Summary

The text satirically depicts a group of wealthy, powerful men making self-serving political decisions while cutting public spending.

Abstract

In a lavish setting, eight affluent men, symbolizing a political elite, indulge in extravagant food served by the less fortunate. They convene to decide on policy matters, such as the removal of walking sticks for amputee orphans from the budget, while simultaneously approving the extravagant gilding of government building walls with the nation's gold reserves. The narrative exposes the disconnect between the ruling class's opulence and the austerity measures imposed on the public, highlighting the elite's indifference to public opinion and their manipulative strategies to justify their luxurious expenditures.

Opinions

The political elite is portrayed as being out of touch with the needs of the general population, prioritizing their own comfort and status over public welfare.
There is a clear disparity between the wealth of the decision-makers and the poverty of those who prepare and serve their food, emphasizing social inequality.
The elite's decision to use the nation's gold reserves for personal aggrandizement is seen as a misuse of public resources.
The leaders are depicted as arrogant, believing they can easily manipulate public perception to justify their actions.
The mention of "the nation’s finest minds" sarcastically criticizes the quality of governance and the leaders' self-importance.
The use of the term "camouflage" to justify the gold paint as protection against invasion is an example of the absurd lengths to which the elite will go to deceive the public.
The dissenting voice, though ultimately overruled, represents a token acknowledgment of the absurdity and potential public backlash of the elite's decisions.

Gold and Lobsters

An entirely accurate account of how political policy is decided

It was very rich food prepared by very poor people. Parfaits and pâtés and mousses and mille-feuilles. Sauces that swirled and smeared and a cheesecake that had been deconstructed, reconstructed, and deconstructed again.

It was arranged across an enormous mahogany table 20 or 30 foot long, packed tight enough to act as a sort of edible table cloth, completely hiding the beautiful dark wood underneath.

‘It’s no good’ bellowed a deep, humourless voice, foie gras clinging to its vocal chords, ‘there’s just no budget for it’.

‘It’s a vote winner, though’, came a reply, bouncing around the luxuriantly decorated walls.

‘No matter. It is hardly the job of government to provide these things. We know that well enough in this chamber and, in time, the people can be educated of it, too.’

At this moment a tiny silver bell rang and brought with it an army or young boys and girls in white shirts and black aprons who hurried and hustled to clear empty plates and sweep up the clean bones and cartilage that had been discarded on the floor. A caravan of trolleys lined with roulades, wellingtons, oysters and lobsters were pushed in to replenish the gaps on the table.

‘So, we’re agreed. Walking sticks for amputee orphans are to be removed from the budget’.

A chorus of concurrence swelled up from the surrounding chairs.

Eight lavishly upholstered armchairs, heavy enough to leave a dent in the floor, spread wide along the expansive table. On the thick, plump cushions of the chairs sat the arses of eight very large, very well dressed men. All clean shaven, all grey, all of a certain age. Like the octuplets of a very tired and regretful mother.

‘So now, the main topic on the agenda, the redecoration of the exterior compound walls. We are agreed, are we not, that the building would look far better, far more regal and majestic, far more appropriate, if every brick were painted a bright and glorious gold’

‘Here, here’

‘Absolutely’

‘Splendid idea’

One dissenting voice rose delicately, ‘There is just the issue, My Lord, of convincing the people. At a time when we are asking them to tighten their belts, some may hold the obviously ludicrous notion that we should do the same. You know, ‘all in this together’, et cetera’

A rumble of affront and indignation rang around the hall.

‘What a thought’

‘How selfish these people are’

‘But it is entirely necessary. We can’t be expected to live and work in a house of brick. We need the appropriate surroundings to do our vital work’

‘Of course, My Lord, but with public spending being cut the way that it is, many members of that public may not be astute enough to see how important this undertaking is. We will need to explain it in the simplest of terms.’

‘I see’ came the first voice, ‘Good point, that man’.

From the surrounding chairs came an avalanche of mutterings, the nation’s finest minds hard at work. The prevailing thought was that, of all the challenges facing government, the most time consuming was adorning the uncomplicated minds of the common folk with the knowledge what we are doing is right, and what they thought was wrong.

‘We could tell them’, said one man, at the distant far end of the table, ‘That the gold paint was needed as camouflage, to protect the country’s most important institution from invading forces’.

‘From bloody foreigners’, spoke up another.

‘To blend in against a solid gold sky’. A wave of agreement swelled into a tsunami. They were on to something.

‘But’, spoke again the dissenting voice ‘isn’t the sky typically blue?’

‘Really’, spoke the first voice, with the assuredness of a hundred generations of unearned wealth, ‘I hardly think that will be a problem’.

He banged his glass on the table, drowning an en croúte of indeterminate meat in spilled red wine.

‘It is decided. We shall melt down the nation’s gold reserves and have this building gilded, finally giving us the surroundings appropriate to us’.

The little bell rang again and the army of young servers returned, clearing empty plates and filling empty glasses. And, when nobody was looking they would slip a half eaten lobster tail in their pocket to share later.