The State of the Union address that never was

Found on the floor by an alert member of Congress:

Mr. Speaker, Mr. Vice President, members of the 105th Congress, distinguished guests, my fellow Americans:

I would like to start out by thanking America for showering me with a 60-plus percent approval rating, mostly because of an economic boom I had little to do with. Oh, I know I've had some problems with the ladies, including that poor intern who claims I had her perform certain sex acts on me in the oral, excuse me, Oval office, but when you get to be my age, it's important to show the nation that the President is still the man he used to be, if you get my drift.

But enough of that. Tonight I come before you with good news. Six presidents have come before you to warn of the danger deficits pose to the nation. Tonight I come to announce that the Federal Deficit, once so incomprehensibly large that it had 11 zeroes, will be, simply, zero.

Too bad this had to come from raising tax rates as high as 42 percent not counting state and local taxes, and too bad I'm still sitting on top of a government so large it reaches everywhere from enforcing sugar quotas to declaring National Dairy Awareness month.

But as I said in 1992, those who have done well must pay their share. In fact, America would be much better off without those pesky rich people creating jobs, donating money to charity and financing my reelection campaign.

But I digress. If we balance the budget next year, it is projected that we will have a sizable surplus in the years immediately afterward. What should we do with this projected surplus? I have a simple four word answer: save Social Security first.

That's right. We trust Americans so little that even if you're perfectly capable of saving for your own retirement, we want to keep seizing 7.65 percent of your income (more if you're self-employed) and turning it over to your grandparents so that your grandchildren can pay even more to support you. Oh, maybe you could invest that money in mutual funds and get a better return, but isn't it easier to let Big Brother take your money and dole it back out to you like a kid on an allowance?

Hopefully, the history books will remember me as the education president, since it sounds so much nicer than the sexual harassment president. So I have something to say to each and every American family listening tonight. Your children can go to college. Even if your children don't want to go to college, by gosh, we just might make them, because we can make college as universal as high school is today. With any luck, a college diploma will be as meaningless as a high school diploma, seeing as about a quarter of high school graduates can't actually read.

But just because they can't read doesn't mean they can't smoke! Now we must help parents protect their children from the gravest health threat they face, an epidemic of teen smoking, spread by multimillion dollar marketing campaigns. Let's raise cigarette prices by $1.50 a pack! It's not as though anybody controls what he sticks in his mouth and sets on fire, it's those darn tobacco companies holding a gun to his head.

And while we're at it, let's charge the tobacco companies hundreds of billions of dollars for the crime of selling a perfectly legal and heavily taxed product to consumers who were willing to buy it. We must recoup our Medicaid dollars! Too bad no one realized that some people make really dumb health decisions before we decided to socialize medicine.

Of course, all this anti-tobacco rhetoric is not intended for the hardworking tobacco farmers in my good friend Jesse Helms' native state of North Carolina. After all, I'm the working man's president. Tobacco farmers unite! Throw off the yokes of oppression! Keep up the good work boys.

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And while I'm at it, we also need to throw off the yoke of oppressive campaign finance. This year, on March 6, the Senate will vote on bipartisan campaign finance reform proposed by Senators McCain and Feingold. Let's be clear: A vote against McCain-Feingold is a vote for soft money, for the status quo, for the system that got me in trouble for making fund-raising calls from the White House and had Gore traipsing around a Buddhist temple. After all, I'm a victim, too.

So I will formally request that the FCC act to provide free TV time for candidates. The airwaves are a public trust, and broadcasters have a responsibility to help strengthen our democracy. And if they refuse, we'll just have the IRS confiscate their homes or else we'll send the ATF agents to beat down their doors until they see the light.

Speaking of the IRS, like every taxpayer, I am outraged by the reports of abuses by the Internal Revenue Service. However, unlike the average taxpayer, I also have the benefit of seeing my accusers, like Paula Jones, "randomly" audited.

I'm also proud to tell you tonight of all the regulations I helped pass so that the EPA can paralyze more businesses for paperwork violations. But far be it from me to hold back technology. Now, in schools, libraries, homes and businesses, millions of Americans surf the web every day. We must give parents the tools they need to protect their children from inappropriate material on the Internet. Last year, I tried it with the Communications Decency Act.

Oh, sure, I knew it was unconstitutional and that as president I was sworn to uphold the Constitution of the United States, but I thought it might play well with conservative voters who were a bit miffed about the whole infidelity thing. After all, sex in the Oval Office is okay, but certainly not on your child's computer screen!

And that's the message I want to leave you with tonight – an America that has continued to rise through every age, has come to deepen the meaning of our freedom as I "form a more perfect union" with an intern in my study. Heh heh, just kidding Ken Starr!

God bless you, and God bless the United States of America.