The Devlin Deception: Book One of The Devlin Quatrology (4 page)

"Of course, any sort of REAL fiscal responsibility would cut off
the taxpayer funding for the trough at which our elected politicians
have been feeding so greedily for decades, lining their own corrupt
pockets and those of their cronies. I swear, every time I watch the
Congress in action, I'm reminded of seagulls squalling and shrieking
around a handful of popcorn tossed on a beach. Or pigeons in Central
Park, for those of you who've never been to a beach. Just take a
moment and picture that.

"And that popcorn, my fellow taxpayers, is YOUR money. But
Congress and Presidents have thought that it's theirs. Remember
Willie Sutton, the 1920s bank robber who was asked why he robbed
banks; apocryphally, he said 'That's where the money is.' Wherever
there's a big pile of money, there are lots of people trying to
figure out how to get their greedy little paws on it, and when some
of those people have the power to write the laws to make that legal,
watch out.

"Now, I'm not going to spend a lot of time tonight on dragging
politicians through the mud and trying to place blame for their past
failures; we'll be dealing with that over the next several months. I
will say that BOTH parties and their supporters, and, of course,
lobbyists, have brought this country nearly to its knees. And I use
the term 'nearly' deliberately. That is about to change in many
ways, and for the better, in the short term, the medium term and the
long term, and the 'full faith and credit of the United States' will
stand as a rock-solid underpinning of our country once again. Are
you listening, (names of three rating agencies deleted; trademark
issues)?”

Marion turned to George and whispered, "He's not using a
teleprompter, is he?"

"Nope," George replied, "and no notes written on his
hand, either." He paused, then, "Is that Walter Cronkite?"
Marion sighed and rolled her eyes.

Debbie slurred to Darryl, "Who the fuck is Fitchmoodies?"

"Shh," the matron to her left said again.

"You got a fuckin' problem, bitch?" Debbie mumbled, raising
her fist, but Darryl restrained her and switched seats with her.

"Many of my compatriots have told me that I'm taking on an
impossible task, but I don't believe that. If we wait any longer,
kick the can down the road again, we may well have passed the point
of no return and it WILL be impossible. But by applying some common
sense and solid business principles, and the innate creativity and
ingenuity of the American people, which we will be encouraging
through some public-private partnerships, mostly private, I believe
that by working together, we can accomplish this task.

"Today, I've fired all of President Obama's so-called 'czars,'
but I've appointed two, one as what I call the Czar of Anti-Hubris,
to advise me when and if she feels I'm overreaching in any way, and a
Czar of Unintended Consequences, which should be self-explanatory.
Each of them has agreed to serve for a salary of a dollar a year, and
I'm sure we're going to have some pretty spirited discussions.

"I've also met with the directors of the FBI, CIA, Homeland
Security, Secret Service and the IRS, as well as the Joint Chiefs of
Staff and the Secretaries of State, Treasury and Defense, and I've
signed and issued over 250 directives, which have the force of law,
and which will begin an accelerated process of America's long-delayed
job-creating recovery. Those directives will all be posted on a web
site at precisely ten o'clock Eastern Standard Time tonight, and I'll
give you the link at the end of my time with you this evening. They
are less than three pages each and they're all written in plain,
direct English, so you don't need to be a lawyer ... or hire one ...
to understand any of them. That, by the way, will be a hallmark of
my administration: plain, direct English, no opaque legalese.

"Some of those directives will take effect immediately, some on
January 1st, 2012, about three weeks from today, and others will
implement changes more gradually, and there will be winners and
losers, as in any change or restructuring. Generally, the losers
will be the folks who've enjoyed special perks and privileges from
riding on the backs of others, and the winners will be the folks
who've borne the burden for those privileged ones for far too long.

"Over this weekend and through next week, I'll be meeting with
all Cabinet members who have not been fired to let them know exactly
what I expect them to do on behalf of the country ... on your behalf
... and in the months to come, you will all see major changes as we
restructure the entire federal government and its relationships with
the individual state and local governments, as well as with the rest
of the world ... but most importantly, with you, our citizens and
taxpayers.

"One of the first directives I signed today declares that,
effective January 1st, 2016, the official language of the United
States will be ... Norwegian. No, just kidding; I have to admit I'm
a fan of that nerdy Manhattan filmmaker and clarinet player. It'll
be English.

"Now, I know many Americans have become accustomed to problems
being solved in half an hour or an hour on television, and I'll tell
you right now that this all is not going to happen that quickly. It
will take some time, and there will be advances and setbacks along
the road."

(Author's note: from here to the end of Chapter 5, readers who have
little or no interest in Donne's actual policies may find this part a
bit tedious and detailed; feel free to skip it and turn the pages to
near the end of this chapter, perhaps the middle of Page 24. On the
other hand, adults and policy wonks will find this to be much of the
crux of how Donne fixes the country and may want to take notes. JD)

"First, on the economic front, this country is facing three
major challenges, one long-term, one medium-term and one short-term.
Long term, our national debt, including unfunded liabilities, looks
overwhelming; projections vary between 65 and 80 TRILLION dollars.
Today, our debt, NOT including the unfunded liabilities, stands at
about 15 trillion dollars, and it's projected to reach 24 trillion
dollars in just three years, at the beginning of 2015, if we continue
on our current path. Using today's figure of 15 trillion dollars,
that works out to about $48,000 per citizen, using the latest census
figures. By the beginning of 2015, that'll rise to about $73,000 per
citizen. And if we add in the unfunded liabilities for things like
Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid and federal retirement benefits,
that figure is so big that I won't even bother to try to explain it.
But it's HUGE. And fixing all those problems has to start now,
should have started years ago, because if WE don't get started, our
children, grandchildren and GREAT GREAT grandchildren are going to be
saddled with an even bigger burden, one that will make what's going
on in Greece, Italy, Ireland, Portugal and Spain these days seem
miniscule.

