Thursday, September 04, 2008

TMRM: Political Consultant To The Stars

Listen up, Guv'nors. Suffering from low popularity? The people of your state gathering on the lawn of the capitol, pitchforks in hand? Don't you worry about, I've got you covered. With my simple 3 point plan, you'll soon be the most popular guy/gal your state has ever known!

1. Find oil.*

2. Tax the profits of whichever company pumps the oil.

3. Use that money to cut everyone in your state a $1200 check.

The best part of it is, this plan can almost certainly be massively scaled-up to work on a national level, should you ever set your sights on, oh I don't know, the Vice Presidency, maybe?


* Important.

3 comments:

res ipsa loquitur said...

Smells suspiciously like socialism.

Seriously, how come those oil companies didn't raise holy hell when the one-woman Jerry Springer show that is Governor Palin taxed their profits? Why didn't Lee Raymond go straight to Karl Rove howling that Palin had to be brought back into line?

Anonymous said...

Answer: because writing those checks to every Alaskan citizen is a pittance compared to the profits they make from selling that crude oil to Japan, and to other Asian countries that don't have smog laws. (The oil is, of course, too sulfurous to refine profitably for Americans, so anyone who thinks opening up Alaska to wildcat drilling will have any real effect on American energy supplies is simply a dunce.)

The oil companies understand that writing every Alaskan a $1200 check is a crucial step in the process of getting Alaskans to tell the rest of us "shut up about ANWR, you don't live here and you're never going to visit it". It's all in the business development model, believe me.

Works pretty much the same way in New Mexico, see "Otero Mesa", except each New Mexican can be bought off for a mere $300 bribe every year.

Anonymous said...

Another nifty idea: Make sure your state gets $1.84 back from the federal government for every $1 in tax paid, ie, make sure your state consistently ranks in the top 5 states for give/give back federal money.

Works wonders.