So I am listening to my dose of
Jeeves
while doing the Christmas kitchen prep (mmm,
chocolate-tangerine semifreddo,) and felt I must transcribe for you an exchange between Bertie Wooster and his uncle-by-marriage, Lord Percy, about an American businessman who is "skittish as a fawn." Imagine Percy's voice as that which would emanate from a stout British man with impressive muttonchop sideburns.
Percy: Odd this neurotic tendency of the American businessman. Can you account for it? No? I can. Too much coffee.
Bertie:Coffee?
Percy: That, or the New Deal.
Over in America it seems, life for the businessman is one long series of large cups of coffee, punctuated with shocks from the New Deal. He drinks a quart of coffee and along comes a nasty surprise from the New Deal. To put himself together, he drinks another quart of coffee, and along comes another nasty surprise from the New Deal. He staggers off, calling feebly for more coffee, and…
Well, you can see what I mean. Vicious circle. No nervous system could stand it.
Of course, that was then; now we have a coffee house on every corner and the New Deal seems like a capital gains tax cut in comparison with this health care deal. So clearly every entrepreneur in America's about to have a world-class nervous breakdown.
