An old miser, because of his exceptional thrift, had no friends. Just before he died he called his doctor, lawyer and minister together around his bedside. “I have always heard you can’t take it with you, but I am going to prove you can,” he said. “I have $90,000 in cash under my matress. It’s in 3 envelopes of $20,000 each. I want each of you to take one envelope now and just before they throw the dirt on me, you throw the envelopes in.”

The threee attended the funeral, and each threw his envelope into the grave. On the way back from the cemetery, the minister said, “I don’t feel exactly right. I’m going to confess: I needed $10,000 badly for a new church we are building, so I took out $10,000 and threw only $20,000 in the grave.”

The doctor said, “I, too must confess. I am building a hospital and took $20,000 and threw in only $10,000.”

The lawyer said, “Gentlemen, I’m surprised and shocked, and ashamed of you. I don’t see how you could hold out that money. I threw in my personal check for the full amount.”

The district attorney was cross-examining the murderess.

“And after you had poisoned the coffee and your husband sat at the breakfast table partaking of the fatal dosage, didn’t you feel any qualms? Didn’t you feel the slightest pity for him, knowing he was about to die and was wholly unaware of it?”

“Yes, there was a moment when I sort of felt sorry for him.”

“When was that?”

“When he asked for the second cup.”

There’s one thing the Democrats and the Republicans share in common—our money.

Governmental machinery is the marvelous device which enables 10 men to do the work of one.

A lobbyist browing through an encyclopedia the other day came upon a stunning idea. In ancient Greece, in order to prevent statesmen from introducing stupid laws, anyone introducing a new law had to stand on a platform with a rope around his neck. If the law passed, the rope was removed. If it failed, the platform was removed.

A Morman acquaintance once pushed Mark Twain into an argument on the issue of polygamy practice. After long and tedious espositions justifying the practice, the Mormon demanded that Twain cite any passage of Scripture expressly forbidding polygamy.

“Nothing easier,” Twain replied. “No man can serve two masters.”

There’s one advantage to being poor—it’s very inexpensive.

Happy holidays to all my readers.