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I read in the papers that our beloved president, "Free Enterprise George," spent a few days in Eastern Europe last week hustling for those countries to try Americanstyle "democracy." His impassioned speeches on the blessings of democracy—and capitalism—were featured throughout the American "free press."

However, in describing the copious life-style of the free citizens of the U.S. of A., he left a few details out. So as not to mislead our brothers and sisters of Eastern Europe, perhaps I should just clarify a few things for them about the blessings of our free enterprise system.

First of all, we do have democracy. For instance, a rich man or woman has as much right to sleep in doorways as do the homeless. And in reverse, a poor man or woman has as much right to hire a maid, butler, rent the best suite at the Fairmont, or purchase a Porsche (or even a congressman) as the rich person does.

A prime example of how our democracy works was best displayed in a full-page ad in The New York Times on July 13. It was an ad aimed at the ultimate wine connoisseur.

For the very humble price of $550,000 a whole gaggle of wine bargains were offered (including a round-trip plane ride on the Concorde to the Chateau d'Yquem, in France). Featured in the long list of wines were 36 bottles of Lafite Library wines—marked down from $250,000 to $125,000.

So for a paltry $500,000 a body could wind up owning, altogether, about 500 bottles of "quality" wine. And unlike the poor comrades behind the "Iron Curtain," our poor folks in America have as much right to buy that wine as does Donald Trump or George Bush.

One of the problems between the rich and the middle class and working class in this country is that the rich seem to catch on faster than the other two groups. The common people are a bit naive.

In the U.S. of A., we have a HUD department—which stands for Housing and Urban Development. The word was sent out by HUD some time ago that this government department was to provide housing for low-income and middleincome people and that it was all to be financed by tax dollars.

Of course, the low-income and middle-income people just didn't get the concept. They actually believed this government-sponsored myth, and lost a golden opportunity. The real purpose of HUD was to help big developers, insurance conglomerates, and bankers get a little richer by allowing them to tear down the homes of low-income and middleincome people and replace them with up-to-date condos.

This improvement of free-enterprise America's living standards, of course, didn't come cheap-even to the rich. It meant pay-offs of enormous amounts to every "born-again" judge, legislator, and government flunky-not to mention hundreds of the president's pals.

In our free-enterprise system, you don't get nothing for nothing. But if only the poor had jumped first— then they could have bought the politicians and the poor could have been sleeping in homes instead of under the trees and in doorways.

THE RICU ADE After all, that's democracy. The politicans aren't prejudiced—they'll sell out to the highest bidder.

There's one more great attribute we in the U.S. of A. have that our poor brothers and sisters behind the Iron Curtain don't. We have a Supreme Court which is bound to protect our rights under the law (except, of course, when they conflict with the rights of the rich).

Workers, for instance, have the right to organize a union and the BY right to strike-but not if they intend to win. Then the courts step in to protect the rights of the bosses and the scabs. It's all evenhanded.

And in our country, Blacks have exactly the same rights as the wealthy whites-except when they start demanding equal opportunity and such things as that. That's when El Supremo Court steps in and re-defines the words "civil rights," which turns out to be neither civil nor right.

And what about women's rights? In this country, women have complete and equal rights-except for some little things like reproductive rights, equal pay, and equal opportunity. But our great leaders declare that if they gave us those rights, it might tear apart the "whole fabric of our free-enterprise system." Women have the same right to choose between politicians owned by the rich as anyone else.

So, dear Iron Curtain comrades, eat your heart out because you don't have our freedom. Especially the "greatest" right of all—the right to burn the flag. In fact, any American can now burn a whole barnful of flags, and the only thing that would change is we would have one less barn and a whole lot less flags.

Now, that's the magic of the free enterprise system at its best.

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GETTING RICHER AND THE POOR ARE GETTING POL DRER.

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