A few days later, Scrooge and Rockefeller both received an invitation out of the blue, conveyed by Mr. Gardner. The leader of an emerging political party, the Republican Party, Abraham Lincoln, was coming to Cleveland to conduct a publicity campaign, and some local Republican supporters had arranged a welcome reception for him. The old Whig Gardner was naturally invited, and at his event, Scrooge and Rockefeller were also invited.

Scrooge knew, of course, that the so-called welcome reception was just a venue for politicians and wealthy people to meet and facilitate the marriage of politics and wealth. In a sense, it was also an election and one that was more important than the formal so-called one-person-one-vote style of elections.

During Scrooge's lifetime, many immature and ill-conceived people liked to equate democracy with votes, thinking that one person, one vote would necessarily lead to democracy. They did not understand that in so-called democratic elections, pre-screening is much more important than the final referendum. A carefully designed pre-screening program that works before the election begins will ensure that no matter how the farts vote, it will be the people who represent your interests that will be in power.

And in modern times, pre-screening is essential. If the so-called countries were as virtuous as the Greek city-states, with no more than 300 or 500 voters of the right age, it would be fine not to have pre-elections. However, for example, in a country with tens of millions of people (we will not take the example of China with more than one billion people or India with more than one billion voting animals despite having only 100 million people), there are at least hundreds of thousands of people who are willing to be president, and then they come together to participate in the election, and each of them introduces their political ideas to the whole country in turn, for eight hours a day, on holidays, and so on. When the time came to vote, the grandchildren of the nation said, "I've been waiting for generations to vote..." What? The candidates died of old age? No way, let's start from scratch!

Since the pre-election is essential, then the criteria for pre-election are very important. For example, in a democratic election in the green grassland, we set a pre-selection condition: "the length of the canine teeth must exceed 30 mm". Well, the final candidates will be Grey Wolf, Red Wolf, Cousin Wolf, and Cousin Wolf ...... Anyway, all of them are a bunch of white-eyed wolves. Don't laugh, this is not a joke, in human history, there are democratic elections using similar standards. For example, ancient Rome in the Republican period stipulated that only people whose family assets exceed a certain number had the right to vote and the right to be elected. And the more money you have, the more quotes you get. If you were as rich as Alexander, who had just robbed Darius, you alone had the legal right to cast 10,000 votes.

When the lighthouse of freedom was first established, and the smoke of the War of Independence had just cleared, the heroes who wrote the most magnificent words in the Declaration of Independence began to discuss how to keep the future democracy from losing control (whose control I will not say), and how to determine a reasonable pre-election rule. Some people directly proposed, simply stipulating that only those who have more than a number of dollars of fixed assets can have the right to be elected to become members of Congress. This way, those who are elected will be our people!

It's just that such a simple and unconscionable approach is so lacking in deception. Just as the "canine teeth must be more than 35 mm long" standard is bound to be opposed by the sheep, such a condition is bound to be opposed by those who fought the British with guns in the War of Independence and who still have guns (this is important) and who do not have so much money at home. So, Benjamin Franklin was adamantly opposed to the motion. Benjamin Franklin was adamantly opposed to the motion, and even ironically said that if I had just enough money to be elected as a member of Parliament, and on the night after I was elected, a donkey died in his house, and I didn't have enough money to be a member of Parliament, should I resign for that reason? Should I resign from that? Who is the counselor, me or the donkey joke?

So, is there a pre-election method that seems fair but also achieves good results?

Of course, there is, and that is the cost of participation. As long as the cost of participation in this game is high enough, those unstable elements that are not under control can naturally be eliminated in the pre-selection.

Let's say that a friend of ours called Baldhead Keung was going to run for the election, he wrote a big sign and carried it on his shoulder to promote himself, then suddenly his cell phone rang.

"Ah, Mr. Lee, what can I do for you?"

"Baldjon! Where have you been?"

"I'm preparing for the election and I'm promoting myself on the street. ......" Baldjon was interrupted before he could finish his sentence.

