From the greatest satire website ever, Iowahawk:
Flanked by officials from the United Elf Toytinkerers union, SantaCorp CEO Kris Kringle today told the House Ways and Means Committee that without immediate government financial help, his firm would be forced to declare bankruptcy, lay off thousands of elves and reindeer, and potentially cancel its annual worldwide Christmas Eve toy delivery.
[…]
Kringle and UET union president Binky McGiggles presented a draft emergency bailout plan to the committee calling for US $18 trillion in federal grants, loan guarantees, and sugarplum gumdrops that they said would keep the company solvent through December 26.
“We believe this proposal shows that management and labor can work together to craft a reasonable, financially responsible short-term survival plan,” said McGiggles. “After the new Congress is seated in January, we would be happy to return to present a long-term package to get us through April.”
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“You might say it’s a perfect snowstorm,” said Merrill Lynch analyst Jennifer Rothstein. “The youth consumer market is demanding more for less, at a time when the government and courts have forced SantaCorp to lower its ‘good list’ credit rating standards. They face increased non-union competition from the East Pole, and huge increases in fuel prices for magical reindeer flying hay. It’s a hard sell for the investment community.”
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“Almost every business in my district has had to adjust to the new economic climate, but SantaCorp seems to believe it can continue with the same old profligate giveaway business-as-usual,” said Paul Ryan (R-Wisconsin). “I’m sorry for your situation, but it is difficult to justify giving trillions of US taxpayer dollars to a private company that is outmoded, headquartered offshore, and, frankly, imaginary.”
Kringle defended the company’s business practices and his reported 4 billion cookie annual salary, saying that the company was “doing the best we can under trying circumstances.” He also blamed the company’s struggles in part on federal environmental and safety regulations.
“Frankly the amount of paperwork you require is astronomical,” said Kringle. “OSHA inspections and reporting requirements have doubled our factory production cycle, and every time I tramp a little fireplace soot into a living room I have to fill out three separate EPA environmental impact reports.”
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A full House vote on the SantaCorp is scheduled Friday morning, where it is expected to pass by a comfortable margin. President Bush has pledged to sign any and all bailout request from Congress until the end of his term, “no queshnions ast.”
“I want to insurer the American People and the evil doers that I and the Crongress and the Hankster [Treasury Sec. Paulsen] and Big Ben [possibly Fed Chair Bernanke] and [unintelligible] and me are unineted together to approve the financial aid and regulations and federal takeovers to get our American free ennerpise system back on track,” said the President, speaking from inside his new shoe-proof plexiglas enclosure.