Friday, December 6, 2013

Obama War Room: Grapes of Roth*



JOE BIDEN: Man, the wingnuts are gonna smoke us in midterms because of ObamaCaca. Two years of Boehner and McConnell drivin’ the bus while we’re sittin’ in back scratchin’ our . . .

OBAMA
: Uh uh, Joe. Republicans controlling both Houses would be problematic only if I respected the Constitution. Still, it would be easier if we kept the Senate. Valerie has a plan.

JARRETT: Yes, we stop talking about health care and tell our media allies to stop reporting on it. Then we launch a sustained attack on the GOP's positions on our issues--open borders, abortion on demand until the blob of protoplasm has lived one year outside the womb, lifetime unemployment benefits, and so on.

JAY CARNEY: Soros's PAC has an immigration ad in the can. They'll run it whenever we say. Opens with a Latino woman breastfeeding her baby at home when Sheriff Joe Arpaio’s SWAT team storms in, arrests her for exposing herself to a minor, carts her to the Rio Grande, throws her in, and laughs as she paddles to Mexico. The voiceover: “It’s 2015 and Republicans control Congress."

OBAMA: Okay! What happens to the baby?

CARNEY: Orphanage. Right out of Dickens.

OBAMA: Works for me. Other distractions.

BIDEN: I'm addressin' NARAL next week, Chief. I’ll tell the ladies Boehner wants to discourage abortions by requiring women to register their uteri with HHS. That’ll be good for a coupla news cycles.

DAN PFIEFFER: How about this, sir: a House Democrat switches parties, then introduces a bill criminalizing the application of makeup while driving.

OBAMA: Good. Let's go positive, too. Chuck?

HAGEL: Announce disbandment of the INS, sir. Millions of know-nothings will cheer you for eliminating the IRS.

JARRETT: That would save us a bundle, Mr. President, and promote hassle-free passage into the U. S. of landscapers from Juárez and Tegucigalpa.

OBAMA: Wonderful. Streisand's always looking for people to tend her Shangri-La estate in Malibu. Other ideas?

JACK LEW: Sell China drilling rights off the coasts of Florida and California, sir, then have our enviros tie up the deal with litigation. If the court rules for the companies, a DNC black ops team will blow a wellhead, setting exploiters back a decade. Your hands would be clean.

OBAMA
: No way we can let those rigs produce. Gasoline’s four bucks a gallon right now, a far cry from our $10 a gallon goal. Last thing I want is more product and lower prices.

JARRETT: You haven’t responded to China’s offer to lease California and build mega-manufactories staffed by restive Muslims from Xinxiang Province.

OBAMA: I dunno. The Chinese say they just want “Made in the USA” tags on their stuff. Sounds harmless enough, but something smells wrong. Stall them. John?

KERRY
: French President Hollande called, sir. He’ll accept return of Jefferson’s 1803 Louisiana Purchase and refund our $15 million payment, minus a 20% restocking fee.

OBAMA: Tempting. Get rid of Texas and a couple other red states. That it?

LEW: McConnell and Boehner laughed when I suggested Treasury assume management of the trillions sitting in IRAs, sir. Too bad. The investments we might have made in America’s future.

BIDEN: Wienies. Argentina’s government had the guts to take control of the country’s private pension funds. Argentina! A tinpot regime shows the world’s most progressive declinin’ superpower howda do it.

OBAMA: Jack, what about the windfall tax revenue you promised from this year’s one time Roth IRA “Pay the IRS now, profit later” conversion deal?

LEW: The public hasn’t bought into the promotion, sir. Frankly, only an idiot would pay taxes proactively while you’re in office.

JARRETT
: Mr. President, why not go after the Roth trove itself ? Most of that money’s owned by the richest 40%, people who don’t need the funds but invested in Roths to help their children and grandchildren evade responsibility for the fix we’re bequeathing them.

BIDEN
: Won’t work, Val . The Hill will never legislate a surtax on Roth withdrawals.

OBAMA: Val’s not talking some measly 10% surtax, Joe. I want it all. Val, how do we do manage that?

JARRETT
: Go Argentina one better: citing fiscal eminent domain, nationalize Roth accounts. Holder can drag out the court fight through 2016.

OBAMA: Brilliant! With more money than God, I‘ll buy off enough legislatures to repeal the 22nd Amendment.

LEW: Related matter, sir: Barney Frank says the Republicans are undoing all the damage he did with Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac during his tenure as Chair of the House Financial Services Committee. He wants a firewall to stop them.

PFEIFFER: Barney’s right. Took years of neglect for Fannie and Freddie to become a bureaucratic rats' nest. Republicans are cleaning it out.

OBAMA: I’ll appropriate those organizations and place them in trust with Treasury. Jack, recharter the two as “Fannie Mae I” and “Freddie Mac the Knife,” the government’s fully owned “tough love” lenders [snort]. I’ll ask budget hawks Paul Krugman and John Kenneth Galbraith to serve as CEOs.

PFEIFFER: Galbraith’s dead, sir.

OBAMA
: True. But when critics say his agency reeks of corruption, we’ll have a counter.



*Adapted from You Hear Me, Barack?

No comments:

Post a Comment