My new business plan

[mithriltabby]

This article from Risks Digest suggests:

On a side note, with so many countries becoming democratic - or at least, somewhat less totalitarian - I suspect it's probably becoming harder and harder to find believable foreign enemies for TV shows and movies. We've lost Russia, East Germany and South Africa over the last twenty years, plus Iraq and Afghanistan in the last five, so basically there aren't a whole lot of believable bad-guy countries in the world left. I figure that won't last long, the U.S. Government will find some new country to target as the 'enemy of the month' or whatever period of time they need to distract the public.

It suggests a wonderful business plan: being the professional bad guy.

If Hollywood and the US government will just give me vast quantities of money, I will happily establish a subversive country that will serve as a generic bad guy to all other civilized nations. (It’s not like the United States hasn’t propped up its own enemies before. This will just be explicit. We don’t even have to keep it secret; Fox News will do that for us.) I’ll even be willing to give cameos as the evil bearded villain sitting behind my massive desk feeding fish to my Maine Coon cats while declaiming my nefarious plans and uttering my booming laugh (for which I will obtain an international trademark).

Naturally, as soon as my corrupt, CIA-laundered billions come rolling in, I’ll need to hire all of you, my friends, for various lethal-sounding jobs like Minister of Propaganda (person in charge of writing up enlightened social policies using the current scare words in use by the current US administration), Chief of Secret Police (who will need to find competent policemen who don’t mind portraying jackbooted thugs while the cameras are rolling and then going back to competent police work as soon as only citizens are watching), Secretary of Public Brainwashing (responsible for hiring competent teachers and providing a highly educated populace trained in critical thinking), Drug Kingpin (tasked with demonstrating that a country that legalizes recreational drugs and educates people about their proper use will do a lot better than one that outlaws them) and Intellectual Property Pirate Captain (who will be running the network infrastructure and establishing mechanisms to directly compensate artists for their work while cutting out the middleman of the RIAA and MPAA).

Comments

[racerxmachina.livejournal.com]

I will produce thousands of Art-deco style posters of blond men and women in white peasant blouses standing in fields of golden wheat, with HAIL THE MAINE COON MOTHERLAND screaming behind them in Cyrillic.

[deirdremoon.livejournal.com]

Remember the subtitle: "Before enlightenment, sharpen claws, catch mice. After enlightenment, sharpen claws, catch mice." It's Max's mantra. :)

Oooo! Ooooo! Can I be Minister of Resource Mismanagment?

[mithriltabby]

As long as it’s in Cyrillic, it can read anything we want and the American public will still believe we’re evil.

Cabinet positions need to have sinister titles that are vaguely related to doing something actually beneficial. So the Minister of Resource Appropriation (or does “Procurement” have better evil overtones?) would actually have a fair amount of fiscal responsibility, as well as lots of photo ops oppressing the members of the populace who have their names come up in the Propaganda Lottery. (“Dear Mr. and Mrs. Citizen: your family has been selected for a staged eviction. Please pick up threadbare clothing at your local Propaganda Ministry office at least 24 hours ahead of time, and feel free to ask for coaching in hamming up your ‘eviction’ from one of our state hovels. Present this letter to your manager so you can be cleared for having the rest of the day off from work at government expense.”)

[racerxmachina.livejournal.com]

Before The Revolution, sharpen claws, catch mice. After the Revolution, sharpen claws, catch mice.

I wanna be Minister of Culture. Me, a bunch of reality-show producers, those Clockwork Orange eye-clippy things, and the entirety of the BBC's Jane Austen works. The revolution will be televised.

[deirdremoon.livejournal.com]

Lady, remind me not to piss you off!

And Max, I definitely think 'procurement'. :)

[mithriltabby]

That’s exactly the kind of barbaric treatment we need to have for the right visitors from the USA. Funny how they only get abducted and tortured if they’re in on business, never if they’re just playing tourist.

[zevblue.livejournal.com]

OK, I want to the Bad Ass Babe in the red sportscar, who delivers secret plans, vials of toxic goo, and the obligtory secret agaent who has stunbled into the wrong base at the wrong time - PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE???????

[mithriltabby]

We’ll definitely need an intelligence service to be prepared to thoroughly confuse any visiting agents from the United States and any other countries that need us as a public enemy.

[cmccurry.livejournal.com]

I figure I can do the shady military officer or the hired mercenary that the government uses to oppress the populace.