A Plaie1 in Three Acts
Act 1 - Once Upon a Time Early in the Century
BigPharma walks into a bar and sees a few BigMoney types in a dark smoky corner, raucously retelling the latest Ponzi jokes. But a stony silence suddenly envelops the room as BigPharma steps up to the bar and orders an LD-50.2 The bartender, seeing that one of his best customers seems in a big funk over something, says, "Well, we don't serve many of those except to the bums who walk in off the street with big woes and little cash, so... shoot yerself. But take a little friendly advice on getting through tough times: never make life-and-death decisions when you're feeling suicidal."3
Nary a chuckle from B.P., which worries the bartender even more, so he shakes up a Duke's Mixture4 of odds and ends, but furtively omitting the main active ingredient, thus rendering the cocktail little more than a placebo.
BigMoney, watching the dismaying BigPharma-needing-a-Prozac scene, says, "Hey B.P., hope you're not feeling too low because of that Angel-Babe's5 dirty laundry book exposing so much of your present predicament! Not to be impolite, but we do have to watch out for our own interests: We'd hate to have to manipulate some stock prices if you can't come up with A PLAN.
B.P., sipping what he thinks might end the misery, says, "Not to Worry B.M.! I've scheduled a meeting with KillerJoe, you know, those Defense Dudes who have been financing some great research on nifty ways to spread disease and mayhem-in-general. Don't let this out of the room, but I can tell you that our international secret labs have been working towards a NewTechnology that will revolutionize the maintenance of ill-health while making BigBucks for all of us, and KillerJoe has seen the wisdom of helping us to introduce the thing. The principle is to keep people alive but only through increasing applications of the NewTechnology!"
B.P.'s show of enthusiasm was more a charade than an honest reassurance for B.M., for B.P. knew it was going to be a long road to the finish line, even with some of the world's best virus-tinkerers on board the project.
It had been decided that it would be an engineered virus that would launch the disease paving the way for the NewTechnology remedy. Much research had gone into classic bacterial scourges of old, and the best they could come up with was Lyme Disease, or psychoactive agents that were too difficult to disperse, and so on. Even a couple of attempts to produce a killer virus that killed only the targeted group had fallen flat, exemplified by DirtyTony's Make-My-Day approach to the AIDS experiment.
BigMedia had to be contacted and brought aboard, for their propaganda would be instrumental in creating a wave of fear and loathing that would turn everybody against everybody else and vice versa. It was learned long ago, during the Vietnam adventure, how powerful TV could be for undoing perfectly good projects for making BigBucks. No truth-tellers could be allowed this time. No Prime-Time Cronkites could be granted an audience. Everything had to be staged perfectly. No rogue politicians could be given a say, and if one should perchance gain ground, he would have to be discredited. Remember the spectacular change of mind for Senator J. Billington Bulworth!
Senator J. Bulworth Rebels (click for film clip)6
There could be no Oversight Committee directing all the factions, telling them what to do; the plan had to be designed so that all parties would have the same general interests. That way it would seem to all that they were pretty much in charge. These people are capitalists! They'd never agree to be lorded over by a controlling committee. If forced to get together for a conference they'd bicker endlessly about the shape of the table. Like good capitalists, they play by the rules, no-holds-barred rules which can be observed at play both in BigBusiness and BigCrime, not mutually exclusive domains.
And so, that was how VAXSCAM began, in a low-life bar on the Bowery where the humor is disagreeable and schlemiels pose as geniuses.
Don't miss the next installments of this Play (on Words), soon to be coming to a SubStack near you!
Act 2 will feature:
Bill "Softhead" Gates getting bored fighting monopoly lawsuits, and cashing in his chips to finance the purchase of the WHO.
Victoria "Fuck-Europe" Nuland distributing cookies and buying time for the rise of propeller worshipers who will be instrumental in diverting attention from the activities of some very secret labs.
A multitude of patents filed, leaving a trail of evidence.
and in Act 3:
KillerJoe takes a few liberties at the end to make the whole thing look like a biowarfare attack on China, and as a mere afterthought to kill a few important Iranians: A coverup intended to hide the actual motives of the whole affair (filthy lucre), and even filthyer control over everything and everyone.
True-doh!-the-False hob-nobs with the "Too-Klaus-for-Comfort" Schwabista, and does a hilarious stand-up duo routine with Bill "Softhead" entitled
“You Can Definitely Trust Us”
and finally, but not least, "MakeMyDay" Dirty-Tony reverses his pronouncements on everything but the Big Bang,
and another famous acolyte of "Too-Klaus-for-Comfort" warns of hard times ahead (for the peons)
No Wikipedia entry on that, but I'm quite sure it was a Woody Allen line.
Marcia Angell The Truth About the Drug Companies Random House 2004 and New York Review of Books 2004. see The Next Big Thing for an excerpt from her aticle in the New York Review of Books.
A scene from Bulworth, a 1998 film written and directed by Warren Beatty.
Another great scene was Bulworth raking Hollywood types over the coals. Might have had a more encouraging ending!
Lots of pilots are dying, and these gov folks fly alot. I can't change those things, but just hope that fate will intervene in our favor.