Pearls Before Pandemic

Now that Congress has apparently graduated from med school, they're putting their vast medical knowledge to good use, cobbling together 20,000 leagues of legislation to ensure we can all get sick for free, get dead when deemed best for the collective, and get buried under a bunch of new taxes.

We know the plan will work; after all, some real doctors dressed in white lab coats posed for a picture at the White House.

So far, so good.

On the down side, the bill, intended to insure everyone, doesn't. The bill, boasting to "bend the curve" of rising health care costs, can't. And the bill, promising to lower insurance premiums, won't.

On the plus side, nobody, including Congress, has read the bill. For all we know, it could guarantee free candy for all, and new teeth on demand.

So let's take a quick look at how they're managing their first health care issue: the flu.

DISCLAIMER: Nothing that follows is true. I hope.

December 2008

• World health panels predict a new strain of the Swine Flu. George Bush is blamed.

• The Center for Disease Control (CDC) admits they have no vaccines for a flu named after a farm animal.

• The White House admits they have no experience managing health crises (or, for that matter, anything else). But they do have unlimited funds with which to convert their fumblings into flawed public policy.

• Congress adjourns for the month.

January 2009

• CDC determines that teenagers may need 2 different shots, administered in 2 different states.

• The Swine Czar consults political donors to see if anybody wants to become a supplier of vaccines and get very rich.

• Congress remembers that they forgot to include the flu in the Health Care Bill. They respond quickly, adjourning for a long weekend.

February 2009

• Vaccine contracts are awarded to a Chicago union shop that, naturally, makes hubcaps.

• The White House defends the decision diplomatically, stating, "You gotta problem with that?"

• CDC confirms that teenagers will have to get 2 shots, especially if they've started dating. The hubcap union immediately strikes, demanding overtime.

• Obama insists that he inherited the CDC from George Bush.

• Congress approves a new tax to print 350 million copies of "How To Sneeze Into Your Inner Elbow For Dummies."

March 2009

• CDC updates its analysis, hoping that teenagers will only need 1 shot, unless they're really large teenagers.

• Congress discovers a typo in the Health Care Bill, resulting in $845 billion being allocated for something called the "Wine Flu."

April 2009

• The first case of Swine Flu is documented at a South Carolina pork barbecue. Witnesses say the victim had been trying to soul-kiss an unusually attractive, undercooked picnic shoulder.

• CDC recommends that dating teenagers should enclose their hands in cement. Parents of dating teenagers heartily agree.

• The White House hints that the vaccines might be late. George Bush is blamed.

May 2009

• Across America, personalized surgical masks are all the rage. Fox debuts a new reality show, "Dancing With The Uninfected Stars."

• Wall Street brokers are encouraged, when closing "pork belly" business deals, to use the elbow bump.

• After an uptick in bank robberies, the FBI impounds all the surgical masks.

• Public schools are instructed to send students home if they notice any odd behaviour, like sneezing or being literate.

June 2009

• The White House admits that taxpayers paid for 325 million vaccines, but the hubcap union only delivered eight.

• Joe Biden advocates that Americans, particularly Republicans, stop exhaling, calling it "the patriotic thing to do."

• CDC revises its revised revisions: teenagers will only need 1 shot, unless they've ever dated a farm animal.

• Congress announces an updated version of the Health Care bill. When asked about provisions for H1N1, Nancy Pelosi said, "The wha? ... Oh, shoot. Hang on."

July 2009

• Obama announces his new flu containment plan, declaring it the best plan he's come up with since the last plan he came up with, earlier that morning, before George Bush woke up.

• CDC re-revises: teens may only require 1 shot, but their iPhone might require one, too.

August 2009

• Hillary reaches out to the virus for high-level summit talks, which sour immediately when she's introduced to the virus and asks, "Welcome to Washington. May I call you 'Swine?'"

• Robert Gibbs bungles a briefing, calling the pandemic "H2N2," and the entire batch of vaccines gets scrapped.

• CDC threatens that teenagers will have to get a whole bunch of shots, unless they agree to spy on their parents' tax returns.

September 2009

• Obama signs an executive order, mandating that only those earning more than $250,000 will get the flu.

• Independent sources release sobering statistics about the pandemic: more Americans have died from chopping garlic.

• CDC guesses that teenagers might need a shot, or two, or more. They're just not sure, but they promise to Google it.

• Congress discovers another typo, and $687 billion is allocated to the treatment of "Spine Fluid."

October 2009

• During Halloween, Typhoid Mary masks are all the rage.

• For no apparent reason, Al Sharpton appears to make a public statement, but is swamped by people offering to buy his mask.

• CDC re-calculates that dating teenagers need 3 shots. Parents of dating teenagers admit they need 3 shots, too. Of Scotch.

November 2009

• Obama blames the pandemic for low election turnout. He signs an executive order, renaming it the "George Bush Flu."

• Poll-watchers invalidate some ballots that were cast by people who are actually dead. The ACLU logs a complaint, citing "post-oxygen bias."

• The Treasury offers to sell the CDC to Fiat.

• A calico cat in Texas contracts the flu. The ACLU logs a complaint, citing "anti-canine bias."

• Congress, clueless and critically close to a long weekend break, consults Stephen King about Captain Trips, and then earmarks $461 billion for "non-discretionary spooky stuff."

December 2009

• CDC concedes that the shots won't work: all dating teenagers must be quarantined at Gitmo. Pre-Christmas iPhone sales plummet.

• The Ho-Ho-Ho Czar extends Christmas through the end of next March.

• The White House blames George Bush for flagging Christmas sales.

• The ACLU logs a complaint about the White House saying "Christmas."

• China offers to purchase Congress for fifty bucks. US citizens counter-offer, lowering the price to $29.95. Both sides do an elbow bump.

January 2010

• China ships Congress back to the US, citing intolerable defects.

• At Gitmo, teenagers are reclassified as aliens, as their parents always suspected. As aliens, the teens will be covered in the Health Care Bill.

• Due to an unforeseen outbreak of Ferret Flu, everyone in America dissolves into piles of thin brown dust, which is not covered in the Health Care Bill.

February 2010

• The Gitmo teenagers swim to Ft. Lauderdale for Spring Break, challenge China to a global game of Beer Ping-Pong, and win back all of America's debt.

And thus will America be saved, although the post-flu Congress will be full of hormone-raging, self-serving, immature brats.

So far, so good.