Poking fun at the world
Ok, here is a funny thing. It makes fun of a lot of governments and then some culture. A tad long, but very enjoyable.
2 Cows
A DEMOCRAT: You have two cows. Your neighbor has none. You feel guilty for being successful. You vote people into office who tax your cows, forcing you to sell one to raise the money to pay the tax. The people you voted for then take the tax money and buy a cow and give it to your neighbor. You feel righteous. Barbara Streisand sings for you.
A REPUBLICAN: You have two cows. Your neighbor has none. So?
FEUDALISM: You have two cows. Your Lord takes some of the milk.
A COMMUNIST: You have two cows. The government seizes both and provides you with milk. You wait in line for hours to get it. It is expensive and sour.
PURE SOCIALISM: You have two cows. The government takes them and puts them in a barn with everyone else’s cows. You have to take care of all the cows. The government gives you as much milk as you need.
BUREAUCRATIC SOCIALISM: You have two cows. The government takes them and puts them in a barn with everyone else’s cows. They are cared for by ex-chicken farmers. You have to take care of the chickens the government took from the chicken farmers. The government gives you as much milk and as many eggs as the regulations say you should need.
A FASCIST: You have two cows. The government seizes both and sells you the milk. You join the underground and start a campaign of sabotage which ultimately blows up the cows.
PURE COMMUNISM: You have two cows. Your neighbors help you take care of them and you all share the milk.
RUSSIAN COMMUNISM: You have two cows. You have to take care of them but the government takes all the milk.
DICTATORSHIP: You have two cows. The government takes both and shoots you.
SINGAPOREAN DEMOCRACY: You have two cows. The government fines you for keeping two unlicensed farm animals in an apartment.
MILITARIARISM: You have two cows. The government takes both and drafts you.
CAPITALISM, AMERICAN STYLE: You have two cows. You sell one, buy a bull, and build a herd of cows.
HONG KONG CAPITALISM: You have two cows. You sell three of them to your publicly listed company, using letters of credit opened by your brother-in-law at the bank, then execute a debt/equity swap with the associated general offer so that you get all four cows back, with a tax deduction for keeping five cows. The milk rights of six cows are transferred via Panamanian intermediary to a Cayman Islands company secretly owned by the majority share holder, who sells the rights to all seven cows’ milk back to the listed company. The annual report says that the company owns eight cows, with an option on one more. Meanwhile, you kill the cows because the feng shui is bad.
PURE DEMOCRACY: You have two cows. Your neighbors decide who gets the milk.
REPRESENTATIVE DEMOCRACY: You have two cows. Your neighbors pick someone to tell you who gets the milk.
DEMOCRACY, BRITISH STYLE: You have two cows. You feed them sheep brains and they go mad. The government doesn’t do anything.
DEMOCRACY, AMERICAN STYLE: You have two cows. The government taxes you to the point you have to sell both to support a man in a foreign country who has only one cow, which was a gift from your government.
BUREAUCRACY: You have two cows. At first the government regulates what you can feed them and when you can milk them. Then it pays you not to milk them. After that it takes both, shoots one, milks the other, pays you for the milk, then pours the milk down the drain. Then it requires you to fill out forms accounting for the missing cows.
ANARCHY: You have two cows. Either you sell the milk at a fair price or your neighbors try to kill you and take the cows.
AN AMERICAN CORPORATION: You have two cows. You sell one, lease it back to yourself and do an IPO on the second one. You force the two cows to produce the milk of four cows. You are surprised when one cow drops dead. You spin an announcement to the analysts that you have reduced your expenses. Your stock goes up.
A JAPANESE CORPORATION: You have two cows. You redesign them so they are one-tenth the size of an ordinary cow and produce twenty times the milk. They learn to travel on unbelievably crowded trains. Most are at the top of their class at cow school.
AN ITALIAN CORPORATION: You have two cows but you don’t know where they are. While ambling around, you see a beautiful woman. You break for lunch. Life is good.
A RUSSIAN CORPORATION: You have two cows. You count them and learn you have five cows. You have some more vodka. You count them again and learn you have 42 cows. You stop counting cows and open another bottle of vodka. The Mafia shows up and takes over however many cows you really have.
A SWISS CORPORATION: You have 5000 cows, none of which belong to you. You charge for storing them for others. If they give milk, you tell no one.
A BRAZILIAN CORPORATION: You have two cows. You enter into a partnership with an American corporation. Soon you have 1000 cows. You expropriate them. The American corporation goes chapter 11.
AN INDIAN CORPORATION: You have two cows. You worship them.
A TALIBAN: You have two cows. You turn them loose in the Afghan “countryside” and they both die. You blame the godless American infidels.
ENVIRONMENTALISM: You have two cows. The government bans you from milking or killing them.
FEMINISM: You have two cows. They get married and adopt a veal calf.
TOTALITARIANISM: You have two cows. The government takes them and denies they ever existed. Milk is banned.
POLITICAL CORRECTNESS: You are associated with (with the concept of “ownership” is a symbol of the phallo-centric, war-mongering, intolerant past) two differently aged (but no less valuable to society) bovines of non-specified gender.
COUNTER CULTURE: Wow, dude, there’s like… these two cows, man. You got to have some of this milk.
SURREALISM: You have two giraffes. The government requires you to take harmonica lessons.