Doonesbury by Garry Trudeau for October 21, 2012
October 20, 2012
October 22, 2012
Transcript:
Operator: Thank you for calling MyFacts.com... privitizing the truth since 2003 or 2006. Whenever. Chairman Priebus? This is Austin from MyFacts.com... just checking to see how your alternative reality package is working for you. Chairman Priebus: It's working great, Austin. The whole party's been using the new fact set. The MSFC are simply beside themselves! Operator: The MSFC? Chairman Priebus: Mainstream fact-checkers. Ryan's convention speech had them tied up for weeks! Operator: Well, I'm not surprised, sir. Virtually all the independent fact-checkers report directly to the democratic party. Chairman Priebus: What?! Really? Operator: Of course not. But I could work up something along those lines.
“You left-wing-pinko-maggots can’t handle the truth. So we give you our version of it!”
“Truth” in the coming wonderful plutocratic world tomorrow = minimum wage: enough to keep a tin roof over your head, and one room to hold a bed, a shower, a toilet, a pipe to hang your clothes, a washer-dryer, a fridge (if you pay extra), a cupboard and a table. Welcome to unregulated free-market capitalism. Your weekly pay can’t quite cover your weekly expenses, but you can barrow up to a certain amount from the company store, in which everything costs slightly less than it does in stores outside your compound. Consequently you go deeper and deeper in debt — till at the end of your working years (from age 6 to age 76 = 70 years).
Your weekly balance of pay minus company-store debt balances at approx. $100. Since there are 50 working weeks per year, 50 weeks times $100 debt balance per week = $500 debt plus interest. $500 debt per year times 70 working years = $35,000 plus compounded interest = $3,500,000 you owe Bain Capital Multinational (BCM) at the end of your working life and the beginning of your retirement at age 70 years.
Any medical you wish to buy is added on, as well as any education you desire for your children. (If you have to ask how much money, you can’t afford to send your kids to school. You may home-school them if you wish, after your 10-hour work-day. (If they are to receive any education at all they will have to work their way through school.)
Meanwhile, the CEO of your company, BCM, lives in a 1000-room house overlooking the Pacific and drinks wine at $10,000 per bottle. His pay+bonus = a million dollars per year plus a billion dollar golden parachute in case he mismanages the company and has to leave to go manage another company.
If you don’t vote GOP you get fired. Two-hour notice max. Lots of luck finding another job, since unemployment hovers around 40% and is kept there by “unregulated free market” forces.
Don’t even think about buying an internal-combustion car at $200,000 each minimum. Gas: $100 per gallon. Get a bike and pedal. The exercise’ll keep you healthier.
Work hard and try to climb to become CEO yourself. Your chances of getting there are the same as those of winning the lottery. Besides the CEOs kids have the “connections” to get that corner office that you’ll never get.
Instead, your lot is to work hard, pray even harder, and be ready to meet your Maker, the great CEO in the sky, at any second.