In Al Capp’s popular comic strip, “Lil Abner,” there was a spin-off from time to time about 40 years ago, about a mythical country called Lower Slobovia, where there was nothing but desolation — no vegetation, no fuel, no industry, and no jobs.

The United States, in its compulsion to solve the world’s problems, sent huge cargo planes to that country, darkening the already sky as they dropped hundreds of bales of money as the astonished citizens stood in waist-deep snow and ice.

But in the minds of the Americans the bales of money were sure to solve the country’s problems.

It is ironic that still today the U.S. thinks that throwing bales of (borrowed) money will solve all the problems and make the pain go away.

J.C. Lovett

Fayetteville, Ga.

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