People. People Who Eat People. Are the Luckiest People.

It's widely observed that eating other people is - at the very least - somewhat discourteous.

Which is not to say that it doesn't occasionally go down.  Usually for practical reasons of survival (see; 'Donner Party, the', as well as our earlier discussion of our friend the Wendigo) but there are other cultures for who the practice had other significance.

Witness* the Asmat - a group of people that live, appropriately enough, in the Asmat Region of Papua, Indonesia.  (I kind of want to say Papua, New Guinea - but I'm pretty sure we're not supposed to say that anymore because it's vaguely racist in some way that I don't entirely understand.)

*But possibly from a safe distance

Historically, if the guy I was just listening to on MPR can be believed, The Asmat had a cultural history of taking heads (with cannibalism being an add-on side effect - not unlike a Clinique bonus gift).  One tribe would kill a member of another tribe, take their head and consume them (literally), thereby taking in their power and energy. 

Now, this sort of thing isn't entirely unheard of in global history - even in your western religions.  (Oh, right... Eucharist was always about wine and bread.  Certainly nothing there held over from earlier and less seemly religious practices.  No sir.) The interesting twist in this case is that once you'd eaten, for example, Bob Johnson from Chisholm, MN, then the people of Chisholm, MN would thereafter be obligated to treat you as if you were Bob Johnson from Chisholm, MN; calling you Bob, awarding you all of Bob's property and Chattel, etc.

Now the obvious question here is - Even if they were inclined to respect your traditions on this point, how exactly are the good people of Chisholm, MN supposed to know that you've eaten Bob Johnson, and that he isn't just off ice fishing or something.  Do you send out announcements?  Is there a page in the Hibbing Tribune for that sort of thing?

Which brings me to Michael Rockefeller, son of Nelson Rockefeller.  Turns out he disappeared in 1961 off the coast of New Guinea and after 50 years of checking things out we're pretty sure that The Asmat ate him.

All of which is one long way of saying that I'm pretty sure that there's a section of Indonesia that now owns controlling interest in Chase Manhattan Bank, and they should definitely look into that as soon as possible, because they could not possibly be worse for the country than the people who are currently running it.