Reg and Syd Save The Arctic

“I tell you, Reg, sometimes it just doesn’t pay to try to follow the news.”

“Oh?”

“This item here. The protest brewing over Shell Oil’s plans to drill in Arctic waters. I’m sure to be getting memos from my people about this.”

“Sydney. Environmental codswallop? Again?”

“Well, surely you don’t plan to ignore this?”

“No. I plan to promote it.”

“Uh … but won’t that have an impact on your portfolio?”

“I’ll do it anonymously, of course. Besides. I divested my petroleum interests long ago, as soon as they started dabbling in that hopelessly-unprofitable biofuels bullhockey. I tell my HR directors not to hire any Ph.D.s unless the job absolutely calls for it, and then to weigh the profits from any prospective hire against the substantial retraining costs. Attitude adjustment is expensive. This can’t hurt me.”

“But how will it help?”

“Simple. Simple enough for you to have worked it out for yourself, Syd; you’ll be ashamed of yourself when I tell you. You promote the cause. People buy into it. Immediate profits, like what happened with those polar bears on the cola cans. Then, the people who buy into it start getting involved. Social networks. Campaigns. Rallies. Cruises, probably including those Sea Shepherd pirate ships. All of which takes energy, Sydney. The very energy that these idiots are trying to stop Shell from generating! You don’t suppose that any of these protestors are going to walk to their meetings, do you?”

“Tee hee.”

“So we promote all this, secretly, and just as secretly collect the data on just how much energy is being used to stop energy being generated. Then we sell the data to Rush. A nice juicy story about how the liberal intelligentsia are trying to prevent anyone but themselves from having a life.”

“He could use a nice juicy story, to distract people from this ‘war on women’ that he precipitated, rather unwisely if I may say so.”

“It might even serve as a useful counterattack, as the people who are likely to be involved with, and spend energy on, that cause are likely to be the same ones that get involved with protesting this Arctic drilling business. The impact will surely be to discredit the protests and allow for business to proceed according to the true will of the people, which as we both know is ‘we want our gas, and we want it now‘.”

“You don’t think there’s a possibility that people will make the necessary lifestyle changes to accommodate dwindling energy supplies and the multiplying effects of using those supplies, as a result of all this protest activity?”

“Sydney. Not even Franklin Roosevelt, with World War II as his justification, could compel American citizens to live within their energy rations. The people will use the supplies until they’re gone, they will have things no other way. It is our duty and responsibility, to ourselves and our shareholders, to extract every drop of profit from these energy supplies until we no longer have them. And we will no longer have them, sooner or later, Syd. That’s as certain as death and tax evasion.”

“What then, Reg?”

“That’s when we trot out the Live Where You Work® product. Without energy to power transportation or computer networks, people will need to live close to their workplaces. Live Where You Work® will provide everything you need – work, home, recreation – all ‘under one roof’, so to speak. And, of course, we will own all the plantations, all the factories, all the shops, all the housing. The customers will be captive, and the profits will roll in.”

“And you’ll have whole crowds of people singing about no. 9 coal.”

“As a matter of fact, Syd, coal mines should be perfectly well suited for Live Where You Work® communities, and we’ve already selected certain ones for product testing. What is in the cellar today?”

“I thought you’d never ask, Reg. Boy!”