AJC > Sandy Springs > Blog > Archives > 2008 > December > 08 > Entry
DEL.ICIO.USHey Congress, I need a bailout too!
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
I’ve heard that success is a lousy teacher; that the great people in history have learned more from their failures than they ever did when things went right. Apparently failing has also become lucrative.
By now I’ve lost count of the exact number but it looks like all those corporations that screwed up for various reasons and were circling the drain are the ones that are going a slice of a multi-billion-dollar pie from the Federal government.
All you have to do is admit to being incompetent enough to put your company in peril and you qualify for a big lick of folding green. And to think of all the years those big-time business executives wasted by spinning their stupidity when they could have been cashing in.
I was really getting the old knickers in a twist over all this — after all that’s my tax dollars — until I realized — jeepers, why not me?
For starters, back in 1999 I started a consulting company. Year one was great, year two was pretty good but by year three it was taking on water.
My target audience was getting pounded by the economy back then and I wasn’t very good at new business.
So if the banks, auto companies and other major players are in line for billions in Federal bailout cash I figure I’ll settle for $5 million — and I promise not to go off to some tony corporate retreat. I may take the family to Disney World, but we’ll stay in one of the cheaper hotels and I’ll get the kids to chip in for the gas.
Now that I think of it back in high school — my senior year — we tried to raise money by selling toothbrushes door-to-door. I think they were $2 a piece. The problem was that the brushes were not a brand anyone had heard of and our sales force — me included — weren’t very motivated. So we took a bath on that one. Let’s say that’s another $2 million.
And there were similar failures with popcorn sales for the Latin club (I joined for the extra credit), band candy and tickets to the Boy Scout Jamboree. Instead of breaking those down individually I’ll be happy to fold all three fiascos into one failure and take $3 million.
So the whole bailout for my various business failures will cost the taxpayers a paltry $10 million, a bargain compared to the $700 billion that led to this whole new perspective on chasing the American dream.
What a country!
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By Tom Osterman (yep)
December 9, 2008 11:40 PM | Link to this
Yo, Bro!
Take this simple test:
Are you “too big to fail?”, i.e. will not getting a bailout put a sizable bloc of voters out of work? Or your elected representative(s)?
Can you put out heart-rending stories of what will happen to someone (Not you. Sorry.) if you “go under.” Family won’t qualify, and must be a certifiable “little person.”
Can you go to Washington, D.C. at great expense on some lavish means of transportation (preferably your own) to sit through a televised harangue by some prominent Democratic Senator or congressman, who will make no secret of the fact that your bailout will have umpteen zillion strings attached and won’t hesitate to blame you for the woeful state of your industry or whatever it is you do?
If you can answer “yes” to all three questions you may have a shot. But you’d better move fast or there won’t be any bailout money left!
Just kidding!