Companies around the world are closing facilities due to economic strife. Even blue-chip companies are getting hammered, with cash-rich titans such as Microsoft announcing cutbacks.
Except in Puerto Rico.
Uh-huh.
For some reason (stick around and you'll find out a few), Microsoft announced a $640 million expansion in Puerto Rico. In typical Microsoft-in-Borinquen fashion, the dollars are flashed, but the specifics are unflashed. All that's trumpeted is the $640 million, which could turn out to be nothing more than warehousing some 160,000 useless Vista installation CDs. (The CDs work: Vista doesn't.)
Now why would Microsoft pony up--in these times--a staggering amount of money to expand in Puerto Rico? Is it because We are "tax haven deluxe"? No. Is it because We are "megaproductive central"? No. Is it because We are "global strategic nexus"? No. We are none of those things (and We should be.) But what We are--mark My words here, folks--is for sale.
Not as in My "bid for Puerto Rico" sense, but in the "bribe a Fool" sense. For you see, the Puerto Rican (non)government is in the midst of acquiring technology, lags far behind State developments in that realm, lacks the widespread technological know-how to properly evaluate technology and the decision-making purseholders are rampant thieves.
In other words, Microsoft sees in Puerto Rico a cretin with plenty of cash. And by Jove's left testicle, they are smack-dab right.
The process is as old as the hills: Pretend to offer a lot in order to get a lot. Flash "$640 million" that never gets spent to secure licenses and dependency worth twice that. Use Puerto Rico to bolster an increasingly-shredded reputation versus opens source-based e-government success and if a double handful of Fools makes a few scattered million dollars in illegal payments, who cares? Everybody wins, right?
Of. Course. Not. What's happening here, with the (non)governor Luis "The Larva" Fortuño practically slithering on his own saliva around Microsoft's boots, perpetuates three obstacles:
1) Our idiotic pay-for-play excuse for an economic development plan, based more on "who pockets the up-front cash" than "what We build for Our future."
2) Our idiotically-willful ignorance about technology, its power and uses, relying instead on slavish aping of others.
3) Our idiotic reliance on morally-defective mental defectives to handle situations that require supra-canine intelligence to at least understand properly.
Don't be surprised if Our next brilliant economic move is Our government's purchase of a fleet of Edsels. Hey, GM is a blue-chip company, too!
The Jenius Has Spoken.
2 comments:
Jil,
The problem is that Microsoft is NOT ponying up any extra investment. Those 640 million were announced a couple of year backs and they include payroll, rent, taxes etc.
Source: http://69.89.25.193/~armandov/?p=178
The larva is not only playing the fool's game you describe, he is trying to paint us fools as well.
I've always said it, but it bears repeating. Why do you always see poor folks with or yearning for expensive cars? It's because they think BUYING something will make them successful. Buying stuff doesn't do you any good. A technology purchase isn't any good unless you have a PLAN for it. Capital isn't any good unless you have a plan for it. You name it, if you don't have a plan for it, you will fail. We have shown we have NO PLAN over and over, ad infinitum, ibid. It makes my teeth hurt.
A shovel can't dig a hole, and Microsoft Excel didn't save the banks - it's not going to save us.
In four more years, things will not have changed. Literacy will still be poor. Drop-out rates will still high. Government will still be unwieldy and corrupt. And we will still not have rolled up our sleeves, owned the problem, and seized agency in our future. It's for others to solve: Microsoft, the Federal Government. The world owes us, doesn't it? Gimmie gimmie.
Guess what, though?
They don't really give a shit - not one bit.
Post a Comment