Archive for March, 2011

by KR Slade

[Note: you may think that you are familiar with the story about the goose that laid golden eggs,
however, everything that you have heard -- or know -- is wrong !! For reasons of privacy and security,
personal gain, et cetera: the true facts of this matter have long-since been consigned to fable,
legend, minor morality, and other distortions: so as to ‘protect’ the truth . . . until now.]

Once upon a time, there was a man named Gus. This was a very, very LONG time ago... And, somewhere long-since forgotten.

We do not know where this story begins. Some sources identify England or France, or more-central Europe, or even the far- or near-east. ‘Where’ is not so important as to the origin, because (as you will see later), in our ‘modern age’ the essential ‘situs’ (i.e., place) becomes several places in the world, which explain why the source is attributed to more than one place.

We do not know ‘when’ this story begins, but a general reference of time being ‘ancient-’ or ‘pre-’ history is ascertainable by the very beginning of the story...

* * * * *

Gus was walking home, from a visit to his friend -- who had just invented cheese.

On the way home, Gus saw a goose.  The goose followed Gus all the way home.  Gus liked the goose; the goose liked Gus.  The wife of Gus said, “Ah, a goose.  Good.  We will eat the goose tomorrow.”

The goose understood what the wife said, because the goose was a Magic Goose.  Although the goose knew that it could not be killed, it wanted to be loved, and to have a good home.  So, the next morning the goose laid a golden egg.

Gus was a very stupid man.  He told everyone about the goose:  about how it laid a golden egg every morning.  Many people came to see such a great wonder, and Gus gave away many eggs.

The problem was that soon everyone knew about the Magic Goose . . . and also that Gus would always be rich.  What to do?  The answer was simple.  Tell everyone that the goose was killed -- to see what was inside.  Everyone would believe it.  End of story.

This is NOT the end of the story . . . this is the beginning of the story . . .  Gus was stupid, but he was not crazy.  This is where our story begins . . .  

* * * * *

Many centuries passed.  The descendents of Gus continued the ‘family business’ of hiding the goose (usually in a flock of geese), saving the eggs, selling/loaning the eggs, and investing the ‘egg money’.  The family’s eldest male, who also inherited the stupidity of Gus, always headed the family business.  Running a golden-egg goose-laying business does not require a lot of brains; so, the company was successful, and the entire family was prolific, became very rich, and married into the best of other families.  However, since the goose was a family secret, this is why today we have so many very rich families, and no one knows how they made their money. 

More centuries passed.  The family business financed all kinds of things:  religions (notably competing religions, which was the best for the religions-business), building projects (e.g., the pyramids, Great Wall of China, many canals, etc.), wars (i.e., always both sides), royal successions / overthrows / assassinations, and just about everything important that has happened in the last few thousand years.  One of the most profitable investments was a dozen eggs, used to finance Columbus, after Isabella had offered only to pawn her necklace and a ring.

* * * * *

Finally, we arrive at the second-half of the 20th century; this is the period for which we have the best records of the business.  At the beginning of this century, the company had invested in banks; but all investment was lost in the stock market crash of 1929. 

By the 1960’s, the company was running low on choices to spend their profit from WWII and the Cold War.  Although the family were sceptical about re-investing in banks, it was explained to them that banks formerly ‘provided a service’, but now banks ‘sold a product’; so banking is now a new kind of business.  In the coming decades, all of the distinctions between various kinds of banks would disappear, as well as distinctions between banking and investing and insuring. 

The golden egg business was becoming somewhat complicated.  There arose a need for a partner with special expertise.  However, the partner-expert soon sold-out to an investment group, which soon sold to an investment-banking firm, which partially sold to another investment bank and partially created a ‘holding company’.  Actually, it is impossible to count the number of times that the company was sold, because it would depend how you counted.  Each time that there was a change of ownership or structure, there were the fees for bankers and lawyers, bonuses for the top executives, and to consultants who became famous.

In addition, there were new financial businesses.  For example, one way of hiding the golden egg business was to create a company that ostensibly sold something other than golden eggs.  So, a company was created to sell ‘derivatives’; which, although no one knew what a derivative was, enabled the new company to become so successful that it no longer needed the golden-egg business, which (once again) was sold.  People would never believe in an actual golden-egg-laying goose, but were completely confident in the magic of derivatives.

In the 1970’s, another business idea cycle came into vogue:  ‘the conglomerate’.  The Magic Goose business entered the complete range of goose-related products and services:  Guano Gold fertilizer, a museum and a theme park, public appearances, feathers, Golden-Goose Lake Resorts, Golden-Goose Mountain Ski Area, goose barnacle, goose hawk, gooseberries, goosefish, goosefoot, goose grass, and the highly successful (and patented) gooseneck.  Eventually, there was a sell-off of the amalgamated industries and a return to the central/core project of producing golden eggs.  The company president summed up, “We obviously overestimated the potential of synergies.”

