The Hypocrites and the Horrors

    Once upon a time in a kingdom beset by Horrors, the royal village had rather dark and spooky markets.  So dark and spooky, the markets were always having problems with the Horrors.  After one particularly horrifying problem, the King ordered bureaucratic functionaries to shine light upon the markets, and poke lanterns everywhere Horrors might be lurking, so that none of the villagers would ever run into the awful creatures again, but that never happened.

    It doesn’t take long for Horrors to bribe their way into bureaucratic functions and staff them full of Horrors, Hypocrites who look and sound and even scribble like bureaucratic functionaries, but aren’t because they’re Horrors like I said.

    Hypocrites are very good at disguises and fool everyone, you know.

    And so, light never really came to shine upon the markets.  Oh, the Hypocrites brought lanterns all right, but hardly ever lit them and then only poked in silly places no self-respecting Horror would deign to beset.  Some villagers tried complaining to the King, but his bureaucratic functionaries wouldn’t let the emails through, and other villagers tried blabbing to the media, but all the talking heads in the village were owned by Horrors, and more’s the pity, nothing ever got done.

    How could it?  The kingdom was beset by Horrors.

    On a day when Horrors were lurking up in the rafters of the markets, tossing phony beans and carrots and rutabagas in with the real beans and carrots and rutabagas, vegetable prices were plummeting.  If people actually bought all the beans and carrots and rutabagas you kind of saw in those rather dark and spooky bins, they’d never be able to eat them all, and would have to throw tons out, so villagers saw no reason to pay a lot of hard-earned royal flibbertigibbets for trash, thus vegetable prices went down and down and down.

    Villagers are funny that way.

    Alas, Horrors were trashing the markets, or so one might be excused for saying, because there was no light there, and also because they’d made bets against vegetable prices at the derivatives casino next door, and the casino was even darker and spookier than the markets and nobody in the royal village knew what was up with that place at all.  The Hypocrites had meetings all day, so zero bureaucratic functionaries were poking about with lanterns, is what was going on with them during this particular trading session, alas again.

    Eventually, farmers rose a clamor over the plummeting vegetable prices, and so it eventually transpired that the talking heads got called in after all.  Somebody found a lantern and a Hypocrite with matches, and a spokesperson for the Horrors called this press conference, and said, “vegetable prices plummeted today on fears over inflation in Asia and debt in Europe.”

    And the Horrors watched the talking heads saying this goofy thing on TV and had a good laugh, and went back to tossing phony beans and carrots and rutabagas into the bins again because that's what was really going on with the vegetable prices.

    Market manipulation.  Bean and carrot and rurabaga market manipulation. 

    Right under everybody's nose.  Or noses.  I never get that one right.

    Thereupon, as fate would have it, when vegetable prices finally got low enough to suit the awful creatures, Horrors bought up everything in the bins at big fat bargains, making oodles next door too, then took out all their phony beans and carrots and rutabagas and marked up the real beans and carrots and rutabagas over the next few trading sessions and sold them for yet more oodles.

    And the spokesperson for the Horrors called another press conference and explained, “fears over inflation in Asia and debt in Europe were overblown,” and the talking heads certainly saw the logic there, and the Horrors had a good laugh over that one too when it came on the TV, but they were all partying down on South Beach now, so no one had to go back and toss beans and carrots and rutabagas into bins this time.

    And so it came to pass that in this kingdom, light stopped shining altogether on the rather dark and spooky markets, and government functionaries stayed in their government function building and had meetings and enjoyed glazed breakfast pastries with their lattes, and the farmers sold their beans and carrots and rutabagas at horribly low prices, and were poor, and the people bought their beans and carrots and maybe 3 rutabagas because 3 of those God awful things are enough for any people, at horribly high prices and were poor too, and the Horrors reported trading profits every day but maybe 8 and partied in cabanas on weekends and market holidays and drank umbrella drinks and stuffed itchy powders up their noses and hired boy bands and got out on that dance floor and did the hoochie coochie all night long.

    And the Hypocrites quit their jobs and went to work for the Horrors, and lived happily ever after with stock options and obscene year-end bonuses.

    Rather horribly obscene year-end bonuses, if you want to know what I think.