Dan Mancini

The other day, I received this letter from the Census Bureau:

(Click to enlarge)

It’s not the fact that the letter is written at about a second grade reading level that I find mildly insulting. That’s understandable. If you’re going to write a letter to the entire country, you sort of have to keep it simple.

What’s insulting is that the powers that be think they can only motivate me to do my civic duty by appealing to my base self-interest in the form of lame promises of my “fair share” of Federal largesse.

Thanks for the vote of confidence, guys!

Also, the letter would be far cooler if the salutation read “Dear Citizen.” It would lend the entire 2010 census an evil, dystopian air. Laurence Fishburne might show up unannounced at my door, tell me that all of reality is a computer program, and offer me the choice between a red pill and a blue pill. In which case, this would actually be the coolest census letter ever — at least until the moment when I realize that the last refuge of humanity is an underground rave attended by 10,000 insufferable hipsters, most of them with rancid dreadlocks. Then it would go back to being what it is right now: the lamest census letter ever.

Oh, well. I’ve got some paperwork to fill out. Gotta get my fair share.