Bovine Philosophies of Economics and Government

This is another of my favorites, especially the entries on surrealism and counter-culture. /jb


PURE COMMUNISM: You have two cows. Your neighbors help you take care of them, and you all share the milk.

COMMUNISM: You have two cows. The government seizes both and provides you with sour, soy milk.

RUSSIAN COMMUNISM: You have two cows. You have to take care of them, but the government takes all the milk.

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.

SOCIALISM: You have two cows. The government takes one and gives it to your neighbor.

TOTALITARIANISM: You have two cows. The government takes them and denies they ever existed. Milk is banned.

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.

BRITISH DEMOCRACY: You have two cows. You feed them sheeps’ 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.

DEMOCRAT (U.S.A): 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 money to pay the tax. The people you voted for then take the tax money and buy, at five times the true price, a cow, and give it to your neighbor. You feel righteous.

REPUBLICAN (U.S.A.): You have two cows. Your neighbor has none. So what?

AMERICAN DEMOCRACY: The government promises to give you two cows if you vote for it. After the election, the president is impeached for speculating in cow futures. The press dubs the affair “Cowgate”.

SINGAPOREAN DEMOCRACY: You have two cows. The government fines you for keeping two unlicensed farm animals in an apartment.

DICTATORSHIP: You have two cows. The government takes both and shoots you.

FASCISM: You have two cows. The government seizes both and sells you the milk.

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 and pours the milk down the drain. Then it requires you to fill out forms accounting for the missing cows.

BUREAUCRACY, AMERICAN STYLE: You have two cows. The government takes them both, shoots one, milks the other, pays you for the milk, then pours the milk down the drain.

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.

FEUDALISM: You have two cows. Your lord takes some of the milk.

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.

AMERICAN CORPORATION: You have two cows. You sell one, and force the other to produce the milk of four cows. You are surprised when the cow drops dead.

BRAZILIAN CORPORATION: You have two cows. You enter into a Partnership with an American corporation. Soon you have 1000 cows and the American corporation declares bankruptcy.

CAPITALISM, AMERICAN STYLE: You have two cows. You sell one, buy a bull, and build a herd of cows.

CAPITALISM: You have two cows. You sell one and buy a bull.

FRENCH CORPORATION: You have two cows. You go on strike because you want three cows.

GERMAN CORPORATION: You have two cows. You reengineer them so they live for 100 years, eat once a month, and milk themselves.

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 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 a Panamanian intermediary to a Cayman Islands company secretly owned by the majority shareholder, 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 two cows because the fung shue is bad.

INDIAN CORPORATION: You have two cows. You worship them.

ITALIAN CORPORATION: You have two cows but you don't know where they are. You break for lunch.

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.

RUSSIAN CORPORATION: You have two cows. You count them and learn you have five cows. You count them again and learn you have 42 cows. You count them again and learn you have 12 cows. You stop counting cows and open another bottle of vodka.

SWISS CORPORATION: You have 5000 cows, none of which belong to you. You charge for storing them for others.

CHRISTIAN: You have two cows. You keep one and give one to your neighbor.

MILITARIANISM: You have two cows. The government takes both and drafts you.

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.

POLITICAL CORRECTNESS: You are associated 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.