I'd run into materials limits and there'd still be politics getting in the way of smooth logistic distribution.

Half the planet will have to cease to be ruled by stupid warlords?

Yeah.

They really are stupid. You'd think they'd notice how their predecessor's lifespans tend to be measured in months.

I'm not sure how good the lifespans of the nonwarlords are in those areas.

Okay, true. 

Welcome to Earth.

I mean, I'm not sorry I'm here. 

I appreciate it!

I don't know if anyone else does but hopefully eventually!

You don't present the sort of public figure that looks very appreciable to the layperson.

It'd be kind of an indefensible use of time.

If you needed popular support for something it'd be worth at least outsourcing, if not necessarily doing yourself. I know you aren't a parahuman per se but I think more of us should outsource our interactions with other people, limit the scope of the conflict thing. I have Rete but honestly capes in general should never talk to anyone they're not really excited and happy to be around.

That philosophy I like.

And it means she is really excited and happy to be around him and that feels surprisingly good. He considers the fact until it is no longer surprising. She's smart and he's lonely. There. Unsurprising.

Imagine how Protectorate recruitment would jump if part of the package was getting to interview personal assistants till you found a really low-friction one and never having to interface with anybody without them running interference if you didn't feel like it! I have to captain a fucking team of people who are idealistic or desperate enough to be superhero-kids under the current policy structure and even with that filtration criterion it's a nightmare.

Yeah I would expect that to be intolerable. Have you suggested that to the Protectorate -

Yes actually. Inadequate budget. And I said "let people sell power use in the private sector on the side and take a cut" and they said no.

You'd think they'd make the money back right away off the 'fewer villains' thing.

Only if I'm right about how the recruitment angle would work, which isn't a guarantee.

They've got offices in lots of cities, they could try it somewhere smallish and find out.

Not sure that would get a clear result. People are mobile and villains might move in from elsewhere just to fill the niche without being obvious.

You could get results on the hero recruitment half of the equation and infer that if way more people become heroes eventually that'll result in fewer villains. 

Heroes who haven't made themselves known to the Protectorate can move too.

So then the city gets lots of previously uninvolved heroes! It still seems worth it even if it's of limited reliability as evidence about the usefulness of doing it everywhere.

See, I can run through all this back and forth with you in ninety seconds but if I go to the Protectorate with it it'll take six weeks and they'll still say no and don't have to tell me why at every step so I can argue back.