Imagine this …
A brand of soap … we’ll call it Morning Glory … has experienced sagging sales, having been around for yonks and recently reputed to cause irritation, and worse.
In an effort to revive interest, maybe even bring in some new victims customers, a massive campaign is carefully planned, the main thrust of which is personal appearances by the company mascot, Mr. Glory himself.
With no change in the Glory formula in sight, the ad/PR machine is taking the “ram it down” tact, trotting out the same old slogans, offers and, of course, the big guns, and BIG TIME … a strategy that has worked for them time after time, and sold a lot of soap.
The UK is chosen as launch pad for the blitz, partly because Morning Glory’s reputation has been especially bitten on the ass in that country; rashes have broken out and some users have been permanently scarred.
A budget of £15 million is set … that’s a whole lotta soap.
Now, here’s the puzzling bit; the British government agrees to pay more than half of the bill, plus, plus.
Shocking, heh?
Okay, we’re not talking soap here, but another representation of morning glory called Pope Ben the Roman Numeral.
Yep … he’s bringing the road show to Britain and the British tax payers are picking up a huge part of the tab.
The total bill for the invited visit – without the cost of police and security – is estimated by the Foreign Office to be about £15m. Of this, £7m will come from the Catholic Church, the rest will be shouldered by taxpayers.
Ooooh. I know if I was still paying taxes in England I’d not be chuffed.
The monsignor coordinating the viz rationalizes this depletion of British coffers by passing the Popester off as “a head of state”, a definition the church cultivates actively, and since the Vatican is its own little world, carries some cred, but shouldn’t.
Yes, that’s my opinion; if they want to look like a State, they should pay taxes, and the pope should no more be invited to spew on global affairs than should Sun Yung Moon.
My fav bit, though, of the report is this:
So where is the Church going to find the £7m it has pledged to contribute?
… He said for the Papal visit the church hoped people would double their contributions to come up with close to a million.
Yeah … because the catholic church doesn’t have two pennies to rub together? Paaaaalllllleeeeeeaaaasssseeee …
When the head of this church gets around on an ass (pun intended), dresses in homespun and sells off the art collection, maybe … and only maybe … then there could be a point made for helping out a bit with his travel budget … like donating a week-long bus/tube pass.
Until that happens, though … frozen precipitation in perdition comes to mind as more likely … pope soap should fork out for its PR gigs.
A collection of my short stories:
I'm in this one, too ...
And I'm in here, as well ...
Paradise Preoccupied 