Rethinking Naked Corruption

I’ve long considered “If you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em” to be one of the many hyper-stupid sayings that persist because we’re all too busy or lazy to go through the bureaucratic nightmare of having them officially excised from the language. Join ‘em? Really? Don’t wanna maybe do a little due diligence before you to take a full 180 and plop into bed with someone or thing you were trying to fully vanquish a minute ago? Seems one might want a bit o’ background first. At least consider potential drug interactions.

But I think I may have found a circumstance, however ill-conceived and temporary, in which joining the worst “them” we’ve got—the lot currently in power—in one of their rottenest core ventures might be the way to go. I speak here of their gift for unapologetic corruption performed exclusively in plain sight, from their klepto-crypto billions to their chunk o’ ballroom millions. I’ll admit that nothing I’ve seen about the way any of them conduct their lives is at all appealing, but while they’re in charge maybe I should see what all the fuss is about.

I can’t recall any personal attempts at naked corruption, though I’m certain I had my share during my early smart-ass years. Since then I’m pretty sure I’ve tried at least average hard to hide any such acts, and if memory serves they were all relatively small and at the time somehow morally defensible. But having never considered it as an option, I suppose it’s possible naked corruption is the road to true happiness and fulfillment. So to satisfy the always-demanding interests of science, I should gather up all the spheres of influence in my life that might light my way to two-thirds of the holy trinity of corruption-sparked spoils, namely money and power. (I’m leaving out sex because this is a family show.)

Let’s see, who do I know has some money and/or power I can through naked corruption pry from their grasp? The head of our neighborhood civic association is a friend, so maybe I should tap that relationship for…well…I have no idea what, as he’s a very nice guy and an excellent leader of an utterly powerless organization. He is trying to build an ADU in his backyard, so maybe since I live so close by I could blackmail him into paying for my silence about any code violations, except I wouldn’t know a code violation if one joined me in the shower. And he has small kids so he has no money. And I’d rather have eczema than assume his civic association presidency and power. And it would be fully cloaked corruption anyway, so next…

Maybe I could put “tariffs” on the dozens of landscaping companies that festoon our neighborhood and provide its near-constant soundtrack of mowers, blowers and topsoil throwers. I could get my steps in by walking from truck to truck, shaking down employees for cash considerations—on which I would pay no taxes, as I would consider them tips—or I could sit on my butt and call their bosses and bemoan what a shame it’d be if anything happened to their nice big piles of mulch. Not bad, and it does echo the Trumpian nod to classic mob techniques, but it still isn’t quite the full birthday suit corruption I’d hoped for.

What about Alvin our postman? Alvin does seem to be one of Mother Nature’s gentlest and cheeriest works, so I suppose he’s a perfect target for the naked corruption of a newly minted malignant narcissist, as we seem to prefer preying on the most vulnerable among us. Right away I notice that Alvin is black—keen powers of observation are critical to the success of unclothed corruption—so this one’s a layup: I threaten to expose him as a DEI hire unless he does what I want. But what do I want? He’s absolutely without peer as a deliverer of mail and exchanger of pleasantries, so there’s no room there. It might be kind of cool to drive his van where the driver gets to sit on the other side, but that’s not really worth the bother. And this one really needs to be naked, so what does Alvin have that I want that I could take in plain sight? I know, mail!

I could make him stop at my carport first thing every day and go through his bag and take what I want in plain sight of our neighbors driving and walking by. Of course, somebody would probably report him and then he might lose his job, but that’s not my…wait…what’s this? All of a sudden I don’t feel so good. In fact, just thinking about it makes me feel…bad. Is this because of the thought that something I might do for personal gain would cause someone else to suffer? How do they get past this part, and with such apparent ease? Is there a chapter in Project 2025 that covers this?

Naked corruption is tougher than I thought, in part because of this whole guilt and shame spiral that suddenly insinkerated my plan, but also because if you don’t already have money and power you have nothing to dangle in front of the people whose money and power you want to take by reneging on every promise you ever make and every contract you ever sign. Like I don’t think any major universities or top law firms will pay me millions of dollars if I threaten to cut their research funding or revoke their security clearances, since even my mother didn’t think I had that kind of juice. And I’m not on any social media, which will make it much tougher to get people of influence to do my bidding by threatening to have them perp-walked—in orange, natch—at halftime of the Super Bowl. I don’t even have any enormous government contracts to award to those tech bros who most lovingly and shamefully smooch my buttock.

Oh well, some smart person long ago must have said something like you learn as much or more from failed experiments as you do from successful ones, and even though nobody really believes that, it does come in handy in situations like this where you’re trying to wrap up the analysis of a failed experiment. James Dyson famously created 5,127 prototypes over a five-year period to develop his first bagless vacuum cleaner, one of which I own and almost revere. His doggedness was incredible, but you could argue that if it took that many prototypes to get it right he wasn’t learning a ton with each new one. Maybe 1/5,127th of what he needed each time.

But I do think that I learned something in this process: If I want to truly succeed at naked corruption, I’m gonna have to move to Florida. Next week: The Simple, Organic Joy of Crushing Your Enemies.