Dear Iowa Legislature,

Happy New Year! New fiscal year, that is. After last fiscal year’s budget debacle, it is more than obvious that a few changes are in order. Being an election year, now is the perfect time to enact my proposals that will once and for all put Iowa off the map.

Off the map, you say, Patrick? That’s right. Off the map. I’m for anything short of seceding from the union.

Let me explain. Most of you talk the talk, but there is very little walking involved. You say Iowa needs this, Iowa needs that and pretty much everything stays the same.

Why? Well, votes, of course. And who votes for lack of change? Old people do. Unfortunately, the only reliable source of votes comes from those least willing to accept anything less than less. Old people vote for less taxes, fewer school bond issues and less tolerance. Understandably, you cater to your constituency.

Think about this, though. If things don’t change quickly, if Iowa continues to neglect and then lose its talented youth, you will all be stuck with a financial picture as painful as my Grandpa’s bunions. That is, you’ll have more people sucking the teat of Social Security than people paying in. Ouch.

Now you understand that unless we hold on (forcibly, if necessary) and secure younger, more able-bodied workers, Iowa will continue to decline steadily toward Oklahoma-like standards. We certainly don’t want that, do we?

So how do we keep these strapping youngsters from leaving? Well, this is where taking Iowa off the map comes in. We give them no other choice.

Proposal Number One: Last year, someone came up with the idea to pass an English-only bill. Super. Except for one thing: 99 percent of the people already speak English. I haven’t been to every state in the Union, but I have yet to find myself in a situation that required my German/English dictionary. Therein lies the problem, or rather, our solution.

Young people leave Iowa because they can so easily. If we were to make it a little bit more difficult, our lazy asses wouldn’t budge. So why not pass a Spanish-only bill? Or better yet, an Esperanto-only bill, requiring a working knowledge of the world’s most internationally unknown language?

Whatever language you choose, try to make it as useless as possible (Sanskrit and Alabaman would work as well), thus making each and every state and country as foreign as possible.

Proposal Number Two: As we’ve seen from such notable ex-Iowans as John Wayne, Ann Landers, Bob Feller and Ronald Reagan, escape is always possible. If there’s anything to learn from these few traitors, it’s that outside influence always have some way of seeping in. Even down dirt roads and rural highways, knowledge and opportunity are carelessly careening with the top down -probably in an electric car that doesn’t need ethanol – and are spewing fumes that are eagerly huffed up by our youth.

How can we stop this? Simple. Find this hot rod of liberalism and shoot out its tires! Think about all the trouble you guys get from the universities.

“Our classes are too big,” they cry. “We don’t have enough rooms for the students,” they complain. “The Boar Semen Research Center won’t be able to survive without additional funding,” they moan.

Whine, whine, whine.

Bollocks to them all!

If we were to simply get rid of the whole system we would: A) have a whole lot more money, and B) have a population so completely baffled by “them big-city ways” that the mere mention of anything cultural would send them scurrying back to their mindless holes. You all seem to be doing so well on this point that it makes me wonder if you haven’t already figured this out. Hmmm.

Although these proposals may seem hard to enact, you all really should thank me. I am, after all, saving you from talking about really hot-button political issues like the heated debates over quail hunting and whether or not to raise the speed limit.

It’d be a lot easier than making Iowa more diverse or more tolerant, and we all know that is no way to get votes. We could try to update both of our downtown areas, following the lead of more notable Midwestern metropolises such as Madison or Minneapolis. In order to do that, though, we would have to pass a whole lot of half-cent tax increases. We know who isn’t going to go for that.

Finally, as a young person myself, I know we are a finicky lot, and you never know what we’ll do or want. So why bother?

Zorgi (Esperanto for “take care”),

P.L. O’Bryan

Patrick O’Bryan is a senior in English from Indianola.