a lot of people out of work. What are they supposed to do? Go on welfare? How are they supposed to support themselves? They have kids you know, and puppies and lawns and car loans. You are getting cruel in your old age! XD
Oh yeah - and here is what I think of standing out in the cold for any reason...this text has been deleted by the people that run the internet as far too vile for human consumption
typical left winger: have as many leeches suck on the common breast, until it runs dry... Then they say: Hey, what's happening? There is no more for us to get from the work of others. Now we may even have to go out and get a real job....
What a crying shame...
Post a Comment