Over the last [35] years, I’ve written dozens of poems, plays, and short stories; hundreds of newspaper articles, commentaries, and comic strips; and thousands of billboards, bumper stickers, brochures, and commercials. Occasionally, I’ve even been paid for my services. — F.R. Duplantier, “Behind The Headlines”
In 1997, the Institute for Socioeconomic Studies announced that it would “award three 20-year sample tax rebates to three families who can best explain how a $1000 a month ‘raise’ would improve their lives and help them build a brighter future.” Given the modest salary I received as editorial director of America’s Future, I was coming up $10-15,000 short every year, so I figured I’d take a stab at the ISS “contest.” I submitted an 80-line poem in rhyming couplets called “What I Would Do with an Extra Twelve Grand” and made it to the “second round.” The article excerpted above, entitled “Dad Believes in Competition, and Providence,” was part of my second-round submission. The stipends, alas, went to three other families — and I continued to come up short year after year, always managing to make up the difference with the assistance of relatives kind enough to pass away in my hours of need.
In keeping with the spirit of the article, I revised the poem, retitled it “Taxpayer’s Lament,” and included it my first collection of Politickles. The article itself, I also retitled (“My Unshakeable Faith in Providence”) and distributed as a Behind The Headlines commentary. So, you see, nothing went to waste; and, once again, I demonstrated that there’s no such thing as a pointless exercise.