With the success of the GBO system, the barriers between the two institutions were blurred. Doukhobor realized that government had a monopoly on the rules of society, it determined the laws and what penalties followed when they were broken. There was no competition for the state and thus, it did not perform as efficiently as it possibly could. There were bureaus that funded art programs, which had negative profit returns; there were departments that focused on environmental studies, which made no money for the government or its citizens; there were small caucuses that oversaw schooling, farming, the citizen’s physical and psychological well-being, population statistics, wildlife, children’s welfare, etc. but none of them made any money for the system. He was quoted once as saying: “If something has no monetary value, as determined by the consumer, than it has no value at all. Nature teaches us this, as even the human body is worth something. However, we know that it must be separated in order to have a market, so we sell off the pieces and throw away the rest.”
Doukhobor worked to remove frivolous expenditures and to streamline the purpose of government, realizing the Schumpeterian route it was naturally taking. He highlighted this in his famous five points speech. All citizens, he said, were entitled to expect from their government: safety, financial possibilities, structure, basic human rights, and lastly, harmony. These, Doukhobor argued, could only be provided by a government that was business based, a government that focused on profits and targets, a government that provided jobs and expected efficiency in exchange. Doukhobor wrote in his immortal Penny Thoughts pamphlet: “I am not a citizen and a consumer, two things that conflict with each other, I am a worker for the world, I am a consumer of the world’s productivity, I seek goals and I attain them, I work for my government and my government works for me.” He correctly reasoned that an economically powered government could provide all of his five points and that these would be accomplished not by force but by the natural progression of a successful business plan. A well-developed plan, he showed, would provide structure and possibilities, which would in turn provide safety and harmony. Once these were in place, basic human rights were inherent in the system.
Doukhobor’s USS was realized eight years after unification. The structure of the new world government would be based upon his model, with a board of directors, a president, a CEO, and a matrix management system that stretched down into every citizen’s home district. These men would be chosen based upon the capital gains of their businesses every four years. Powerful companies like Immunex, Global Tech, Barringer’s, FullSafe Insurance, and others, would be able to appoint board members from the highest echelons of their companies. These men would make up the world’s board of directors and amongst them would be chosen the CEO and president. On a curved scale, each business would be allocated a position in the government. If a company had a billion numbers in profit, they would be capable of appointing a manager of a particular department or a member of the senate. If a company made one million digits a particular year, they would be eligible to post a representative from a state district, and so on.
To ensure the union between capital and government was always transparent, and because many representatives were in essence advocates for a number of private firms, they were required to don patronage suits whenever they conducted official business. These suits were generally dyed a primary color, covered the wearer from head-to-toe, and carried the symbol of each of their corporate sponsors, that way citizens knew immediately from which company or companies an official represented. As the program progressed, most bureaucrats took to the custom of having the primary corporate sponsor’s logo placed in a significant spot (say square on the back) and much larger than any other, with secondary sponsors having their icons smaller, inferior sponsors ever smaller, etc. until their suit was nearly covered in corporate transparency. In this way, no one could ever confuse their motives nor argue they were unaware which entity’s interests they were advocating.
For his accomplishment, Doukhobor was appointed the first grand advisor to the first Chief Executive Officer.
* * *
He, with whom we are well known, although not mutually, as it were, wakes (purely coincidentally) in the warmth of flannel covers and rightfully acknowledges the ceiling. As previously suggested, it does not escape his attention that he is the composer of a particularly lengthy opus that has yet to be smoothly placed within the entire score and focuses his attention on the twisted hands to ensure he is not missing anything. He has previously and lazily missed the daily premiere and has never forgiven himself for it, as it is a lengthy operation in which he receives a tissue feast engorged with potential and further fodder for his creation. He lies motionless, despite the promises of the on-screen divinity exposing her flesh in a myriad of movements that applaud the day, unable to convince himself to leave the sanctuary of his bed, if she be an Esmeralda, he is perfectly willing to behave in a camel-like fashion. He can feel the cold air of the room on his arm, lying on top of the covers and remains motionless, as if the apatetic vision of her caught within the screen was an admission of his future apostate situation. He runs his other hand over his crotch and itches the spot between his anus and scrotum while he considers the habromania that will surely follow. The flannel slides against him and he begins to rub himself against the sheet.
A woman is removing her shirt. A girl is running on the beach, he can see the profile of her body. She does not notice the bikini riding up, the flesh of her taut cheek slowly exposing itself to the sunbathers. A nameless woman lifts up her shirt for a second, he captures the image of her breasts. The dancer bends down, her legs apart, her buttocks in the air and sweeps her naked chest in front of the audience, teasing them. She springs back up, folds her knees and begins to slither towards him. Her expression is a mirage, she wants my paycheck. No, she wants me. She wants me to take her in my car, after she’s done with all the others. Yes, she wants it. She’s on top. Her head’s banging against the glass, her breasts rocking back and forth; she’s screaming how great it is.
With this assistance of a small cube of tissue, he is free to depart and enter the conscious firmament, a place where the good (in the strictest of senses, as defined in the Manual) listen and watch with attention to the personal affairs of others for what are intended to be purely Watsonian purposes. She is still languishing in the room, the dark men holding watch over, a promise of violence echoing within her subconscious even as they remain in statue positions. He can see the folds of the covers, the contours of her body framed by the blankets, the rhythmic movement of her breathing softly. He runs his fingers over the screen, feeling the small shock of static electricity and she moves slightly so that he recalls his hand, Heisenbergly. She felt me, a giant ghost hand probing her in her sleep. No, she is still in the corner, a dunce hat on her head and the dark men spying on her from within shady goggles. They have chained a wolf to the door. There is a ghost circling overhead, chasing the arms of the fan that seems to please the dark men, who watch her shivering like a haptodysphoriac covered in wool. Wake up darling, wake up. She turns and presses a button on her alarm clock. She lies back down and slides back into the room, where the dark men are waiting with the wolf and the ghost, eyeing the way the cold air affects her body. This is the third time she’s had this one. He returns his fingers to the screen. She raises, her dark hair pressed up in a spider web tiara, her face still swollen from the night. Her arms are bare, her legs are naked, her shoulders are exposed. She has a gray gown on that flows down to her knees. She puts her slippers on, left foot, then right and disappears into the bathroom.