You want change? I'll show you change

Have we all had more than enough of the economy, Congress, the Senate, the president, the presidential campaign, the vice presidential debates, lipstick on pigs, hockey moms, soccer moms, FDR on television even before TV existed?

I know I have.

Boy. My darling daughter, Madam, and I are facing our very first federal election. She in fact is facing her first ever election.

I’ve been a good little Vegemite, as I’m sure she has. I have absorbed, I think a lot through osmosis, the entire thing. I have watched coverage ad nauseum. I made my mind up months ago, but still I take an interest.

I have the perfect solution to the quivering economy though. Let’s see: $700 billion, divided evenly among the 300 million or so of we Americans ... the math is far too hard as there are more zeroes in there than I can cope with, but you see where I’m going?

Hey, Prez? Give it to us!

Oh it could come with conditions – for sure.

First, one member of the household must buy a house. No bigger than is necessary though for the immediate family. We don’t all need eight bedrooms, nine bathrooms, a ballroom and a library, now do we? And we would have to pay cash for it.

Everyone over the driving age must buy a sensible car. No, we can’t all own Corvettes or Jaguars. Just a car to get us from A to B with safety. Preferably a hybrid for we sedan drivers. And we would have to pay cash for them.

If you are in school, you must stay there until you graduate. And graduation will come at a cost.

You will need to read and write English fluently. Not Ebonics, not street-speak, but the King’s English. You may keep your Americanized spelling, but you may not drop the “I” out of aluminium (sic) because it seems clumsy to you. You may not use double negatives. And you will use the past tense correctly: e.g. I spat out the bad oyster, not I spit out the bad oyster.

A degree will mean something. Needing a bachelor of arts degree to become a secretary is all a bit silly now, isn’t it? I’m not taking anything away from secretaries at all – I have been one for a long time, but four years of studying Keats, Native American basket weaving or the history of the giant gippsland earthworm is not going to get you to answer the phone or get His Lordship’s dry cleaning any better.

Every member of the household must have health insurance. Health insurance will not be nearly as sneaky as it is now. This insurance will cover you for all medical, dental and vision costs. It will not cover you for cosmetic surgery to lift a boob or a bum, but it will cover everything else, without needing to go to the insurance company for permission. You will no longer need to check with your insurance company whether you really need that emergency appendectomy. The insurance company will not act as a doctorial God and decide who gets what. We get it all, bubkiss. Insurance companies will go back to being the servants they are supposed to be.

Every member of the household will, when able, get a job. Our earnings will be taxed at a flat rate of 20 percent. No need for Medicare deductions, unemployment contributions, Social Security deductions as we are all millionaires. Multi-millionaires. But we need to work to keep our brains sharp. Taxes will be paid to a federal authority, and will be distributed according to each state’s needs. No state or local taxes will be levied.

Every member of the household will get four week’s vacation per year. Plus 8 days sick leave. Retirement age will be completely up to the individual, but once retired, each person must pledge eight hours per week to good deeds – volunteering for a charity, reading to children, coaching a sport – whatever that individual is good at.

We will all slot away money for our college education and retirement.

We will pay an additional 5 percent tax on our earnings to fund a well manned police force across the nation, with a possible additional 1 percent going to Kansas City as its murder rate right now is staggeringly appalling. We will not begrudge this tax. This is for our own good, after all.

We will not stow our spare cash in the mattress. Each household will establish a locker at Fort Knox which will only be accessible by confirmation of DNA.

Credit cards will be banned. You pay cash, or you wait, save the money and then pay cash. Neither a borrower nor a lender be. Gee I wish Wall Street had paid more attention to Shakespeare, don’t you?

We will become a kinder and gentler society, as we at least monetarily, will all be on the same page. Anyone found causing harm to another will be incarcerated in open air facilities on islands around Alaska. Anyone who is then sociopathic enough to murder another will immediately be taken out the back and shot.

Presidents will be allowed to stay in power for an unlimited time if voted in by the general public. Not the clumsy system we have now, but back to the old tried and true “one man, one vote” system. If the president proves to be a bum, he will be voted out. Trust us. Lobbyists will join the ranks of murderers and will be taken out the back and shot.

A little communistic, I agree – but it can’t be any worse than it is now, can it?

Oh how I long to see commercials again for Coke, for happy little airlines – just for the normalities of life.

Enough politics, already.