The Geico Supreme Court

by digby

I think Matt Yglesias should get the Nobel prize for this idea. Product placement (as we saw with the “Baby Einstein” colloquey in last night’s SOTU) as a way to close the deficit is brilliant. Why shouldn’t Disney pay for that effusive mention from the president of the United States on national television?

I don’t think Yglesias goes far enough, though. Every speech, every photo-op could also be sponsored by a different corporation. And just as the sports arenas named Viagra Park and Jonny Cat Field no longer have a civic identity, we could change the name of the White House to the “Halliburton House” (for now — the next president could have a different sponsor.) Companies would pay billions for that kind of daily mention in the free media.

It would also be much more transparent and equally efficient to have elected officials simply license their offices to industry to become the Senator from Pfizer or Congressman Exxon. At least we would know up front who we were voting for and perhaps we the people could start lobbying the industries directly for charity and pro-bono projects to patch up the safety net or do some basic scientific research and the like.

As Yglesias says, raising taxes on the rich is “desperately inside the box thinking.” Product placement to fund the government is the kind of creative brainstorming that makes America great.

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