WP-09-Diplo [The Programmer]: Bob's capital!
Date:Sat, 07 Aug 2010 11:07:24 +0000

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[Out of character]
Bob!  There was only Down the Drain or Wealth of Nations to choose from, but does 277 of defence mean that I found it?!?!  I had actually figured Wealth of Nations was it, but maybe that is nearby, eh?!?!

WP-09-Diplo [Adam Smith]: Adam's Capital...
Date:Sat, 07 Aug 2010 14:15:41 +0000

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Ivan wonders whether he has come near our capital.  He fails to understand that capital, the surplus of production over consumption, or perhaps more aptly the means of production, is spread all over.  There are great concentrations of capital in many parts of our lands!

Down the Drain happens to be a hub with high production, so it was easy for us to assemble forces there to attempt to stem his assault... although once again, said forces had to be withdrawn from prospective hostile-takeover operations elsewhere...

(If in fact he meant to wonder where our headquarters is, that might be a meaningful question, but for a diversified multinational conglomerate such as mine, headquarters can move to wherever the tax rates are lowest...  As for Wealth of Nations, well, that's a very nice book to read sometime...)

[ Real Life:  I am finding that using the corporate mindset in this game helps me read the news ... corporate-speak appears to include a lot of "euphemistic translations" -- they have these nice flowery phrases to conceal what they're doing, but in the end there's too much "I win/you lose" and not enough "win/win" in the system... ]