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There's money in it "Bring Me the Head of Osama bin Laden"By Rick Horowitz
The word for today is "incentivize." As in, "If we dangle enough money out there, maybe somebody will do what we'd love to see done but would really rather not have to do ourselves thank you very much." So what do you think? Is $25 million enough money to roust The Evil One out of whichever miserable hole in the ground he happens to be occupying at the moment? Are the big bucks enough to convince someone to do whatever it takes to bring the big guy in? A Mr. Donald Rumsfeld of Washington, D.C., waxes practically rhapsodic on the subject. "Our hope," explained the defense secretary at his Monday briefing, "is that the incentive -- the dual incentive of helping to free that country from a very repressive regime and to get the foreigners in the al Qaeda out of there, coupled with substantial monetary rewards, will incentivize, through the great principle of University of Chicago economics -- incentivize a large number of people to begin crawling through those tunnels and caves, looking for the bad folks." The "great principle" being self-interest. Going for the dough. And "crawling through those tunnels and caves" being something the Pentagon would just as soon subcontract out to somebody else. There are plenty of things the mighty American fighting machine can do exceedingly well. Spelunking may not be one of them. Which is why we've started dropping leaflets and broadcasting announcements promoting the loot: "Attention people of Afghanistan! Up to 25 million dollar reward is being offered for information leading to the location or capture of..." It makes perfect sense. The prospect of a humongous payday doesn't just put a little extra spring into the step of bin Laden's many enemies. And it doesn't just give the fence sitters a reason to get off the fence and join the posse. It also puts a bug in the ear of bin Laden's own supporters. Some totally devoted and perfectly loyal lieutenant, some tiny pebble in bin Laden's impregnable wall of security, may look at the latest trend lines and decide that this back-to-nature thing doesn't cut it anymore. Dying for the cause is nice, but living the lush life also has its advantages -- so why not drop a dime on the man and scoop up those millions? Call it "Bounty on the Mutiny." (Sorry.) And there's one more reason for delegating. We may say -- our government, that is -- that we want bin Laden dead or alive, but we're not being entirely candid. We think dead is better. We think dead is much, much better. No circus-like trial, no elegantly inflammatory statements from the defendant, no kidnappings to force a prisoner swap. Dead avoids all of that. On the other hand, there are rules. If American troops were somehow to corner bin Laden or stumble across him, and if somehow, rather than resisting, he actually offered to surrender -- well, it might be awkward. Whereas if some anonymous Afghan with his eyes on the prize found himself in a similar situation and put a bullet through bin Laden's forehead -- hey, these things happen. Tough break. Don't blame us. Anyway... Do you remember when, in the weeks after the September attacks, the experts weighed in on how the drama of real life made "reality TV" suddenly meaningless? Maybe so. But what if it's not quite like that? What if real life has decided to use reality TV as a model? Throw enough money in front of people, reality TV made clear, and they'll leave the comforts of home, travel to bizarre locations, slither through the mud and eat rats and bugs and such. Throw even more money in front of people and who knows what you can get them to do? Maybe they'll even turn themselves into cavemen and hunt down the world's most dangerous terrorist. Stay tuned. Posted 11/20/01.
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Rick Horowitz
