The old M1 Garand wouldn’t be a bad choice if we went back to 30-06. Maybe a modernized version of that will be what the “Tanker”Garand was supposed to be.

And, I think that the babyboomers and even the greatest generation voted themselves unsustainable largess to begin with.

2. Repeal mark-to-market and restore generally accepted accounting principles (GAAP) including historical basis for value to stabilize toxic securities. Value stability of supposedly stable securities is the goal. (Mark to market actually makes sense. Acquisition cost for a variable asset that now has an undefined value? Nonsense, the emperor would not only have no clothes; he would have no skin.)

3. Repeal all capital gains and corporate taxes, which would bring the markets roaring back, and make George W. Bush tax cuts permanent, which would quiet concerns about punitive taxation and prevent the John Galt reaction we got. (Repeal the Estate Tax, an exercise in grave robbery as well as double taxation.)

5. Repeal Sarbanes Oxley, repeal CRA, which would restore sensible lending and double the profits of public companies at two strokes of a pen. (Nonsense. Too damn many companies tried to go public when they had no cash flow in the dot.com ’90s. Let them do those deals in the City of London: you see how well that is going. There is a value to the CRA, as it encourages purchases of property in depressed areas.)

6. Prosecute the swindlers in Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac and elsewhere, and find the other Madoffs that are still out there swindling people. Also publicly audit the entire Federal Reserve system and mandate annual repeat audits with full transparency including internet publication. Also institute annual public audits of Federal Government spending with internet publication of results. (Paul Volker is recommending something like this.) Tie money supply, including available reserves, to gross value of all real property in the USA, no more and no less. This would restore confidence in the markets and the dollar. (Why real property? The relationship to the money supply is tangential at best. Why not GDP?)
7. Improve security of US currency with RFID and security technologies. Bring back coins that are worth something, like $5, $20 and $100 coins. (That would be . . . heavy, man, heavy.)

8. Declare that all credit default swaps and other forms of insurance that did not back up an actual covered security or property were immediately null and void. Same with the naked shorting that was being done at the time. Both these changes have been implemented recently. (Watch banks here and overseas go belly up. CDOs are a good instrument, but just aren’t investment grade, up to a AAA- level. If everyone understands that, they are fine.)

9. Investigate and prosecute vote fraud vigorously, including voter registration fraud and denial of voting rights to the military, since rampant frauds are destroying trust in the results of voting. Reduced trust in the voting process encourages violent revolution, since the ballot box can’t be trusted. (More likely, apathy.)

10. Enforce the US Constitution fully, including provisions against dual citizenship, and the 9th and 10th Amendments. (The X th Amendment is the key to the 21st Century.)

11. Don’t pass SCHIP reform that makes trust-fund “children” up to age 25 and children of parents earning well over the median national income eligible for “free” government health insurance. The whole bill was and is ridiculous. It must be repealed. (Reform health care by taking it away from both employers and the Government and you won’t need SCHIP, Medicaid or Medicare.)

12. Deregulate the insurance market for all types of insurance, allowing any US insurance company to insure in any state, thereby spreading out risk pools and lowering everyone’s rates. State insurance boards can get over themselves. This will bring competition into the health insurance market and lower administrative costs. Will insurance companies try to lower costs by denying coverage? Preventing those kind of shenanigans is what state insurance boards are supposed to be doing. (Allow people to set up health insurance buying cooperatives.)

16. Close the borders tight to smuggling of drugs and aliens, increase the quotas for LEGAL Mexicans, Filipinos, Canadians, and other desirable immigrants, and finish the fence. (The fence is nonsense. A good bit of the Border is in the territory of an Indian Nation that stands to gain from passing illegal border crossers through. If it didn’t work on the IZB, with guards willing to shoot, why would it work here?)

17. Grant individual deductions for health insurance, which would untie health insurance from employers, allowing people to form voluntary associations with which to buy group insurance, or even buy it individually. (This is probably the key along with legal reform. get employers and the governments out of this business. Maybe use this same approach to Social Security and pensions. Probably works better with groups than individuals.)

18. Call in all banks’ leverage to no more than 12:1. Restore Glass-Steagal. (Regulation should not tell people how to do things. It should tell them what not to do, as with Glass-Steagal, and it should tell them to report what they are doing, as with 10-K s and other SEC filing requirements.)

19. Fire all political appointees in the federal government. They can be brought back slowly, in reduced numbers, as the economy recovers and tax revenues allow. (They say the Obama Administration deliberately did not fill all existing political positions for that reason. If so, the next Administration needs to make that a tradition.)

20. Cut all federal agencies budgets by 20% except for defense. (Eliminate anything not reasonably attributed to an enumerated power of the Federal Government.) Also fire and prosecute federal employees who engage in political work on the clock. This would be a zero tolerance rule with a whistle-blower program. If this does not produce a balanced budget keep cutting budgets until it does. The unproductive government should not be allowed to grow while the productive economy is shrinking. (Bottom line: government needs to live within its [likely declining] means.)

21. Cut 90% of the pages from federal regulations across the board. (See if anyone misses them?) Make every department cut their regulations, leaving only the most important ones. Cuts should not be made by lawyers, but by subject matter experts.

