What, You Wouldn't Leave Money to Someone Who Screwed You?
Margaret Elizabeth Taylor, a 98-year old widow from Findlay, Ohio, who died last November, instructed the executor of her $1.5 million estate to fork the whole works over to the federal government, with the explicit instruction that it be dedicated to reducing to the national debt. Never mind that said debt now finances all sorts of rampant idiocy--from the Office of Faith-Based Charities to the sunny prose stylings of the Lincoln Group. Never mind, in addition, that Ms. Taylor was "a staunch Democrat" and that her own attorney, Tom Drake says he would have counseled against the bequest. It's easy to make sport of all this, but we figure an Ohio Democrat at the end of her days, having suffered through November 2004, is entitled to any stunningly meaningless send-off gesture of her choosing. After all, it's not as though her vote counted when she was alive. --HOLLY MARTINS
Woman Leaves Entire Estate to Pay National Debt [WFTV, via Plastic ]