THE ROBERT W. WHITAKER ARCHIVE

CHEAP TRICKS | 2004-11-13

Speaking of Clinton reminds me of the whole subject of fraud.

So let me explain to you what "is" is.

Fraud may cost you millions of dollars, but it is still a cheap trick. It is called a cheap trick, not because a lot of money is not involved, but because it makes THE PERSON WHO DOES IT cheap.

All cheap tricksters are equal. He can be called "Guru Macadamian" and wear jewels, or he can be a shabby tramp who robs the man who gives him a free meal. He can be a Pope or a Great Theologian. He is routinely a full professor at a major university.

He is still a cheap person, a LITTLE person.

You notice I said a cheap trickster professor is as small a person as a tramp who steals from somebody who gives him a free meal. You may confuse the word hobo and tramp. What I am talking about was the exact difference between hobos and tramps. Hobos would not ask for a free meal. They would ask to WORK for a meal. They were as shabby as any tramp, but they prided themselves on the fact that they exploited nobody.

Old-fashioned Americans like me understood what a gigantic difference this was. Tramps were cheap little men. Hobos were honest men. How much money they had in their pockets or the clothes they wore had absolutely nothing to do with it. I would much rather trust the average old-fashioned hobo than I would the average modern clergyman.