"Election, my ass! Have you finished cutting your wood? If you do not come back immediately to cut trees, I will fire you and let you go to the street to eat the northwest wind!" The phone is the boss Lee's roar, his mouth spittle seems to follow the radio waves, spewing out of the microphone, so that bald Qiang had to hold the phone a little farther away from his face.

"I'm not going to choose. I don't choose, I'll be right back to cut the tree ......"

So, most of the working class was successfully screened out.

If there are still people who do not die, save a few years of money, and temporarily do not have to work can also support themselves what to do? Never mind, we still have publicity barriers.

Advertising is very expensive, advertising in newspapers, magazines, television, and the Internet needs a large amount of money, and this money is not a person can afford. So you must get the support of the rich, and they certainly will not support you for no reason.

For example, you are an animal that intends to participate in the Green Grassland election, but you do not have enough money for publicity, so you can only go to the rich "Prairie Wolf" club, or "Forest Tiger" club to seek financial support.

"Tell me about your political views."

"I think all animals are equal, and no one has the right to eat anyone. ......"

"Get out! Bang!" So you flew out the door of the club with your butt backward, and a big shoe print could be seen on your butt. So what kind of political opinion should be funded? It would be something like this.

"I think all animals are equal, who have the right to eat each other."

This is the best way of selection. Any person who propagates the heresy of forbidding wolves to eat sheep will be eliminated first in this selection mode. The rest, no matter how you choose, will be elected by us, the wolves and tigers!

Therefore, in the election, such things as these welcome receptions are the candidates explaining their political views to the "Prairie Wolves" or "Forest Tigers" club owners and being screened.

"Scrooge, are you going to attend?" Rockefeller asked.

"Sure. Are you going?" Scrooge asked in return.

"Of course, I'm going. Any change in politics affects the economy, affects our business. So I have to go and see which way the wind is blowing." Rockefeller said.

"John, you're not entirely right about that." Scrooge said slowly, "We're not just there to see which way the wind blows, we're there to make a sale."

"To do business? What's the deal?" Rockefeller asked.

"Political futures," Scrooge replied. Seeing that Rockefeller did not seem to understand, Scrooge had to explain further.

"John, as you know, political changes can affect the economy and our business. If that's the case, why don't we try to control the changes and make them change in our favor? Compared to completely uncontrollable weather changes, the controllability of political changes is much stronger. Think about it, if the future president of the United States were to consider our interests first when designating his policies, would our business still not go well?"

"Are you talking about bribing political figures? That's an illegal act! God taught us ......" Rockefeller opened his eyes wide.

Seeing Rockefeller deliberately make that look, Scrooge felt amused, bribing political figures, bribing judges, bribing police, these things are not one of the historical Rockefeller wealthy magic? He pretended to be pure in front of himself?

"Believe you, I am very stupid and naive!" Scrooge said in his heart.

"Of course not. I wouldn't do such a thing which is against the law and not God's law." Scrooge immediately acted like a law-abiding boy. But he also understood that just as Rockefeller could not fool him by pretending to be pure, he knew that his words could not fool Rockefeller either, because they were the kind of people who could trample on all the rules of the world for the sake of 300% profit.

"The election is a very costly affair, the publicity, and the organization all need money. Without our financial support of us, the bosses, no one would be able to play. So the candidate must please us or some of us. He must convince us that we will benefit from the policies he implements once he is in office. And our choice to support a political figure is, in a sense, like buying futures. Well, it's a kind of future, political futures."

"And what if he gets in office and backs out?" Rockefeller asked. After asking, he immediately realized he was talking foolishly.

"You see, I've been talking foolishly. It's not something he can renege on. His caucus will not allow him to renege. Because to do so would be to cut off the party's money. His caucus would be the first to abandon him, and even kill him, before we could do anything! There is indeed a risk in such futures, but the risk is not that the politicians will renege after they are in power."

"Yes! Politicians always give the impression that they like to keep their word. But that impression is largely because they often renege on their promises to ordinary voters. And they do so because the cost of reneging is very low - the people are always easy to cheat. But the cost of reneging on the proletariat is not low at all." Scrooge added