A Day of Analogies

I had a weird day. I woke up and decided I needed to start my day with a doughnut. I went to the doughnut shop, but they didn't have any doughnuts. They explained to me that they no longer believed that frying was ideologically sound. They said doughnuts were good, but they believed that if a doughnut really wanted to exist it would. Frying was a process that gave dough a crutch, and kept it from becoming a doughnut on its own.

I shook off my disappointment and headed to my doctor's office. I have had knee trouble, and I was suppose to be getting a final check-up before some reconstructive surgery. Much to my surprise, my doctor explained to me that he could not perform surgery because it went against his beliefs. As I wondered why he hadn't disclosed this fact to me before, he explained that surgery was an inefficient way to heal the body. If the body needed to be healed, an invisible hand would come in and help facilitate the recovery.

I wasn't sure how to respond to my doctor's revelation, so I headed off to work. I have been working on next year's budget, and I needed to get some clarification from the CFO. I went to the CFO's office and explained my situation. Without so much as a whiff of irony, the CFO explained that budgeting no longer fit within his philosophy of accounting. He explained that budgeting was a command and control version of business wherein the accounting office had to police individual departments who would use their money much more efficiently if left to their own devices. He showed me an elaborate graph in which money is spent much more efficiently with no controls on how or why. I must admit, it seemed a little confusing.

I went back to the office with my mind spinning. The doughnut shop doesn't believe in frying, the doctor doesn't believe in surgery, and the CFO doesn't believe in budgeting. It was all a little much, so I elected to get on the web and read something of interest. It just so happened that the first article I came to was about the leader of our government. It seems he is someone called a "conservative," and anyone of this political persuasion believes that government isn't helpful but harmful to our country.

Suddenly it all made sense. I mean, if you can't use your president as an example...