I often think about how hard it would be for me to get elected to public office. I’m not tall and I don’t have good hair. I don’t go to church. I have a documented history of insisting I am too ignorant to vote. I can’t pronounce the names of world leaders without wondering aloud why they can’t afford more vowels. The list goes on and on.
Well, the list got longer yesterday when I read an article in Slate that says Internet porn apparently reduces the incidents of rape. The numbers show that when communities become more wired for the Internet, the rate of rape declines markedly while the rates of other crimes (such as murder) are unchanged.
http://www.slate.com/id/2152487/
As a political candidate, I would advocate some sort of tax rebate to subsidize Internet porn and Kleenex for single men between the ages of 18 and 35. That way all the potential rapists can more easily afford to exhaust themselves at home. I’d have graphs and charts to make my argument that no other policy would be as effective. My slogan would be “Deal with the root cause.” I would call it my Yankee Doodle plan.
I would also legalize drugs, partly to free up law enforcement resources for more serious crimes, and partly to make the Internet porn that much more enjoyable compared to raping.
I know that some of you will argue that Internet porn breaks up families. You might be right. That’s why my porn subsidies would only go to young, single guys. Older guys and married guys don’t do that much raping anyway, so they’ll have to buy porn and Kleenex at regular prices.
I would also advocate legalizing “happy endings” at licensed massage parlors. I haven’t seen the statistics, but I’ll bet no massage client uses that last five minutes to plan robbing a convenience store. So even if my happy ending policy didn’t reduce crime, it might postpone it a few minutes. That’s worth something.
Lastly I would advocate taking all of the remaining money from the poor and giving it to the richest 1%. My argument would be “Poor people don’t vote. Let’s take what’s left of their money.” To be clear, I don’t believe it is right to steal from the poor. But I can’t think of a better way to increase voter turnout. Once the poor start voting, we’ll have universal health care in no time.
To pay for universal health care and tax breaks for porn and Kleenex, I’d institute a $100 cover charge and a two drink minimum for any non-resident entering the country. If we can’t stop immigration, we might as well turn it into a source of revenue.
In summary, my platform would promote drug legalization, porn, porous borders, and robbing the poor. The sad part is that I’d be the only politician with a workable plan.