Wow, Shayne! A great chapter, and obviously you've done your research. I didn't know half these things.
“I’m a little suspicious of any offer that seems too good to be true,” Clark said.
Good for Clark!
“Insurance companies own fifteen billion dollars worth of communication satellites many of which have nothing wrong with them other than needing minor repairs…repairs that aren’t available at any price. What happens when Superman offers to repair those satellites for $5 million apiece?”
Wasn't it Heinlein who said that once you're out of Earth's gravity well, you're halfway to anywhere? Somebody check me on this.
“This wasn’t what I was expecting to hear from you,” Lois admitted. “I thought you’d talk about Clark working for the government.”
“You were thinking we’d want to use Clark as a weapon?” Mr. Smith asked. He smirked. “We don’t actually need him. As long as nobody else uses him as a weapon we’re reasonably content.”
Wow! The government's being reasonable! Is this all a facade?
“You seem a little different than the others,” Clark said. “I thought you were going to try to sell me on promoting American interests.”
“I am,” Mr. Smith said. At Clark’s look he said, “These things I’m suggesting are very much in the best interest of America.”
Excellent point! We're all connected. Very clearly explained here, Shayne - good job. People think, Why should I care about people in Africa? You've just told us why.
“Couldn’t I just set up a Superman Foundation and accept charitable donations to do the same thing?” Clark asked. “Maybe license the use of my name and image…”
“DC Comics already owns that, unless you want to change to a different suit,” Mr. Smith said. “They’ll be collecting on all the posters and action figures and underroos for years to come. It’s the only reason they aren’t suing you for copyright violations.”
I rolled on the floor laughing at this. I bet the DC guys were rubbing their hands in glee when the Clark/Superman news came out...Also, suing Clark for copyright violation would be a major bad PR move for DC at this time....Of course, if Clark sticks around, what are the comics guys going to do? It's hard to write about a real person.
“Because a 500 megawatt coal plant burns 1.43 million tons of coal a year. Eight of those plants would burn over eleven million tons of coal, at a cost of $100 a ton. That’s not counting the employees needed to run the plant, or any of a dozen other costs associated with disposing of waste and the environmental cost.”
Shayne, excellent point here. Have you ever read
Basic Economics by Thomas Sowell? A textbook deliberately excluding the usual equations and math, but explaining economics in clear terms. The Garden of Eden wasn't an economy because resources were unlimited. Economics is the science of dealing with unlimited wants & needs with limited means - and making the decisions about which wants & needs to fulfill. Dr. Sowell made reference to the 1970's energy crisis. There was plenty of oil around - there just wasn't $10 a barrel oil. It was $30 a barrel oil. (or whatever it was.) It all depends on the cost vs benefits.
There's plenty of coal available in the USA - the question is, do we want to pay the price to use it? (The environmental issues, the mining, the ash, as you've pointed out.) Good job in pointing out some of the costs involved.
What a really excellent idea this is for Superman! The transport into space is the expensive part.
Clark continued. “What does the government get out of this?”
“Clean energy, cheap telecommunications, thousands of jobs in the solar sector with the taxes associated with that. The United States’ dependence on foreign oil would be lessened to some extent.”
“And you don’t think the government would interfere with me?”
“No more than it would interfere with any other citizen,” Mr. Smith said. “People are afraid of you now because you’re a loose cannon. You could decide to join Al Quaida tomorrow and there wouldn’t be anything we could do about it.”
“But owning stakes in a company or even a Foundation…”
“It creates a sense of stability. You’d have assets that could be seized, legal penalties that could be assessed…you’d be part of the system. People would feel that the Foundation would be important to you, so you could in some way be held accountable.”
“So basically people in Congress would feel safer if Superman was a businessman, because that’s something they can understand,” Lois said.
Wow again. Somehow you never read about this in the comic books. Lots of superhero fights....but none of this "boring" economic stuff. But it's the boring economic stuff that determines our lifestyle, what jobs are available, the opportunities for advancement, etc.
It's like this: when Rome fell and the Dark Ages came, it wasn't really Rome "falling". The city was still there (although sacked by the barbarians). What fell apart was the intricate web of merchants and transactions and insurance and shipping and risk management and banking all over the Mediterranean world. It wasn't economical to trade anymore - the risk couldn't be managed, the return wasn't great enough. And so the Western Empire descended into feudalism, illiteracy, local warlords, and the breakdown of the previous high civilization. Our civilization today is like that of the Romans - trade from far-off places, management of capital, ways to handle risk. And it's just as vulnerable to rot, decay, and attack as any advanced civilization. As Poul Anderson said, the barbarians always come.
He pulled a business card from his jacket pocket and gave it to Lois. “I’d hate for it to get lost in the middle of the Atlantic somewhere.”
Clark scowled. Apparently everyone had been briefed on his problems keeping a wallet.
Another ROTFL!
Mr. Smith shrugged. “Also, the Astronomers at SETI want to talk to you. They’d like to pinpoint the part of the galaxy that Krypton is in.”
“Why?” Clark asked. In the movie, Lex Luthor had used that information to find kryptonite. He wondered if the government was looking to see if any existed on this world as well.
“Given that are worlds are so analogous, they wonder if maybe the reason a version of you doesn’t exist here is that Krypton never exploded.”
Clark stared at the other man suddenly speechless.
Oh, Shayne, Mr. Smith is so seductive.....
