The other morning, I was driving up to Albany listening to Public Radio. Some feminist was holding forth on the terrible injustice that only dead white males are featured on money. She was very upset that women had never been pictured on United States currency. Well, I can forgive her for forgetting the Susan B. Anthony dollar since most everyone else has forgotten it, too.

In that illogical state one gets when there has been too little sleep, too much coffee, and too many boring interstate miles it came to me that the salvation of our country is that we *do not* place the pictures of happy females on our money.

One cold fish-eye look from Ulysses S. Grant and you think again about buying that 103rd pair of shoes. Dour George Washington glares disapprovingly as you purchase yet another lottery ticket. The dwindling supply of assassinated Abe Lincoln's in your wallet puts a damper on most frivolity.

Would a smiling picture of former NOW President Patricia Ireland provide a needed drag on our profligacy? Hardly. If Helen Gurley Brown gets another facelift the fright factor might be something to consider.

Americans began plunging headlong into debt at about the same time they started handing out designer checks down at the bank. It hardly seems possible that the check with the serene landscape is going to bounce. Flowers, cars, space ships, almost any icon you can imagine is printed on checks. I would guess you could get a feminist heroes series -- well, maybe not.

Bank card plastic invites you to burn through your cash and credit. My Visa card has a hologram of a dove sailing off into freedom. My American Express card features a photo of Mercury, the swift. My new Sears card has blue lines that quiver when you stare at them - I believe the intended effect is hypnotic.

The British understand the importance of sour money. Even though they put a picture of the Queen on every pound and pence, they make sure she is not smiling. Whatever you are buying, SHE is not amused. The result is that Britain has the strongest economy in Europe while we push our pastel plastic about like drunken sailors on shore leave.

Congress is now considering the creation of one and two dollar coins. There will be the inevitable shouting match to see which victim group gets to put the face of their biggest victim on our money. I really do not care who gets the nod as long as the rendition of their face is severe, dismal, and ill-humored. Like most feminists who do essays on Public Radio.

Postscript - They ended up putting Sacagawea and her baby John Baptiste on the front (or obverse) side of the coin.  As I had hoped, both look fairly adverse.

© Copyright 1998, Merrill Guice, All Rights Reserved