Killing Sprees.

Touchy subject. Still, probably worth solving.

Suicide is a terrible thing. It may seem like a victimless solution to someone in the throes of depression, but to the grieving friends and family left behind, the loss is real and painful beyond imagination.

The only thing worse is to take someone with you. Murder is the ultimate act of selfishness. It is the mindless and irreversible assertion that your wants and needs outweigh those of anyone else. We will not be solving murder yet. But we will tackle the multiple victim murder sprees that are occurring at an alarming and increasing rate.

The people that commit these horrible acts are unbalanced, to say the least. They are susceptible to suggestion. They are lonely. Without anyone to love, they can only focus on themselves. They are lazy. Why get to the root of why everyone shuns them when they can just kill them off?

When one of these shootings (and it's always shootings, isn't it?) occurs, the media circus that erupts around it is like a beacon to their damaged minds: "I'm ignored. I'm going to die forgotten. Unless I kill the people that torment me, cementing my place in history." And then they kill themselves, in the ultimate act of cowardice.

You want to be remembered, douchebag? Fine, but it's going to be on our terms.

Here's the deal. The next time this happens (and it will; sorry, this isn't a quick fix), we report the story. Then we move on. There will be no in-depth fucking tutorial on how he bought the weapons and planned the attack. There will be no round-the-clock punditry blaming video games or junk food for the actions of an unloved, unimaginative idiot.

What will the 24-hour news networks do with all the extra time they aren't spending on this frivolous coverage? There will be these two essential follow-ups, and then the issue is buried with the dead.

First, a brief and respectful mourning for the loss of life and celebration of the lives of the victims.

Second, a vicious, relentless attack on the character of the perpetrator. Every name he was called, every pimple, every failure, every shortcoming as a human being, in short, everything that drove him to kill will be broadcast to the world.

The subsequent generations of potential spree murderers will not see an aloof killer who terrified the hearts of a nation. They will see all their worst fears come to life: Here's a picture of the killer when he was stood up by his prom date. Here's his 6th grade diary detailing his constant struggle with nocturnal emissions. Here's his expulsion letter from Space Camp.

In short order, spree killings will fade as the misanthropes realize that they will go down in history as that which they hate most: themselves.

Oh, also, we won't make it so goddamn easy to buy a handgun and/or automatic weapon when you have a documented history of mental instability and/or poor judgment. This will also help solve the problems of gang violence and Texas.

This fucking economy.

Let's talk about the big elephant in the room: the decaying corpse that is our economy.

I'm going to be honest. This one isn't going to be easy. But it will be a whole lot easier if all the experts would just stop making it worse. So let's fix it.

The health of the economy is simply a matter of perception. If everyone thinks things are fine, they'll keep spending money and investing and all that crap people with money do. But people tell them the economy is bad, and then the people with the money shove it in rich people matresses (banks), shove it in super-rich people matresses (Swiss banks) or give it to Ponzi schemers to piss away.

So, first things first. Any experts or pundits found making public statements that the economy is troubled will be put to death. Their organs will be harvested, thus helping solve the problem of people dying. The remains will be fed to the polar bears.

Politicians who do not hold an advanced degree in economics from a respectable institution of higher learning will not be allowed to publicly disparage the efficacy of an economic package. In fact, in order to vote on any given bill, politicians will be required to pass a short aptitude test on the subject of the legislation. The exam will be written by a non-partisan group of experts. This will solve the problem of terrible laws being passed.

The government will then pay unemployed people to be the new experts and pundits, who will tell people to go ahead and invest their money and buy stuff. This will help solve unemployment and get money back into the economy.

Next, we'll convert all publicly traded companies back into private companies. With no stocks, there will be no more stockmarket crashes. There will also be no more stockbrokers.

In fact, any job wherein you are not producing a good or providing a service that can be explained to a 6 year-old will be eliminated. These are jobs that siphon money out of the economy and give it to people who buy yachts and name them "Camilleon." Stockbrokers will be given jobs as stockboys so they can keep their existing business cards with minor modifications.

With no board of directors or stockholders to answer to, companies will be held accountable for their actions at the executive level. All white collar crimes will be punishable by death.

The myth of corporate citizenship will also be put to death, so companies can't pretend they have all the rights of a person with none of the responsibilities. Companies will no longer be able to call campaign donation caps a violation of their right to free speech. This will help put an end to companies owning our government, and then making them pass laws that benefit them in the short-term while dooming the long-term health of the economy.

So, in short: stop calling it a depression before it's a depression. No more jobs that can't be explained in under 30 seconds at a dinner party. Corporations stop trying to suck the life out of people like they're wheatgrass at a Jamba Juice. Bing bang boom, economy's fixed.