Free $$$!

Dear Uncle Barry,

My wife was out of work for a year.

Then she got a job that paid 35% less than she used to make.

I worked for twenty years at the same company.

Then my position was eliminated.

Then I used up all my severance.

Then I used up all my unemployment.

Then I used up all my savings.

I live in the poorest city in the country.

It became the poorest city in the country while you were president.

It is very hard to find a good job in this city or nearby but I try very hard every day.

But no one likes me. I think they think I am too old or something.

Despite it all I managed to keep the bills paid nearly on time for the last 3 years.

But now I am broke.

And gas and food and booze and smokes aren't getting any cheaper you know.

Especially bacon and eggs and coffee and Wild Turkey.

I would really like to have you over to the house for supper and a beer summit to discuss these things but I really can not afford to feed you and Aunt Mooch right now.

Please send $$$.

Signed,

Your fauxvorite nephew

midnight rider.

p.s. don't forget to click the little clicky thingy in the bottom right corner!

HuffPo (oh, don't choke):

Obama Has Written Personal Checks To Struggling Americans

WASHINGTON -- Got problems? Tell Barack Obama. He can help. He might even give you money.

On more than one occasion, the president has cut personal checks to struggling Americans who've written to the White House, according to an excerpt from a new book by Washington Post reporter Eli Saslow about the ten letters the president reads every day.

"It's not something I should advertise, but it has happened," the president told Saslow.

How many times has President Obama intervened on someone's behalf, and with what kind of problems does he help? Mortgage payments? Medical bills? And when he wants to help someone out with a personal check, how does it work? Does he send a check signed "Barack Obama" directly to the individual in need, or does he send the money to a bank or company on the person's behalf? Do people even know when Obama has helped them out, or does the help arrive anonymously through a lawyer?

The White House declined to answer any questions about the practice.

It's long been known that the president occasionally responds to the people who write him. Several folks who've heard back from Obama have even put the correspondence up for sale. NBC reported in June, for instance, that a single mom from Hobart, Ind. hoped to stave off eviction by selling an Obama letter for thousands of dollars. And a man who'd received a note from the president in response to an angry letter about bank bonuses put the letter up for auction in March.

It seems like Obama views writing a check or making a phone call on a correspondent's behalf as a way for him to alleviate the powerlessness he sometimes feels when reading his mail from regular people.

"Some of these letters you read and you say, 'Gosh, I really want to help this person, and I may not have the tools to help them right now,'" the president told Saslow. "And then you start thinking about the fact that for every one person that wrote describing their story, there might be another hundred thousand going through the same thing. So there are times when I'm reading the letters and I feel pained that I can't do more, faster, to make a difference in their lives."