In the world of the American political right, government not the solution to our problems, government is the problem. Why? Because government is made up of equal parts incompetence, mismanagement and stagnant thinking that always leads to failure. It is American business that is the brilliant heart and soul of this nation run by the most competent capitalists imaginable. In fact, they say, we should make government more like businesses! Government services should be outsourced and privatized so that the magic of the marketplace will make them perfect. It is in business and the private sector where the best people and ideas percolate. That is where progress is found in America! I could not agree more – and I think I’m just the person to head more than one major U.S. corporation. In light of some of the great decisions that we seen from U.S. business over the years, I think it is high time for me to take my place in the pantheon of great business leaders.
With that in mind, I’ll exhibit for you here what I see as the greatest business decisions we’ve seen in the last 50 years and then show you what I could do in similar situations. The message: put me in charge.
#1: New Coke. What they did: Eager to chip away at Pepsi’s share of the soft drink marketplace, Coca-Cola changed their decades old formula and marketed it as “New Coke.” Basically, it was sweeter and didn’t taste as good. Sort of like Pepsi. The public went wild for it! And within a very short amount of time, regular Coke returned to the shelves and New Coke shrank considerably to “Coke II” for a few years before finally dying.
What I would do: From now on, Mountain Dew is made of piss! No, silly, not real piss! But something that looks and smells an awful lot like it. Young people will like the razzle-dazzle of this bold new flavor and marketing campaign, which has the virtue of never having been tried. “Hey everybody: let’s drink a glass of piss! Mountain Dew: 21st Century.”
What they did: As the 50s wore on the car designs were changing, Ford designed and released a massive throw-back hideous new vehicle line with something that looked like snout on the front. It was such a big deal, it has gone down in history and is studied in business and marketing classes all over the nation. It was so awesome that people were afraid to buy it and it nearly bankrupted the Ford company. What I would do: Life now is so complex and we’re awfully tired of GOVERNMENT telling us how to behave, so let’s do ourselves a favor and roll back the clocks to 1947! The new Chevy Titanic features: fins, AM radio, a trunk the size of Singapore, no seat belts (not even ineffective lap belts), glass that will shatter instead of just spider-web and a steering column that is practically guaranteed to impale the driver if you’re involved in an accident. And it gets as much as 9 miles to the gallon! “The Chevy Titanic: A Deathtrap From a Simpler Time.”
#3. Subprime mortgages.
What they did: Sell adjustable rate mortgages to people who couldn’t afford mortgages. They would initially have low rates that would then skyrocket within a few years to unaffordable levels, forcing many homeowners into bankruptcy and foreclosure. But don’t worry! For a while there, Wall Street really made a bundle! Right up until the U.S. economy collapsed!
What I would do: Get ready for it: the interchangeable community credit card. People are sick and tired of Obama-style personal finance where one person gets one credit card and then use it exclusively. From now on, banks will sell your credit card numbers to people with terrible credit and they can buy whatever they want with your card! It’s perfectly fair because the interest rate would be a favorable 50% and the real owners of the cards would get cash-back when they (or their proxy card-holders) bought common necessaries such as liquor or cigarettes. “The Community Credit Card: It’s Eeeeeeeeeasy!”
#4. The NBC “Tonight Show”
What they did: To avoid losing a quirky late-night talent, NBC demoted their #1 rated host of the Tonight Show to a 10:00pm show instead and made the quirky guy the new host of the Tonight Show. Then nobody watched either of them! So they decided to move the Tonight Show to 12:05am (technically “tomorrow”) and give the formerly #1 host a new half-hour show from 11:35 to 12:05 which was just great because it made everyone involved perfectly miserable! So the 12:05 guy gets $40 million of their money to leave and things go back to the way there were, except the formerly #1 guy is now damaged goods, they lost the quirky guy and are $40 million poorer than they were before. Bang! The bottom line: I need to be a corporate titan like the men behind these decisions – because I’m a fucking idiot, too! Just put me in there and let the magic of the marketplace do its work.
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