This was the beginning of twenty years of ‘spin-offs’, ‘taking smaller units public’, ‘employee stock ownership programs’, ‘retirement shares investments’, ‘merging divisions’, ‘creating wholly-owned subsidiaries’, ‘splitting into independent companies’, ‘creating parent companies’, etc.  Of course, the ‘business-side’ of the ‘capitalistic method’ was to produce and sell the golden eggs; but the ‘finance-side’ of the capitalists’ ‘strata_gem’ had nothing to do with a Magic Goose or the golden eggs.  Thus, the descendants of Gus were completely eliminated from the business.

* * * * *

In 1985, the company was raided by the Federal Revenue Service, which determined that the records showed only 28 eggs output-per-month; the number of weeks in a month is 4.3, not 4.  The company president, who had worked for many years without any apparent remuneration, was arrested for ‘grand-theft-golden-eggs’ and tax evasion.  After serving 8 months, of his 10-year prison sentence, at a federal facility for white-collar criminals, he left the country and became the president of an offshore bank in the Caribbean.

The company itself was fined 5 million dollars, and all eggs in inventory were seized and forfeited as ‘proceeds of a criminal enterprise’.  The company was placed in bankruptcy.  The court-appointed trustee decided that there were few fiscal controls and professional management was required.  The company hired a salaried president, who earned $725,000 annually [plus bonuses indexed to any rise (but not decline) in the price of gold].  The executive staff also came to include a chief financial officer, auditors, and a larger professional goose-care staff.

In 1989, the company president resigned to accept a position with the federal treasury department; his departure bonus was 1,000 eggs.  The new president announced that the fiscal year, which ended on 1 April 1990, would show a big improvement over the previous year’s bottom line, after the application of ‘new accounting methods’.  However, the re-stated financial statements showed that the company would still be ‘in the red’, for the fifth successive year.

The losses began with about $1 million in ‘unsubstantiated expenses’, under the administration of the previous president.  It then cost $992,842.17:  for lawyers, auditors, and accountants to help clean-up that which in accounting terminology is called ‘the mess’.  After the scandal broke, annual revenues from royalties, sponsorships, admissions, donations, and events dropped by $10 million.

Unable to meet its expenses, the enterprise obtained a $20 million mortgage on its only asset:  the Magic Goose.  However, because of ‘market-forces’ doubt in the existence of a goose that lays golden eggs (even though the laying has been going on since before recorded history), the company was required to pay an ‘above-prime’ 18 percent rate of interest (compared to a market-rate of mortgage interest of 6%).  In addition, there was the loan requirement of insuring the ‘life’ and ‘productivity’ of the goose, as well as the insurance on the market value of gold ‘futures’ during the term of the loan.  The insurance expense added another 11 % to the cost of the loan.  And, there was the additional cost of the bank’s on-premises observers, estimated at 5%, to ‘secure the collateral’.  Although the total actual cost of the loan was 34 percent, this was not an ‘illegal rate of interest’, because, by law, the ‘loan expenses’ are not ‘interest charges’.

By the year 2000, the company had been acquired by an ‘agri business’.  At first, there were some attempts to ‘clone’ the goose; but after 5 years of effort, the scientists concluded that they could replicate the Magic Goose, except for ‘the magic’.  Also in this year was the potential scandal that the Magic Goose had not reproduced, and that domesticated geese can be polygamous.  The solution was to photograph all of the ‘decoy geese’ always with little goslings.  This ‘PR spin’ successful avoided the likely ‘sell-off of stock’ by major institutional holders, regarding the fact that some geese are long-term same-sex couples.

During 2001, the business completed its cycle of various plans:  the ‘Business Turn-around Plan’, ‘Business Restructuring Plan’, ‘Business Profitability Plan’, ‘Business Cost-Cutting Plan’, ‘Business Research and Marketing Investment Plan’, ‘Diversification Plan’,  ‘Consolidation Plan’ . . .  et cetera ad infinitum.  Each plan had been ‘successful’:  in that it raised the price of company stock for one (1) day, which enabled the management to sell some stock at a much higher-than-normal price.

The year 2002 saw the trial of the ‘sales leaseback’ concept:  sell the goose, then ‘lease it back’; in order to realise the ‘dead capital’ in the goose, capital that can be used to support and invest in further growth and progress of the ‘core business’.  This effort was abandoned when the company mistakenly bought the company to which it had sold the goose, thereby paying to lease something that it already owned.  

In 2003, there was a far-more-scary development:  ‘Mad Goose Disease’.  In order to lower the cost of goose feed, the agri-business owner had begun mixing ‘goose body parts’ into the goose feed.  Naturally, this was a problem because geese are vegetarians, although the domesticated variety will try anything.  All of the geese on the farm went ‘mad’, and had to be destroyed.  However, the Magic Goose was unaffected, because it cannot die.  As a precaution, the diet for the Magic Goose was changed to ‘all-natural veggie’, since the cost-savings, of using the animal parts, had produced a ‘savings’ of only 3 cents per month.

