Smoke on the water

The Wall Street Journal thought it worth giving Scott Adams a column to expand on his quaint notion that the world's wealthiest citizens will one day migrate to floating tax havens. I agree, but only because this stuff is silly enough to be entertaining, especially when Scott warns the world's mega-rich of the coming socialist tax-apocalypse:

The final phase will involve a tax rate on the top 1% of earners that is so high it can't be described without the Viking word for pillage.

Yeah, right.

Mention of Vikings makes me almost regret that the great floating tax havens will always be a figment of  the over-heated libertarian imagination, though. The funerary rituals of such a seagoing elite could be quite spectacular. I can't imagine the ex-Masters of the Universe being content with just being wrapped in some sailcloth and quietly dropped over the side when their time comes. Something more spectacular and ostentatious would be in order.

I'm thinking of a full-on flaming ship-burial (think Kirk Douglas's dragon ship funeral pyre at the end of The Vikings)* to speed the dear departed to the high net worth Valhalla.

From the fury of the hedge fund managers deliver us, O Lord.

*Although these guys could presumably afford to outdo a warrior from the dark ages and sign off with a grand gesture to match the Graf Spee's final moments.