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Monday 24 July 2006

THE SQUIRREL AND THE GRASSHOPPER [shedir]

THE SQUIRREL AND THE GRASSHOPPER
REST OF THE WORLD VERSION:
The squirrel works hard in the withering heat all summer long, building and improving his house andlaying up supplies for the winter. The grasshopper thinks he's a fool, and laughs and dances andplays the summer away.
Come winter, the squirrel is warm and well fed. The shivering grasshopper has no food or shelter, sohe dies out in the cold.
THE END
THE BRITISH VERSION:
The squirrel works hard in the withering heat all summer long, building his house and laying upsupplies for the winter. The grasshopper thinks he's a fool, and laughs and dances and plays thesummer away. Come winter, the squirrel is warm and well fed.
A social worker finds the shivering grasshopper, calls a press conference and demands to know whythe squirrel should be allowed to be warm and well fed while others less fortunate, like thegrasshopper, are cold and starving. The BBC shows up to provide live coverage of the shiveringgrasshopper; with cuts to a video of the squirrel in his comfortable warm home with a table ladenwith food.
The British press inform people that they should be ashamed that in a country of such wealth, thispoor grasshopper is allowed to suffer so while others have plenty. The Labour Party, Greenpeace,Animal Rights and The Grasshopper Council of GB demonstrate in front of the squirrel's house.
The BBC, interrupting a cultural festival special from Notting Hill with breaking news, broadcasts amulti cultural choir singing "We Shall Overcome". Ken Livingstone rants in an interview with TrevorMcDonald that the squirrel has gotten rich off the backs of grasshoppers, and calls for an immediatetax hike on the squirrel to make him pay his "fair share" and increases the charge for squirrels toenter inner London.
In response to pressure from the media, the Government drafts the Economic Equity and GrasshopperAnti Discrimination Act, retroactive to the beginning of the summer.
The squirrels's taxes are reassessed. He is taken to court and fined for failing to hiregrasshoppers as builders for the work he was doing on his home and an additional fine for contemptwhen he told the court the grasshopper did not want to work.
The grasshopper is provided with a council house, financial aid to furnish it and an account with alocal taxi firm to ensure he can be socially mobile. The squirrels food is siezed and re distributedto the more needy members of society, in this case the grasshopper.
Without enough money to buy more food, to pay the fine and his newly imposed retroactive taxes, thesquirrel has to downsize and start building a new home. The local authority takes over his old homeand utilises it as a temporary home for asylum seeking cats who had hijacked a plane to get toBritain as they had to share their country of origin with mice. On arrival they tried to blow up theairport because of Britains apparent love of dogs.
The cats had been arrested for the international offence of hijacking and attempt bombing but wereimmediately released because the police fed them pilchards instead of salmon whilst in custody.Initial moves to then return them to their own country were abandoned because it was feared theywould face death by the mice. The cats devise and start a scam to obtain money from peoples creditcards.
A Panorama special shows the grasshopper finishing up the last of the squirrels's food, thoughSpring is still months away, while the council house he is in, crumbles around him because he hasn'tbothered to maintain the house. He is shown to be taking drugs. Inadequate government funding isblamed for the grasshoppers drug 'illness'.
The cats seek recompense in the British courts for their treatment since arrival in UK.The grasshopper gets arrested for stabbing an old dog during a burglary to get money for his drugshabit. He is imprisoned but released immediately because he has been in custody for a few weeks. Heis placed in the care of the probation service to monitor and supervise him. Within a few weeks hehas killed a guinea pig in a botched robbery.
A commission of enquiry, that will eventually cost £10,000,000 and state the obvious, is set up.
Additional money is put into funding a drug rehabilitation scheme for grasshoppers and legal aid forlawyers representing asylum seekers is increased. The asylum seeking cats are praised by thegovernment for enriching Britain's multicultural diversity and dogs are criticised by the governmentfor failing to befriend the cats.
The grasshopper dies of a drug overdose. The usual sections of the press blame it on the obviousfailure of government to address the root causes of despair arising from social inequity and histraumatic experience of prison. They call for the resignation of a minister.
The cats are paid a million pounds each because their rights were infringed when the governmentfailed to inform them there were mice in the United Kingdom.
The squirrel, the dogs and the victims of the hijacking, the bombing, the burglaries and robberieshave to pay an additional percentage on their credit cards to cover losses, their taxes areincreased to pay for law and order and they are told that they will have to work beyond 65 becauseof a shortfall in government funds.

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