WHEN ROBERT FROST RAN FOR PRESIDENT

A great American humorist once said: "Vote as if your ballot depended on it."

When I said that, I wasn´t kidding around. I was trying to come up with a line of ageless wit and wisdom for which I´d always be best remembered, like "Give me liberty or give me death," or "Absence makes the heart grow fonder" or "Where´s the beef?"

Soon, we´ll be voting for a new president, but let´s forget that for the moment. If you don´t know who your candidate is by now, you probably shouldn´t be looking to me for guidance. I graduated from the PRFSPS, (the Paraphrased Robert Frost School of Political Science). Thus:

"Two roads diverged in a wood, and I---I took the other one."

But, if you want a real New Hampshire autumn fun distraction before the big election, what better way than to read the Granite State´s MAIED ("Monthly Analysis of Industry Employment Data") from one year ago this month.

Alright, it was a tough summer for humor, and logic like the above is why I´m often not invited to my own book signings.

I find that all other humor column fodder pales in comparison to local government and its undoings. I say "undoings" because it is the well-accepted purpose of all homegrown legislative assemblies to fix the unbroken, complicate the simple, and find the beef.

Examples? Did we really need a law outlawing intoxication in a cemetery? We have such a statute in New Hampshire, but at the risk of exposing my social circles, I was unaware that an influx of happy hour celebrants was running amok in the one place no one would complain or need a designated driver.

Or, was it necessary to use nearly 200 words (counting all the "hereinafters" and "whereinunders") in another NH law, only to proclaim that no makers of New Hampshire imitation cheese shall label their products with lettering smaller than THIS?

My vote? I say that imitation cheesemakers in this state should be outlawed or banished to Vermont, period, no matter the wheretofore font size! Can I get an attaboy, or at least a "Write-In Sherman For Senator!" rallying cry?

Some may claim or deny first-ownership of this statement, but it was a New Hampshire pol who once said: "We´re going to turn this bill around 360 degrees." I believe that I too can aspire to such lofty rhetoric, but I´ll spare him the comic legacy of having his name mentioned here.

New Hampshire´s October 2007 MAIED was published by our ELMIB, ("Economic and Labor Market Information Bureau") and was never meant to be a funny document. Humor has no place in government, and if you believe that, you haven´t read the Congressional Record.

I never knew we had an ELMIB, and I´m now wondering if they have roadside booths. Still, determined to find some comic relief in the financial state of our state´s finances, I waded into the heady retrospect and read our ELMIB´s MAIED.

You´ll be pleased to know that New Hampshire´s total non-farm employment levels went up by nearly 11,000 a year ago. "Non-farm employment." I like that. Makes us sound like we prize our farmers above all else, and that our non-city unemployment levels are the lowest anywhere.

This must be true, if you subscribe to SURE ("Sherman´s Underwritten Rule of Equitability") which states that every action has an equal and opposite government employee.

I won´t trouble you with the MAIED´s head-pounding phraseology that I had to dumb-down enroute to a simple understanding of New Hampshire´s workload. Yes, this industry expanded and that manufacturing force trimmed its ranks. Over here we boomed and over there we fizzled. Last year we minified and next year we hope to maximize that minification. Egads.

My favorite statistic was the one we already knew like the backs of our bag-balming hands: The industry with the biggest job growth? Government. The biggest losses? Leisure and Hospitality. This is where I´d cite my campaign pledge:

If I´m voted in, as a government worker I promise to spend more time relaxing and being friendly.

Come Election Day, we´ll either have a sound economy or a reasonable facsimile of a good imitation, at least until the real beef cows come home on the other road not taken.

Copyright 2008 B. Elwin Sherman. All rights reserved. Used here with permission. This content is protected by intellectual property laws, including U.S. copyright laws. Electronic or print reproduction, adaptation, or distribution without permission is prohibited. Ordinary links to this column at elwinshumor.com may be distributed without written permission.