Columnist’s note: Behold the wages of secrecy! The following transcript is from a transmission intercepted from a $400,000 space station in geosynchronous orbit over Embassy Square. Let us hope the conspiracy theorists can find a weakness in time!
| Watkins: Let us open this secret meeting of the Hardly Veiled Economic Playboys with a prayer. Reverend?
Harper: Wait, I thought we were the “Henderson-Vance Economic Partnership.” Watkins: That name is for the suckers. Reverend? Reverend Wright: Lord, hear our prayer. Give us, O Lord, the strength to concentrate additional wealth among the members of this august body. By your grace may the people of Vance County be prosperous through the bounty of trickle-down economics. Amen. |
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All: Ka-ching!
Watkins: First order of business, then. Mr. Alston, have the members of Henderson City Council been replaced by my zombie robots? Alston: All except the one called Yount. She continues to elude us while asking impertinent questions. Watkins: This committee will not accept failure. You too can be easily replaced, Mr. Alston. Alston: My lord, she may soon be replaced by the one called Wester. He will serve us well. Watkins: I am holding you personally responsible. (Pause.) We will now hear Dr. Shearin’s report. Shearin: Through the use of Leandro money, we have managed to retain some of our best teachers. We hope that … Watkins: Fool! How can we bring in low-wage jobs with an educated population? Here is a list of Vance County’s best teachers. Terminate them immediately. Shearin: You want me to fire my best teachers? Watkins: I suppose you could do that instead. Shearin: I refuse. The children of Vance County … Watkins: Guards! Throw Dr. Shearin into the airlock. Prepare a zombie robot! Shearin: No! You’ll never get away with this! People will know that their children aren’t getting a free and appropriate public education! Watkins: You overestimate them. (Sounds of a struggle, a dull thud, then of a body being dragged away.) Mr. Fleming, tell me how the financial arrangements are progressing. Fleming: Once the zombie robots are in place, the City Council will vote to raise sewage rates by 500 percent. The proceeds will then be funneled into a HVEP “flush fund.” Every time someone uses the toilet, it’ll shower gold on us. Watkins: Excellent. Make sure they understand that outhouses will not be tolerated. We will now hear the Sweatshop, Sharecropping and Child Labor Subcommittee report. Were your discussions with the Guatemalan ambassador fruitful? (At this point the transmission was lost, probably because of a shift in the wind over the secret nuclear waste disposal facility/new library.) |
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