Writing for Vaudeville Part 45

Our country has got a superab.u.m, a superab.u.m--a superab.u.m--we've got a lot of money.

There's money lying in the treasury that never was touched. And the first fellow that will touch it will get six months.

The whole trouble is the trusts.

Look what the cold storage trust have done with the eggs. Sixty cents a dozen--for the good ones. And the good ones are rotten.

Then they say the reason prices are going up is because wages are getting higher.

But why should they raise the price of eggs?

The chickens ain't getting any more wages.

And if meat goes up any higher, it will be worth more than money.

Then there won't be any money.

Instead of carrying money in your pocket, you'll carry meat around.

A sirloin steak will be worth a thousand dollar bill.

When you go down to the bank to make a deposit, instead of giving the cas.h.i.+er a thousand dollar bill, you'll slip him a sirloin steak.

If you ask him for change, he'll give you a hunk of bologny.

If they keep on, we won't be able to live at all.

Statistics prove that the average wages of the workingman is one dollar a day.

Out of that, he's got to spend fifty cents a day for food; fifty-five cents for rent; ten cents for car fare.

And at the end of a hard day's work--he owes himself fifteen cents.

Yet the rich people say that the poor people are getting prosperous.

They say, look at our streets. You see nothing but automobiles.

You don't see half the poor people now that you used to.

Certainly you don't.

Half of them have already been run over and the other half is afraid to come out.

Why, between the automobiles and the trusts the poor man hasn't got a chance to live.

And if only the gas trust gets a little stronger, the price of gas will go up so high a poor man won't even be able to commit suicide.

They'll have him both ways. He can't live and he can't die.

And that's why I am with the socialists.

They say, "Down with the trusts! Do away with money. Make everything equal."

Imagine a fellow going into a jewelry store and saying:

"Give me a diamond ring, here's a lemon."

But the socialists have got some good ideas for the working people.

And my heart and soul is with the labor cla.s.s of people. I am for labor unions.

But what help are the labor unions to the working man?

Look at it in the right light.

A man pays twenty-five dollars to join a union. He gets a job in a shop for two dollars a day, works two weeks, the union gets out on a strike and he owes himself a dollar.

The unions are crying the days are too long.

They want the days shorter. They want the days should be eight hours long.

But think of the fellows out in the North Pole where the days are six months long. That's the place for the poor man to live.

When the landlord comes around and says, "Rent," all you have to do is to tell him to come around the day after tomorrow.

Then Andrew Carn.i.g.g.e.r, he comes out and tells us you should save money and put it in the bank.

What's the use of putting your money in the bank?

It's easy enough to put it in, but it aint so easy to get it out.

When you want to take your money out, you got to give the cas.h.i.+er sixty days notice.

And did you ever figure out how far a cas.h.i.+er can go in sixty days?

Then they say, as the world goes on, we are improving.

It's ridiculum.

We were better off years ago than we are now.

Look at Adam in the Garden of Eat-ing.

Life to him was a pleasure;

There was a fellow that had nothing to worry about.

Anything he wanted he could get.

But the darn fool had to get lonesome.

And that's the guy that started all our troubles.