Abolish death politics

After the deaths of several prominent individuals in “the community,” some of our public officials are reviving death politics yet again. By “death politics,” I am here, of course, naturally referring to the fairly widespread local practice of exploiting deaths for political purposes–i.e., for political gain.

It seems that every time someone important, popular, or well-liked loses his life, local politicians converge upon funerals and rosaries. They offer cash donations. They use taxpayer funds to defray funeral and rosary expenses, for tent rentals and the like, hoping that the Department of Finance will find it in its heart of hearts to kindly reimburse them for their completely unselfish “public purpose” expenses.

(You see, if our politicians were truly selfish, they would use their own personal funds to defray these funeral and rosary expenses, taking all of the credit for themselves. Instead, they compassionately force us–the taxpayers–to share in the expenses.)

Now our compassionate and caring politicians want to go a step further than they have in the past. This time, they want to pass legislation giving them the discretion of bestowing state funerals for the recently deceased. This would enable them to score even more political points by honoring the dead in such dramatic fashion.

Not all of the recently deceased, mind you–just those who were well-connected, well-liked, or politically-influential. In other words, those for whom it would be politically useful to honor with a state funeral. The poor, ordinary, average citizen would not likely receive a state funeral–unless maybe he had a huge family of voters to woo and impress.

This may seem cynical, but how else are we to regard it? Indeed, why should we even bother having state funerals in the first place?
After all, there are many great and productive individuals who die each and every year. Many of them have never worked a day in the public sector. Many of them have created useful, beneficial businesses. Why should we believe that these people are any less important than a recently deceased high-ranking government official?

Why should a senator or mayor get a state funeral while a productive businessman–who subsidized the government worker’s salary all of his working life through taxation–go without one? Bear in mind that a great CEO–one who has made millions for his shareholders–does not get a company-sponsored corporate funeral after he dies. Why should a governor get one? Why should we worship the state?

The only government workers who should be entitled to state funerals are soldiers, firemen, and police officers–those who have perished in the line of duty. That is fair. The rest should get life insurance. The rest should provide for their own demise. Their funeral expenses should come from their own estates.

Why should we, as taxpayers, be forced into paying for the funeral expenses of unproductive and sometimes corrupt governent officials we may have never even supported in the first place?

Abolish most state funerals. Good grief, don’t expand the practice.