In 2004, there was the ‘Goose Flu’ scare.  The cost of insuring the Magic Goose increased 10 times.  The increased insurance rate did not take into consideration that a Magic Goose cannot die, because such a consideration would lower rates on goose insurability.  The demand by insurance and banking interests required the development and stockpiling of ‘goose flu vaccine’, which cost the company $100 million.

In (early) 2005, the Magic Goose went on strike, and refused to produce any golden eggs:  until the farm stopped the detestable industry practice of fattening the livers of fellow-geese, before their ‘harvest’, by forced-feeding (i.e., using a pneumatic pump, in order to swell the livers 6 to 10 times normal).  The stock price took a dive.  The strike lasted 30 days, until the company abandoned the practice.  The stock price recovered immediately. 

However, there was a withdrawal of European bank financing, due to the fact that many bank directors were members of the <<Societe generale des grands connoisseurs du pate de foie gras d’oie>> (loosely translated:  ‘goose liver-lovers’).  The bank credit cancellation caused the company’s credit-worthiness rating to be lowered, leading to the cost of financing to double, and the company stock to take another dive. 

By early-spring of 2005, the company retained the services of a former Under-Secretary of Defence, to assume duties of the newly created position of ‘Vice-President of Counter-measures’, who hired a PR ‘consulting’ firm, which ‘leaked’ information to the public.  And, there were some ‘other activities’.  The summer saw European rioting, led by the newly-established ‘green’ youth group <<Anti Grands Cons>>.  Many European bank directors retired.  The company of the Magic Goose was hailed as ‘ecological’.  The stock price doubled.  The new-VP retired, with a ‘platinum parachute’ estimated at $50,000,000.00.     

In 2006, the company announced “a ‘re-architectured’ (sic) cost structure to generate a healthier portfolio that will allow for operating margin expansion to optimally weather any future market environment”.  The stock price soared.

In 2007, the company was purchased by a very-east ‘oil-royal’, who thought that having a Magic Goose in his desert palace would be prestigious; especially the ‘entertainment value’ of finding a golden egg every day.  The company was liquidated and the Magic Goose was flown to the desert kingdom in August.  However, the goose suffered from ‘extreme disorientation’ -- from flying inside an airplane, got sick from the air-conditioning in the palace, became depressed from being the only goose in a desert, stopped laying eggs, lost its feathers, quit eating, and . . . ‘died’. 

His Supreme Serene Highness was not concerned about the goose dying.  The goose running around the palace had become boring.  Also, the goose ‘trails’ had done quite a job on the palace marble floors, even after the white marble had been changed to black-and-green.  Worse, there was the ‘slippery factor’, especially problematic for people wearing long garments and who cannot always see so well where they are stepping.  However, there was the public relations problem of not wanting the kingdom to be blamed for the death of the world’s only Magic Goose. 

The night the goose died, there was a BBC-TV special documentary program about the ‘Canadian Goose’.  Since it was autumn, the geese should be flying all-over Canada.  Why not just put the dead goose into the royal private plane . . .  fly over Canada . . .  and push the goose (i.e., what is left of it) out of the door?  No one would ever know . . . 

With all of those geese flying about in Canada, there are bound to be a few, now and then, that fall out of the sky, anyway.  It’s ‘natural’.  No one would be suspicious of finding some dead goose on the ground, during the twice-annual goose-flying time.  A Canadian would just bury it, not tell anyone, and forget about it.  And, it would not be like dropping something from a plane over the USA, where they would shoot-down the plane, causing a worse incident than a dead Magic Goose.

So, that is what they did . . .  or at least planned to do.  The problem was that they were a few weeks late; they could not find one goose (not to mention a flock), flying anywhere over Canada.  All of the geese had already gone.  So, a dead goose on the ground at this time of year would be highly suspicious; any Canadian finding a dead goose would call the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. 

Moreover, all of that flying, all-over Canada, which is much larger than they had imagined, had consumed a lot of fuel.  So, they headed home . . . via the ‘northern route’.  When they looked out and saw no more trees, and figured that no one lived there, they pushed the goose out of the door.

The fact is:  the goose landed where it would become frozen in snow and ice.  However, with global warming, that place is already unfreezing.  Another fact, which the oil-royal would have known (if he had spent some time studying, rather than being a playboy, at Oxbridge), is that the Magic Goose lives forever.  The goose is not dead. 

Someday, probably soon, the Magic Goose is going to thaw.  So, be kind to your web-footed found-friends; you may become rich . . . 

Or, maybe the story will end in another way . . . Maybe, the goose will awaken very, very ANGRY . . .  Who knows, eh?  It is going to be a very different world in the next few years . . .

The foregoing article is ‘fiction’. Then again, maybe it is a ‘fiction’ to say that it was ‘fiction’; you can never know with ‘fiction’