Doomed from the very beginning, the legislative “super committee” failed to craft a measure that would have begun to nibble away at the nation’s looming deficit.

As the old saying goes, however, within every dark cloud is a silver lining.

Unknown to most observers of the budget bill that created the committee last summer is a small clause, nearly invisible matter of fact, that takes the matter out of the hands of the politicians and places it squarely in the lap of the National Union of Friendly Americans (NUFA).

The very capable and affable NUFA High and Mighty Council of Regular Folks in Mediation (HMCRFM) has already been busy with the task of managing the process to save the Union from what appears to be an inevitable fiscal and moral collapse.

Super Committee gone? A mere footnote in the annals of failure.

The NUFA High and Mighty Council of Regular Folks in Mediation has created the Super Dooper Committee to take its place. 

“We’ve all raised children and we know what it takes to solve juvenile behavior,” said the Grand Despot, who serves as head bartender and disciplinarian for NUFA. With millions of members and never an argument or a plate thrown during any gathering, even with liquor involved, the Grand Despot learned the secret to keep people on the road to responsibility and out of harms way when those evil spirits Denial and Blame set in.

“A good drink and a healthy dose of Swedish guilt usually does the trick,” he said. “And you know what, sometimes it’s not a two-way street. Sometimes, as in this case, one side is just plain wrong. There is no blame if someone is just plain wrong. You simply work to right the wrong and leave blame out of the equation. It may take some meditation, some levitation, some ceremonial cleansing in the camp sauna but we will get to the bottom of this and I guarantee just enough of the ones who are wrong will soon have their heads in their hands asking forgiveness. The others that don’t come to their senses will be booted from office for being numbskulls but that will have to wait another year. A person without guilt is a person without a soul. There are plenty of those types in that New Conservative Neanderthal Party, formerly known as the Republicans.

“My grandmother would have them doing penance by kneading and baking rye bread. Not us. We’re a little more direct these days. There are better ways to have them see the plight and suffering of the 99 percent. A little time with the dispossessed and the downtrodden, a little time sleeping in abandoned cars and living on a can of beans will allow them to understand that protecting the fat cats and abandoning any part of the social contract is a prospect for the doomed. Cutting food stamps doesn’t get a person a job.”

Under the watchful eye of NUFA life skills coaches, Super Dooper Committee members will gather at Camp Shack (it’s so much more than a hunting shack) where they will be assigned personal bartenders and be given almost-sacred satchels of steel wool and xanthan gum to ward off the evil spirits of ignorant ideologies. A little dog therapy with happy dogs for the more reticent members of the NCNP might be necessary. A healthy dose of shack levity and mentality will also be applied. Fuddy-duddies and conservatives generally wilt under the twin doses of levity and mentality. The Grand Despot rarely needs to apply Swedish guilt to get things in perspective.

“Makes my job pretty easy most of the time,” he admitted.

But when he does apply the guilt it’s like a headlock from Crusher Kowalski, the sleeper hold from Verne Gagne. 

No one leaves standing.  

NUFA financial engineers skilled in the diversion of sketchy revenue streams have enrolled the U.S. Treasury in the patented Permanent Asset Relief Program (PARP). This is no temporary measure, no TARP, just for Wall Street and the banks. Nope, this one is for all of us and it’ll give the Super Dooper Committee time and breathing space to create a lasting peace, a lasting social vision that’s fair for all Americans, not just the few that have enough wealth to ignore the rest of us.

No more talk of privatizing Social Security or the Postal Service or spending a trillion dollars a year to protect ourselves from the boogeyman, no more idiotic notions that tax cuts for the rich and the corporations will pull us from the burning house of cards that is our economy thanks to the unregulated free market. 

With PARP the government won’t be threatened with closure so a really dumb idea, an insane idea, such as sticking entrenched New Conservative Neanderthal Party members on a committee and hoping they negotiate and compromise, an oxymoronic idea in itself, can't be forced upon the populace.

The Exalted Shack Master himself will stop by to welcome the legislators and provide an inspirational message. He will explain the Camp Shack Deficit Induction Program.

“Never let your deficit think it’s smarter than you are. It’s only money, it doesn’t have opposable thumbs and can’t move from one place to another without our help. It’s only a tool and it’s helpless.“ 

He’ll explain the Camp Shack Jobs Program, focused solely on those things that can’t be outsourced. People. Citizens. NUFA.

“Jobs can be outsourced but they can’t outsource us.”

The Exalted Shack Master sets the mousetraps, cooks, does the dishes, cleans, drags and butchers the deer, provides the ash trays, cuts the firewood, distills the rum and ferments the wine, maintains relations with neighboring camps, sweeps the floors, does the laundry, fixes the radio that only draws an FM signal for some reason, offers a bootlace when needed. And he’s the boss. There is no squabble between labor and management. It is egalitarian. There is no condescension. It is a sustainable relationship.

He will quote Alvin Toffler.

“The illiterate of the future will not be the person who cannot read. It will be the person who does not know how to learn.”