"My long-term economic goal is to get the current national debt
down to around two trillion; I'd aim for lower, but I don't want to
keep investors and traders from having that fixed-income choice
available.

"Medium term, the challenge is the budget deficit, the amount we
spend above and beyond our revenues each year, which we're now
covering by borrowing. Every dollar of deficit adds a dollar to our
debt, and the only way we're going to start paying down the debt is
to not only balance the budget, but create a surplus, where our
revenues exceed our expenses. That surplus can then be used to start
chipping away at the debt.

"The short-term challenge is an economy that is still in the
doldrums, maybe showing a tiny bit of growth, but nowhere near enough
to bring in enough revenues to start bringing down the deficit, never
mind getting to balance and certainly not enough to generate a
surplus. A BIG cause of the slowness of economic growth is and has
been the uncertainty that the back-and-forth political sandboxing has
created for American businesses and individuals. I'm going to change
that to CERTAINTY.

"I need to give a huge thank you to the Simpson-Bowles
Commission for all their hard and unappreciated work, and I've used
their recommendations as a starting point, but the strategies and
policies in my directives go far beyond theirs in many respects.

"So my immediate goal on the economic front will be to get the
economy growing and to take the dampers that the government has put
on it off its back. One part of that will be totally restructuring
our ridiculous tax code.

"So on January 1st, 2012, MANY changes will take effect, which
will allow most individuals and couples to fill out a simple two-page
tax return like the one I'm holding here, a copy of which will also
be posted on the web site by ten o'clock tonight. We'll also be
making significant changes to Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid,
none of which will affect anyone who is currently enrolled in those
programs or who will be enrolling in the next fifteen years. Younger
people will have a variety of choices available to them, and the
younger you are now, the more choices you will have.

"Business taxes will also change on January 1st, designed to
make American businesses much more competitive in the global economy
and to incentivize businesses to repatriate the trillions of dollars
they have kept overseas … and to do that within the first six
months of 2012 … and begin investing in American enterprises
and creating jobs in this country. At long last, the playing field
will be leveled for all American businesses.

"Now, I know those sound like buzzwords that you've heard over
and over again from politicians ... hmmm; I just can't keep the
contempt out of my voice when I say that word, in case you haven't
noticed ... but you'll be seeing specifics over the next days, weeks
and months. Some of you will like some of them, others will hate
those same things, but when you see the whole package as it develops,
I believe that you'll see how all the pieces fit together to put the
US on a sustainable and reasonable road to recovery and growth well
beyond anything you've been able to expect since the financial and
housing crisis that finally caught up with us about three years ago,
when the chickens of bad policies came home to roost.

"As for my domestic priorities, first is the taxpayers; I will
ensure that the monies we take from you … and I do mean
'take,' since that IS what taxes do ... are spent efficiently and
well, with minimal waste, corruption, fraud and abuse (I know, more
of those buzzwords, but I mean them and you will see them really
minimized). I'll be especially hard on institutions and programs that
were created to serve people, but have grown to think that people
exist to serve them.

“One of my first directives orders that all federal employees
and contractors have a mandatory fiduciary duty to the taxpayers and
will be personally accountable for failures in dealing with YOUR
money.

"My second priority is business, especially small business and
entrepreneurs, to finally give them some degree of certainty for at
least the next ten years, and the economy, since that's what gives
our citizens a much broader range of choices and opportunities to
live the kind of life most of us dream of living (yup, more
buzzwords; but note that I said 'opportunities,' not 'guaranteed
outcomes').

"My goal for the economy is to achieve a 10% annual growth rate
in GDP within eight years, and many of my policies have been and will
be based on a simple criterion: will this policy advance or hinder
that goal? As just a few examples, I have issued directives
abolishing the National Labor Relations Board, repealing the
Davis-Bacon Act, decertifying the AFSCME at the federal level and
establishing a federal Right to Work law, as well as eliminating the
federal Civil Service Board.

"I have issued another directive banning strikes, both by ANY
public employees and by private employees for a period of three
years, during which time I will work with both business and labor
with a goal of cooperative solutions, not adversarial ones, as we
have now. I have also frozen all union strike funds. No lockouts,
either.

"Also, we will be loosening a lot of the overreaching, byzantine
regulatory grip that agencies like the EPA, EEOC, OSHA and several
others have had on the throat of businesses and individuals for far
too long; we will return to levels of sensible, reasonable
regulation, not ideologically driven, and we will also pay very
little attention to agenda-driven science. I have issued an
immediate moratorium on ANY new regulations and will be going thru
each and every existing one, eliminating those that have kept
businesses from expanding and/or locating in this country. Several
of those are already in directives that you'll be able to find on the
web site at ten p.m.

"Now, none of that means that we'll be ignoring the 'safety
nets' that our truly vulnerable citizens need, but there will be
changes in that area, as well, since our government has done a pretty
abysmal job there for several decades.

"On the international front, we face a plethora of issues, both
economic and security-related. First, as to our foreign aid policy,
we will insist on reciprocal agreements AND performance for every
dollar of foreign aid we send out, and renewal of each of our
commitments will be based on performance-based criteria. And I will
be VERY quick to cut off foreign aid to countries that do not live up
to their agreements and promises.

"Our defense department will not see many serious changes in the
immediate future, but the Joint Chiefs and I have come to several
agreements in which the defense budget can be reduced significantly
but wisely, mostly by eliminating the political influences that have
controlled many of their past decisions, and without changing either
our readiness or our security posture. Our goal there is to be lean,
mean and nimble."