Mr. Pipeline and Business as Usual

The puppets have gathered in a dingy basement, heads together under the ceiling. Mr. Pipeline has called a meeting of sorts, and ever amiable Per, Good Time and NOWCA have shown up to see what he’s on about. Mr. Pipeline is clearly agitated, and opens the conversation rather brusquely.

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MR. PIPELINE:  AH, AH, hi everyone. So nice you could make it. Er I mean, good to see you.

PER: Sure, Mr. Pipeline, it’s the least a fellow puppet can do.

GOOD TIME: Glad to see everyone again.

NOWCA smiled warmly.

MR. PIPELINE: I just wanted a chance to say, hmm, how wrong it is to be constantly harping on about pipelines and fossil fuels. You people need a dose of the real world…and I’m going to give it to you.

PER: I don’t think….(but Pipeline interrupts immediately)

image courtesy of Pixabay

MR. PIPELINE: Yes, but you have to realize that it’s businesses, corporations like mine, that put the food on everyone’s table, fuel the cars and buses, build the hospitals and schools. And when you start limiting opportunities and then attacking the economic viability of companies…you are hurting everyone in the country. That’s exactly what you are doing when you no good…I mean…that’s what happens when you illegally stop the pipelines our industry needs.

PER: Now wait a minute…our whole economy depends on nature and the environment to run…and...(Pipeline talks over Per again)

MR. PIPELINE: Now don’t start telling me that beautiful trees put bread on the table and dollars in your pocket. That’s what industries like oil do, and sure there are costs -- there are for everything -- but it’s the cost of doing business, of creating jobs and keeping the economy going. I think if one more hooligan waves a picket sign about how i’m wrecking the planet outside our corporate centre, I’ll get a pack of guard dogs to straighten them all out.

Lousy, useless sticks-in-the-mud are trying to stop everything.

PER: Really Mr. Pipeline. You would sick dogs on people who are trying to protect us all? If you weren’t so blind you would read the writing on the wall and realize we cannot dilly dally anymore. We have to deal with climate change, or face the catastrophic weather, droughts, crop failures, rising…(again, Pipeline cuts Per off).

MR. PIPELINE: Yes, yes I know, we still have to deal with that theory that using good old oil is going to wreck everything. And we are saying we are ready to start to phase it out as soon as our proven profitable oil runs out. (his voice begins to rise loudly) In the meantime you are making it hard to run my business…It’s having a real impact on the bottom line...and I wont’ take this lying down…we have to fight back to protect our investments and your jobs for chrissake…

GOOD TIME: Calm down, please, Mr. Pipeline! We are among fellow puppets here, aren’t we? We are here to listen to you. No need to start shouting.

MR. PIPELINE: Well you would be shouting too if it was your corporation that was having to cut dividends and reduce profits. I mean really, is this a free market or what? I’m getting complaints from the Board and from shareholders. This is unheard of, we’ve always been a very profitable company.

You just have to cut out all this destructive nonsense about reduce, reduce, reduce...companies need room to expand, grow, sell more and make more money, otherwise, what’s the point? 

PER: The point, Mr. Pipeline, is preservation of the natural world and avoiding climate catastrophe. We keep trying to tell you. 

Besides you are far from starving, Mr. Pipeline. Answer me this simple question: How many houses do you own?

image courtesy of Pixabay

MR. PIPELINE:  How is that relevant at all? Give me a break, I’m a successful businessman. I get to invest in property, stimulate the real estate market, bring all values up.

PER: But honestly, how many houses do you own?

MR. PIPELINE: Why would we talk about my houses?

PER: So it’s more than one, Mr. Pipeline?

MR. PIPELINE: Of course, don’t be absurd, what businessman owns just one house?  What’s your point, anyway? I thought we were talking about all this violent illegal protesting nonsense.

PER: Can you tell us about your houses? Come on, Pipeline, if you want us to listen you can level with us at least a little bit.

MR. PIPELINE:  Well that’s really private business. You know you don’t have a right to know. Most of my homes are just owned by one of the corporations anyway. But they are really mine. They are legitimate business costs and have to be tax sheltered. Like my condo in Toronto, I need it for board meetings. I’m flying back and forth at least once a week you know.

PER: How much would that condo have cost, Mr. Pipeline?

MR. PIPELINE: Give me a break, it’s just a condo. Probably only a few million, what’s your point?

PER: And you have a house in Calgary of course?

image courtesy of Pixabay

MR. PIPELINE: Well it’s a ranch in Cochrane actually. Quite a spread. My stables have some beautiful horses…I can’t remember their names right now...but it’s lovely when my trainer takes them out for exercising…It’s a nice place for me and my family. And, actually, I write quite a bit of it off for corporate entertaining. I have to have the guys over now and then for poker…just good business practice you know.

PER: Any other multi million dollar properties you can remember just off the top of your head?

MR. PIPELINE: Well, now that you mention it, I really do like the Houston house too, with a great view of the ocean. Good thing it’s up on a hill… I’m no dummy you know, I bought it well above the flood plain, good thing too after that hurricane last year. My housekeepers took good care of it though…and insurance paid for the new roof and the trees will grow back in time. It’s a great house…I remember when we made the deal with a certain oil company and we had their whole Board over…and…ah, well it’s a great house.

PER: And who lives in those houses now Mr. Pipeline?

image courtesy of Pixabay

MR. PIPELINE: What do you mean? I live in them, they’re mine…why should someone else be in them?

PER: Maybe you have heard that there is a housing crisis?

MR. PIPELINE: Of course. Government has to let the free market build more to meet demand. Why are you on at me about this anyway…I’m a good upstanding citizen, a builder of the economy. I pay my taxes like anyone else. I really don’t know what you are on about.

PER:  Ah, yes, taxes, just how much do you pay in taxes, Mr. Pipeline?  

MR. PIPELINE: Same as anyone else, I pay my income taxes.

PER: And last year that was how much?

MR. PIPELINE: How would I know? I have a whole accounting department that handles investments and taxes. Their profession is to keep my tax bill as low as possible. And they are good. They’ve got it arranged so almost all the income is tax sheltered in the companies. They maximize my royalty credits and all my tax breaks. Best business practice going. They even bought me a lovely beachside house in the Bahamas, where a lot of my banking is done now, so I can be close to my money.

image courtesy of Pixabay

PER: What?! How can you do that to your country, to your fellow citizens? We need to transform our economy and you are hiding profits and cheating on your taxes. Mr. Pipeline, you are nothing but a…a….

NOWCA: Take it easy, Per. Mr. Pipeline is just another PERson, like you or Good Time and he has beliefs and understandings like each of us do. We really are far more the same than we are different you know.

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Thanks to Keith Wiley for this guest post.