22. Pass balanced-budget Amendment. (Also an amendment that prohibits knowingly inflating the currency.)

24. Withhold all federal funds from locales that do not enable enforcement of federal laws including immigration laws. Withhold all federal funds from schools that do not allow ROTC programs or military recruiters. (Why are Federal Funds being given to localities at all?)

25. Begin phase-out of student loan programs. Strongly encourage (by means of tax and other rules changes) schools to compensate by lowering prices, laying off non-teaching faculty and staff, and selling off non-core properties. There is no good reason why tuition should be the same as the average family’s annual income. And the government should not place graduates under intolerable debt burdens immediately after graduation as the student loan programs now do. (Markets set prices. Nothing else should try.)

26. Fire all government economists. Delete their positions. Create a voluntary, outside economic advisory group for Executive and Legislative Branches, and the States, and restrict it to followers of the neo-Austrian School. Explicitly ban access to Keynesians. Encourage advisors to profit by publicizing their positions and writing articles for popular audiences. Sorry, Keynesians. But Keynes admitted he didn’t believe his own theories before he died. He just never managed to write down his revised opinions. (Amen, Keynesian approaches just don’t work.)

27. Terminate federal arts funding. Terminate Department of Education and NCLB. Terminate PBS and Public Radio. (Eliminate anything not justified under an enumerated power.) Bring back Voice of America and translation programs of English language books to other languages, especially Arabic, the Indian subcontinental languages, and Chinese. (DoD, OK.) Reduce funding to the UN and permanently reject the Law of the Sea Treaty, by statute if needed. The UN should be reduced to about 10% of its current size instead of being encouraged to become a world government. (All of that is by Treaty. Not much you can do, other than ignore it.)

30. Managed bankruptcy for critical industries that need it, with the government guaranteeing their products to consumers, while allowing them to throw out legacy agreements that hobble them. (Constitution gives great power over bankruptcy to Congress, so OK.)

31. Switch to privatized social security with investments in the free markets (including gold specie), while guaranteeing payments will be no worse than those presently in the plans. (See 11, 12 and 17 above, do the same kind of thing.)

32. Cut back medicare/medicaid to restore them to their original purpose as safety nets for people who are temporarily down on their luck and the aged, instead of making them permanent programs for people who settle for being drunk, stupid, and poor. (Fix health care as you suggest and you won’t need them.)

33. Restore death penalty by hanging for treason, terrorism and piracy. (Let the local courts take jurisdiction of pirates and let them hand them under the Customary Law of the Sea.)

35. Raise the mandatory federal retirement age from 65 to 75. Lower the minimum age at which people can work from 16 to 13. (Fix education, so people get to work sooner.)

36. Repeal McCain-Feingold, and require 100% transparency in all campaign contributions of all dollar values, including in-kind contributions from artists, entertainers and the media who simply repeat campaign promises and publish hagiographic stories as if they were news. (Small donations to popular candidates work well. Your last idea is great.)

37. Begin negotiations on statehood with Puerto Rico and Guam. There is no reason in today’s world why the USA must be contiguous. We already know this because of Hawaii and Alaska, but seem to have forgotten. Create a process for other lands to apply for USA statehood. Just imagine if Iraqis could aspire to a future in which they were a part of the USA, with all the advantages that would come from it. (Offer to Let them buy out of the union, as an option. Federal government needs to sell off all its business and real estate holdings not related to an enumerated power.)

38. Start selling off and privatizing federal lands in a way that maximizes long term revenue in order to pay off the national debt. First goal is to make at least 25% of Alaska privately owned. (SEE ABOVE, IT makes sense.)

39. Stop all foreign aid. Encourage trade instead, which increases employment and reduces poverty instead of giving money to dictators for weapons and miltias. This would also zero out the US trade deficit, which is as high as it is precisely because of foreign aid. (Good to this point. The last is nonsense.)

41. Make bubble-caused losses in property value 100% deductible as expenses for up to ten years as they are incurred, without requiring the property to be sold, thereby allowing people and corporations to pay off the bubble-caused decline in their property value with zero net cost while keeping their full equity. Change bank regulations to require lenders to accept these and other early payoffs, coupled with reduction of the face value of the loan, without penalties. Early payment penalties should be illegal, and would be banned generally. (Tax credits for being current on mortgage debt?)

42. The Switzerland Rule: Encourage all minors over age 12 and adults of sound mind and body to be proficient in semi-auto 7.62mm rifle (AR15 or variant) and semi-auto shotgun. Make purchase and upkeep of one standardized copy of each, including ammunition, tax deductible for each adult of sound mind and body. Declare open carry legal everywhere, overruling all state and local rules. (No, this impinges on the rights of the States under the II d Amendment to “regulate the militia.” Do it through uniform laws or power of the purse, which I hate, but is more justifiable here due to Federal Support of the Army and Air National Guard.)

There’s going to be another Tea Party in Minnesota next month, I plan to print this list up and hand it out to everyone who will take a copy.

So if you don’t like BeagleScout’s list, either come up with a list of your own or go lay down by your dish.

I wish I had a rolled up newspaper right now.

Getting FT passed without support from the Geritol demographic isn’t going to happen.

But the main obstacles are the necessary repeal of the 16thA and then the transition, and I think the combination of the time and energy involved in both would sap energy away from a more productive and quicker remedy with the flat tax under the existing structure.

But you make a good point, and I could be wrong on my first point.