Amendments We Need
by Bill Shein

As the war in Iraq rages, and the national debt grows, and the cost of health care and energy climbs, and wages stagnate, and media consolidates, and civil liberties vanish, and the climate warms, and doves cry, are you surprised to learn that the U.S. Senate will spend time this summer debating some thoroughly preposterous amendments to the Constitution?

Yes, friends, the troubles we face here and abroad can, it seems, be traced directly to the twin questions of (a) who should be allowed to marry whom, and (b) whether or not some jerk can burn the American flag.

Such are the election-year priorities of what its members describe — with a straight face — as "the world's greatest deliberative body."

Who are these senators, and just what do they think they're doing? Couldn't any number of us regular Jills and Joes do a better job?

I pose this question because last week, during an especially vivid daydream, several people stopped me on the street to ask what I would do if I suddenly became a United States senator.

Of course, the very first thing would be to find a crowded bar filled with attractive movie-star types, leap onto a table and yell, "Hey, I never ran for office, but somehow I'm now a United States senator! Check me out, ladies: One-hundred-percent Grade-A senator!"

After that shameless attempt to use my senatorial status to attract the interest of various lovelies, I'd race back to Capitol Hill and introduce these urgently needed amendments to the U.S. Constitution:

AMENDMENT 28— The right of citizens to mock, satirize, ridicule, point an accusatory finger at, deride, disparage, and generally laugh uproariously at the shameless antics of pandering politicians in an election year shall not be abridged.

AMENDMENT 29 — Marriage in the United States shall consist only of the union of two human beings who love each other a great deal — period.

AMENDMENT 30 — Divorce in the United States shall be defined as the legal and permanent separation of two human beings who once loved each other a great deal, but, after an extended period of bickering over toilet seats and toothpaste caps and finances and in-laws and God knows what else, decide that they are better off apart, especially now that the fancy kitchen appliances they received as wedding gifts are old, worn, and mostly broken beyond repair.

AMENDMENT 31 — Congress shall pass no law making it a crime to deface the American flag, because the fundamental right to free expression — however repugnant that expression may be — is far more sacred than any piece of cloth. Unless that piece of cloth once touched the bare shoulder of actress Kate Beckinsale; defacing such a cloth shall hereafter be punishable by life in prison without the possibility of parole.

AMENDMENT 32 — No citizen of the United States shall be denied the right to vote solely because of the provable foolishness of his or her previous electoral choices.

AMENDMENT 33 — Congress shall pass no law that prevents citizens who have made provably foolish electoral choices from receiving, in the mail, an invitation to attend a daylong Election Day party with Hollywood's hottest celebrities that would, just coincidentally, make it impossible for them to cast a ballot.

AMENDMENT 34 — The right of all citizens to berate, give dirty looks to, and heap scorn upon those who throw their cigarette butts on the ground as if our fragile natural environment was little more than a giant ashtray shall not be abridged.

AMENDMENT 35 — Those who serve in the United States Senate shall be properly elected by the people of the various states and not just "suddenly become a United States senator" in the wake of an especially vivid daydream, even if they have some interesting ideas for constitutional amendments.

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Bill Shein is a U.S. senator from a little-known western state.

(This column originally appeared in the Berkshire Eagle newspaper on May 24, 2006. Join a discussion about this column in Bill's blog. And read Bill's previous column, " Pliocene Epoch Personal Ads").