One of the many things (and they seem to increase as my senescence creeps forward) is that, every four years, as the clock and calendar turns, there is an election for President. And with said election, the great mob of Americanos herd, lemming-like, to their local polling places not to leap off a cliff so much as to pick a Deliverer. They perform this ritual with one idea in mind: to make sure that they get their share. And the prospective Deliverers, seeking the same goal and purpose, have promised everyone - large and small - that they will do just that.

If anyone would spend a minute (I concede that for most of the booboisie, a minute may be quite insufficient) contemplating the absolute idiocy of the premise, I am convinced that a large number of citizens would realize the utter fallacy of the proposition. If all the governmental programs, which is to say "giveaways", proposed by all the candidates were implemented, what would be the result? I will tell you as plainly as I can: The government would further cement its rightful standing as the most expensive, wasteful, unproductive and invasive bureaucracy ever to roam the earth, something akin to the work and shopping habits of my ex-wife. If only I could, I would treat Washington, D.C. as I did my former amour: I would seek a divorce on the grounds of breach of promise.

Clearly, the question that leaps to the mind of anyone with half their wits is: Who will pay for all this wasteful inefficiency? And, equally plain, is the reply: Why, we will, of course. While, sadly, the government is sanctioned to print currency as they see fit, most of the time the laws of economics forbid it to do so willy-nilly. If they did, the American dollar would fall even lower against the currencies of nations with more sensible governments, like Iran, Somalia and Greenland. Even the Treasury Department is smarter than that. Rather than have the dollar sink to the level of peso or the Zimbabwean dollar, the Great Wheel of federal government will merely spin faster, increase the vacuum and simply suck the funds needed for their grand utopia out of the pockets, wallets and mattresses of their citizenry. And band played on.

The preeminent inquiry, as it springs out, fully formed, from the forehead of Washington, is just how much government can we afford? I, for one, believe we have long passed the point of both the fiscally responsible and prudent and are now ambling, headlong, into the dangerous ground of national bankruptcy. We have too many government programs administered by too many career bureaucrats who are content with nothing more than keeping their job, spending OPM ("other people’s money") wastefully and expeditiously, and justifying their existence by affirming that their service is absolutely essential to making the world safe for democracy. As to who might, concurrently, be making democracy safe for the world, is anyone’s guess.

If there is to be a monetary policy that makes sense, something as simple as a 3^rd rate business which seeks to match expenses to income, much must change. There has to be innovation. And I, imaginative, which is not to say deranged, anarchist and devoted iconoclast that I am, have just such a plan. The federal government needs to explore and take advantage of what American businesses have been implementing for years, to wit, outsourcing. No, not to New Delhi or Singapore, mind you, but to contracted U.S. businesses. Two immediate benefits would follow: more private sector jobs are created and government inefficiency is bypassed. It is, in the words of someone at some distant time, a "win-win arrangement".

The paradox has long been that there is absolutely nothing that the government does that private enterprise could not provide at a lower cost and a higher quality and, at the same time, the government is taking a bigger role in "providing services" for their citizenry. I will go further: there has never been a government assumption of a private service that has been an improvement. All one has to do to find proof of this idea is to look at the U.S. Postal Service or the public schools. No where is there greater inefficiency, shoddy service and greater cost to the consumer than in a government-run business - an oxymoron if ever there was one. All those who think that UPS or Fedex cannot deliver postal materials more efficiently than the U.S. Postal Service or that privately-run schools cannot compete, dollar for dollar, with public schools, please stand up. Those of you now upright are morons, socialists, imbeciles and, quite likely, members of a trade union. But I repeat myself. Now, sit down and shut up.

The only hope for this nation to continue to provide the (apparently) coveted All-Nurturing Mother State is to take government service out of the hands of government. If private business, always profit motivated and constantly vigilant of their bottom-line, has embraced outsourcing with loving arms - even at the cost of severe public censure and horrific customer relations - and realized the cost-savings that it produces, why does this model not make sense for the largest money-losing businesses in the world, i.e. our government?

Instead of having monolithic marble buildings mushrooming up all over the D.C. landscape and beyond, filled with 5^th rate employees who clamor for higher and higher pay for less and less work, we would instantly infuse the economy with thousands of opportunities for new businesses and entrepreneurship. The job market would immediately swell and unemployment would plummet. Like any profitable business, these new concerns would ask of their workers to work hard, work enthusiastically and compete for raises and promotions. Their government counterparts have been asked much less. Government paper-pushers have a less-challenging job description: constant surliness, never-ending sullenness and maintenance of incompetence. If they manage to show up for work at least 3 days and don’t kill anyone on the premises, lifetime employment is theirs. If we turn to real-world entrepreneurship, customer satisfaction could, conceivably, once again be "Job One" instead of irrelevant and superfluous, as is the current state of "government workers" - another oxymoron worthy of note.

