Date Received: Tue, 13 May 1997
- 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".
- A BRITISH CORPORATION:
- You have two cows. Both are mad.
- A CHINESE CORPORATION:
- You have two cows. You have 300 people milking them. You claim full employment, high bovine productivity, and arrest the newsman who reported the numbers.
- A FRENCH CORPORATION:
- You have two cows. You go on strike because you want three cows.
- A GERMAN CORPORATION:
- You have two cows. You reengineer them so they live for 100 years, eat once a month, and milk themselves.
- A HINDU CORPORATION:
- You have two cows. You worship them.
- A 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. You then create clever cow cartoon images called Cowkimon and market them Worldwide.
- A NEW ZEALAND CORPORATION:
- You have two cows. That one on the left is kinda cute...
- A 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.
- A SWISS CORPORATION:
- You have 5000 cows, none of which belong to you. You charge others for storing them.
- AN ITALIAN CORPORATION:
- You have two cows, but you don't know where they are. You break for lunch.
- AN 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.
- 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.
- BRITISH DEMOCRACY:
- You have two cows. You feed them sheep' brains and they go mad. The government doesn't do anything.
- 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.
- 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.
- CAPITALISM:
- You have two cows. You sell one and buy a bull. Your herd multiplies, and the economy grows. You sell them and retire on the income.
- COUNTER CULTURE:
- Wow, dude, there's like... these two cows, man. You got to have some of this milk.
- DICTATORSHIP:
- You have two cows. The government takes both and shoots you.
- ENVIRONMENTALISM:
- You have two cows. The government bans you from milking or killing them.
- EUROPEAN DEMOCRACY:
- 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.
- FASCISM:
- You have two cows. The government takes both, hires you to take care of them, and sells you the milk.
- FEMINISM:
- You have two cows. They get married and adopt a veal calf.
- FEUDALISM:
- You have two cows. Your lord takes some of the milk.
- 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 shui is bad.
Enron variant:
- As above, but instead of the fung shui, sell one cow to buy a new resident of the United States, leaving you with nine cows. No balance sheet provided with the release. The public buys your bull.
- MILITARIANISM:
- You have two cows. The government takes both and drafts you.
- NIGERIAN DEMOCRACY:
- You have two cows. The government takes both and shoots you and send the cows to Zurich.
- 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.
- PURE COMMUNISM:
- You have two cows. Your neighbors help you take care of them, and you all share the milk.
- PURE DEMOCRACY:
- You have two cows. Your neighbors decide who gets 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.
- REPRESENTATIVE DEMOCRACY:
- You have two cows. Your neighbors pick someone to tell you who gets the milk.
- RUSSIAN COMMUNISM:
- You have two cows. You have to take care of them, but the government takes all the milk.
- SINGAPOREAN DEMOCRACY:
- You have two cows. The government fines you for keeping two unlicensed farm animals in an apartment.
- SURREALISM:
- You have two giraffes. The government requires you to take harmonica lessons.
- TOTALITARIANISM:
- You have two cows. The government takes them and denies they ever existed. Milk is banned.
An infographic (abridged) version is
here: