Tuesday, July 1, 2008

How much do you hate your family?

Do you hate them enough to not send them to not send them a Christmas card? How about to leave them out of your will? If that isn't spiteful enough, you could force them to spend all of your money on charity. Not poetic enough? If you really want to twist the knife, you could always force them to spend every penny you have on your bichon friez.

That is what Leona Helmsley did with her multi-billion dollar hotel fortune. If you are not familiar with the story, after Leona died last year, she allocated her ~6 Billion dollar estate to charities that benefit dogs, saving 6 million for her own toy pooch.

This story angers me on many levels.

First, small dogs are dumb. They usually rank somewhere between an accessory and a stuffed animals on the food chain, even though they will try to eat both. They lack the charm of cats and larger dogs, and if you are too codepended to be a cat person, the game ended for you a long time ago. If you are not convinced: Beverly Hills Chiwawa.

Second, what about people? I don't care that she gave all her money to charity. "Immature" doesn't quite seem to cover a multi billion dollar slap in the face to your own kin and beloved, but they probably don't really need it anyway. 6 Billion dollars could help a lot of PEOPLE. There are countries with GPCs less than 6 Billion dollars. She could have actually bought everybody a coke, and still have enough to feed her pets for the next 70 bajillion dog-years.

There certainly are good charities for animals. But, as the Times reports, Helmsley's estate is more than ten times the value of every animal related non-profit in the country. (I'm not sure if this includes the one where Bob Barker spays you cat) There is certainly a better way of dealing with your money, your pets, and your family.

...At least she was ugly...

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