HIGHTOWER: The Alibi Agency

Let's travel again into the Far, Far, Far-out Frontiers of Free Enterprise.Today, Spaceship Hightower takes you around to the far side of marital bliss ... into the steamy realm of marital infidelity. Proving that just about anything can be an opportunity to make a buck, three English entrepreneurs have launched the Alibi Agency, providing a service for those men and women who are having extra-marital affairs and need legitimate-sounding excuses to get away from home.Cox bureau reporter Shelley Emling writes that the Alibi Agency "will provide credible cover stories for almost every adulterous moment for a fee of $25 to $75, depending on the tailor-made fib." For example, the agency will send a bogus invitation for you to attend a weekend conference in another city. You can even leave a phone number with your spouse. It will actually ring at the Alibi Agency, where a trained employee will answer as though it's the conference hotel. Want to buy a special gift for your lover? Let the agency make the purchase for you, so no tell-tale receipts show up later at your home.Some British church leaders are aghast at this entrepreneurially-assisted cheating on the institution of marriage. But the Alibi Agency operates on the assumption that Hanky-Panky Happens, and that by helping keep an affair secret, they're actually keeping the marriage together: "There are so many people these days who have a short-term fling or dalliance," explains one of the agency's founders, "and there's no sense in breaking up a long-term relationship over it."Morality aside, the market seems to be booming! More than 10,000 customers have responded to the lie-for-hire service -- a third of them women. Already, the agency is planning to open franchises in the U.S., Argentina, Australia, Denmark, and Mexico.This is Jim Hightower saying ... In the new one-world economy, even lying to your spouse is being turned into a global business.