Sound Off

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Hello and welcome to Sound Off, the show where we have experts sound off on various issues so you don't have to. Tonight we'll be taking a look at an innovative new technique being used to improve the lives of hundreds of corporate executives across America while also increasing productivity. We'll be talking more about that in a little bit, but first let me introduce our panel of experts who will be handling your calls.

[ to be written: panel of experts ]

Now, let me give you a little bit of background on this. Throughout the history of industrial civilization, Americans have always striven towards ever greater prosperity for those most deserving of reward. In the early 1900s, Thomas Edison invented the lightbulb, allowing work to proceed long after sundown, so far more work got done. In the latter half of the century, advanced management techniques allowed corporate officials to effectively isolate themselves behind layers of middle management, allowing them to work with fewer interruptions by unhappy customers. The invention of automated telephone answering scripts honed this trend still further, to the point where a company can easily keep hundreds of customers on hold for hours without a single staff member present.

Now, these innovations have all been great boons to our national productivity, as they keep the problems carefully separated from the producers. But it was only just last month that a truly innovative new technique arrived on the scene, and we're going to tell you some more about that. But first, I want to show you this brief video clip. It's a silent clip, taken from a security camera, so I'll just narrate and explain what's going on. Ok, here we go...

So here we see a customer coming into a store... he's got a bag with him and maybe a receipt in one hand, probably coming in to complain about something... under the old payday loans system, he'd be directed to a customer service desk, but here's where the exciting stuff happens: two employees approach the man. One of them grabs him by the arms, from behind -- now these guys are highly trained, they won't hurt him -- while the other goes through his pockets, takes out his wallet, and removes all his cash and credit cards. ... They're done with the wallet now... very considerately and gently putting the emptied wallet back in the customer's pocket... and now they're giving him a courtesy escort back out the front door... and finally we see the employees handing the cash and cards over to the bursar... instant profit! ...and that's the end of the clip.

Now... do you see how absolutely brilliant this is? I mean, this totally changes the way commerce will work from now on! In the bad old days, as they will soon be known, a company had to deliver a "product" if they wanted to make money. Customers come in, hand over the money, and get some gewgaw in return. This business model has always been just absolutely riddled with problems -- products cost money to manufacture, customers can complain that the product is defective, and so on -- but it was simply the best we had to work with. But with one fell swoop, we see here demonstrated a much much more efficient way to get the money from the customer to the company, which is simply to make use of the company's superior force to physically restrain the customer and -- simply -- take his money from him. I know, it seems almost unbelievable that nobody thought of this before now!

And what's happening now, as you might expect with anything done by a "large corporation", especially if it involves increasing profit, is the liberal media are just all over this thing -- claiming there are "ethical issues" with this whole thing, whining about how "it's not fair!" Look, you know this as well as I do -- corporations aren't "evil", they're just looking out for the bottom line, right? This revolutionary technique does that, in spades. I mean, look at the gains: You can eliminate the customer service desk. You can eliminate product development and research. You can eliminate cash registers and loss prevention equipment. All you need is a few strong staff people trained in personal combat techniques, and maybe a few firearms just to prevent customers from escaping before surrendering their cash.

So... that's what's we're talking about tonight, and I think it's time to take our first caller...

(later in show, have a caller say something off-message which results in a "Sound Off Moment -- the moment where some wingnut gets through and we just have to turn the sound off".)