All you nonbelievers, I challenge you to this little test: take a shoddily-wrapped package to the local post office and ask the clerk at the front desk to help you make the package ready to ship. Note the response. Observe the facial expressions and body language of the $18.50/hour, union-protected and, thus, virtually un-fire-able humanoid. Time the exchange and how long it takes for the brain-dead clock-puncher to actually stop talking and laughing at you with their co-worker and complete your transaction. Next, take an identical package to your local privately-owned and franchised U.P.S. packaging store. Perform the same measurements and observations. Compare the costs incurred. Now, tell me which variety of service is superior. Which company would you recommend to a friend? Which is more likely to get your business in the future?

The problems do not end with the fact that government is filled with self-seeking, life-long cretins who got their job - not because of any expertise or skill they might have - but simply because they fill a quota or their second-cousin worked the same job for 25 years. There is no greater culture of nepotism since ancient Rome or Stalinist Russia than political appointments within our federal, state or local administrations. Once hired, and barring an inter-office droit de seigneur or homicide in the workplace, the jobholders are the perpetual burden of the people. I say perpetual because even after they have received their 30-year pins and their faux gold-inlaid Timex, dutifully inscribed with "Thanks for the great work!", they will be paid, in perpetuity, their undeserved, unearned and, undoubtedly, exorbitant pension from the public till. In fact, most end up triple-dipping - retirement, Social Security and Medicare - all from tax money. The work output expected from the Boobus americanis will remain the same, employed or retired, which is to say, exactly nil.

We have trouble, my friends. Therefore, in the tradition of Jonathan Swift, I offer a modest proposal:

Since I am suggesting outsourcing, perhaps I should render the complete plan as I envision it. Let the new Department of Victim Reimbursement (a new proposal to be part of the reorganized Department of Health, Education and Welfare) be a subsidiary of Harpo Productions. It is a natural match. For her trouble, Oprah would have enough fresh material to last her show forever. In fact, she might have to start her own Oprah Network to handle the overflow. She would have right of first refusal for the countless sad, heart-wrenching, lachrymally-stimulating tales ‘o woe of the applicants for reimbursement. Applications would be accepted from anyone who felt they had been aggrieved, slighted or wronged by nature, God or anyone, living or dead. Any money Ms. Winfrey might make off the book and movie rights would be hers to keep. In return, she could handle the logistics of handling the multi-billion dollar slush fund. How the fund would actually be, well, "funded" is still under discussion. The auctioning off of recently-vacated office space in Washington, D.C. would be the logical place to start.

The newly established Office of Universal Insurance (which would supercede the existing Medicare, Medicaid, Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC), Aid to Derelicts, Homeless and Sociopathic Deadbeats (ADHD, not to be confused with, well, ADHD and all other medical programs) could be run by the triumvirate of David Blaine, David Copperfield and Penn & Teller (I count the duo as one actual person because Teller never speaks and Penn never thinks, ergo, they are each half-persons). Who better to administer such a delusion than actual illusionists? They could take the allocated funds - up to $90-100 billion annually - and make it vanish. In an even better made-for-TV competition, the magicians could compete against other bureaucracies to see who could actually make $100 billion disappear with the greatest speed and with the least to show for it. As their next magical feat, they could induce, in the slackers, naer-do-wells, high school dropouts, bridge-dwellers, gnomes, trolls, Cro-Magnons and the other chronically unemployable who have no health care, a mass hallucination that they are actually happy, healthy and pain-free. This would remove upwards of 100 million souls from the Universal Insurance roles and drastically cut costs.

These are just two of my working hypotheses. There are many other possibilities, equally sound, that would make outsourcing the bloated Washington bureaucracy cost effective and, yes, possibly even profit-making. But for this to work, we need to get the cold, stiff hands of the career federal jobholders off the damned checkbook. If we are to have a subsidized administration with a department, division, bureau or office for every social ill, shortcoming or grievance, at least allow it to be run in the hands of a private concern. It is the only possible way to prevent more efficiently governed nations (say, China, Kuwait or Qatar) from buying the U.S., lock, stock and Yellowstone.

Though, if one thinks about it for any length of time, a change in management might just be overdue and not entirely unwelcomed.