July 24th, 2011
11th hour debt dealmaking
The President met with senior leaders of the Bizarreville Congress all weekend attempting to forge a government spending/debt reduction deal in order to allow the Debt ceiling to be raised. The sides continued to be far apart due to the enormous number of sacred cows that were unwilling to be compromised.
Congress asked the President to put an end to all the stupid wars around the world that had no apparent mission, no tangible benefit, and were wasting money by the hundreds of billions. The President responded that useless missions were a fundamental promise he made to citizens during his campaign, and he could not back down now. He pointed out the progress made in Funkistan to unseat the ruthless dictator Elmo Shlabba. “Yes, sir, but who gives a crap about Funkistan?” commented a congressional leader. “The only thing they contribute to the world economy is that they produce 1% of the world’s lima beans. Who in the hell likes lima beans?? They taste like bird doo-doo.” The President responded that there was more to the situation than lima beans, but admitted he did, in fact, like lima beans.
The President then turned the tables and insisted on the need for new tax increases. “It’s been years since we’ve had a good, old-fashion, healthy tax increase. If you go too long, taxpayers get complacent and forget about their responsibility to cover entitlements to those less-motivated. These poor people are entitled, by their birthright in Bizarreville, to be able to sponge for a living. And somebody’s got to pay the ever-increasing tab. You don’t turn a blind eye to these people, and ignore them just because they’re lazy. That’s not who we are.”
Opposition party leaders rebuked the idea of tax increases, stating that their Tea Party constituents feel they’ve been taxed enough already. But the President promised that his proposed tax increases would not apply to everyone…only those people that had a job. He further proposed that he would require all businesses to give every employee a 10% raise to compensate for their increased taxes. “That way,” he said, “No one is really hurt. We make everyone whole, and guess what? The National Debt gets chiseled away.” The opposing leaders said they might be able to live with that stipulation, but counter-proposed that the increase be 15%, just to be on the safe side.
But Congress still wants a meaningful reduction in stupid government spending and lame, nonsensical government bureaucracy that produces no intrinsic national value. The President commented that they have tried doing that before in the past, but inevitably it ends up going nowhere. “The bureaucracy kills all bureaucracy-killers, and furthermore, adds new bureaucracy in the fight. Every spending-reduction initiative results in more spending. Every streamline attempt creates new turbulence. It’s a bureaucratic paradox…a Bureaudox. Best just to give up, stay the course with the status quo, and not fuss.”
Congress seems to be weakening their position on spending cuts, now that the Bureaudox concept has come to light.
Disclaimer: all stories in Bizarreville are fiction, even the ones that seem real.