The Scout Report

Documentary Series: "History's Most Intriguing Ironies"

Scarlett Billows Productions (SBP), the parent company of The Scout Report (TSR), feels the need to diversify in order to generate a profit for its shareholders. Okay, if not a profit, then the appearance of revenue of some sort, even if it's fiat currency from a zombie bank, which pretty much describes all currency these days. As irony—a.k.a. the derivative off of which TSR has been dining for years—would have it, the shareholders in question are also members of TSR's editorial board. Not since Mrs. James Peregrine Leger-Demain, IV, TSR's chief of protocol enforcement and downsizing, made a few Benjamins selling defenestration kits to Wall Streeters in October 2008 has the board earned anything but scorn.

So, here we are. Scarlett Billows, acting unilaterally as always from the SBP bunker (upper left), has turned to film-making to keep TSR in mutton and mead, because if facile pilferer James Cameron can make a fortune, why can't she? Well, she can and will. Cherry Blossoms: the Double Agents of WWII is the first documentary in SBP's original, non-Cameronian series, History's Most Intriguing Ironies. The Texas Board of Education has already expressed interest in adding Cherry Blossoms to its history curriculum.

Controlled tangent. On December 11, 1941, someone chopped down four Japanese cherry trees in Washington in retaliation for the Japanese attack against the U.S. Pacific Fleet at Pearl Harbor. The U.S. government responded quickly and effectively to prevent more hatchet jobs by temporarily renaming them "Oriental" cherry trees, successfully fooling everyone under the age of seven.

Lemon Socialism, Zombie Banks, and Clawback Diplomacy: 2.23.09

Due to the galaxy-wide collapse of every financial institution ever incorporated, The Scout Report's editorial board has been playing the quiet game in Dick Cheney's abandoned bunker. Much to the board's surprise, the aforementioned bunker's legendary Undisclosed Location (UL) turned out to be the pool house at the Naval Observatory. His Halliburton pennant still hangs over the family cauldron. Team spirit!

Revealing digression. The board is whiling away the recession in the bunker playing Charades, using only words and terms its members never heard of before things went terribly wrong—derivatives, Madoff, securitization, debt swaps, zombie banks, clawback, lemon socialism, and trillion. Meanwhile, Mrs. James Peregrine Leger-Demain IV, TSR's chief of protocol enforcement and defenestration, received Lehman Brothers' first Clawback Fellowship, a little-known entitlement embedded in the Stimulus Bill. (Mrs. IV can't believe she's the only one who thinks it's funny that it's called a "bill.") She has elected to study menu engineering at the University of Phoenix, the one school Governor Sarah Palin didn't attend. 

Jarring juxtaposition. TSR board is happy to report that the glass is half-Fuld. The wife of former Lehman Brothers CEO, Kathleen Fuld, has emerged as a role model for frugality and discreet acquisitioning. First of all, she negotiated the purchase of a $13.3 million Florida mansion for a mere $100. That's right, one Benjamin. With her savings, she was able to buy cashmere throws from Hermès to give those with a less developed sense of entitlement. 

The Vapors, Fiat Currency, and Wolves: 10.26.08

TSR's editorial board members are heirloom rich and cash poor, as mandated by company bylaws. Members exude a snarky gentility and have impeccable manners. During recent weeks, however, when the board witnessed the value of its meager assets morph into Confederate dollars, it assumed the wartime position: Contract the vapors. Second, follow emergency procedures for Continuity of Government (CoG). Convert to modest suppers of root vegetables and kidney-bean rabbit (left) or mutton. Dignify meals with great-grandmama's discontinued Haviland and unnecessarily ornate Chantilly. Third, maintain a stiff upper lip and stiffer drinks until fortunes reverse.

Revealing digression. Mrs. James Peregrine Leger-Demain, IV, TSR's chief of protocol enforcement and defenestration, was reading her favorite Charlotte Perkins Gilman poem, "The Wolf at the Door" (left), to her children—Driveway, Pee Dee, Waxhaw, Chigger, and 雞尾酒—as she does every night at bedtime. "Children are more malleable in the morning, if they lay awake all night trembling." Suddenly, she realized that being torn apart my a pack of rabid wolves was an apt analogy for TSR's current economic downturn. Mrs. IV pulled out her signed copy of M.F.K. Fisher's wartime classic, How to Cook a Wolf (1942), and began planning supper.

Jarring juxtaposition. TSR invited Joe the Aerial Wolf Hunter (right) for cocktails last night. (He preferred the six-pack the board happened to have stored in the bunker its members sometimes share with Dick Cheney, another talented marksman.) Joe argued eloquently that shooting wolves protects the moose and caribou herds, and the bounty he receives pays the legal fees to fight Joe Junior's meth-lab conviction. Mrs. IV, always nonpartisan, commented, "I don't imagine that makes the moose feel any safer, since the governor herself is quite the moose slayer. On the other hand, killing wolves does reduce the competition. I dunno, though, sounds a little like socialism to me."

...The 180 volunteer pilots and aerial gunners who are the backbone of the program can get $150 in cash for turning in legs of freshly killed wolves, Gov. Sarah Palin's office announced Tuesday. Previously, the only reward was a wolf pelt they could sell, usually for somewhere between $200 and $300, said Bruce Bartley, Department of Fish and Game spokesman.—Anchorage Daily News

Wall Streeters Offered Defenestration Kits: 10.12.08

The Scout Report editorial board was reminded of the 1618 Defenestration of Prague (left, click for larger image), while watching things go terribly wrong on Wall Street from the safety of the bunker it shares with Dick Cheney [HAL 17.41 -1.53 (-8.08%) Oct 10 4:01pm ET] at an undisclosed location. TSR's chief of protocol enforcement and downsizing—Mrs. James Peregrine Leger-Demain IV—is familiar with defenestration (the act of throwing someone out the window), as it is the preferred method of attrition at TSR. Not only is it not easy to achieve from a bunker, it's almost impossible to perform in a modern skyscraper, which is hermetically sealed with non-operable, double-glazed, laminated, window units.

Controlled tangent. Fire and rescue departments in the U.S. have equipment for what they call "penetration-deterrent windows" and what Mrs. IV calls "a temporary inconvenience." The tools include axes, hooligan tools (just what the name suggests), and pike poles. Always drinking from a glass half full, Mrs. IV has assembled defenetration kits for sale in handsome and sturdy canvas bags. [Date of Defenetration (DoD) can be monogrammed on the bag for an extra charge]. Kits will be available while supplies last from TSR interns in front of 11 Wall Street Monday morning. Look for the sign: "No money-back guarantee below the fifth floor!"