From: Tom Carlson
Date: 7/1/99
Subject: A Really, Really Great Modest Proposal

We've heard suggestions that the Ten Commandments be posted in schools and courtrooms as a solution to ah...crime, I guess.

We have also heard others pooh pooh the idea.

I say let's have a test of the proposal!

Let's have churches and synagogues volunteer to have the commandments posted on their sites for a trial period, say forty days and forty nights. Then we can easily calculate what happens to the crime rate there. (Remember I said the postings should be voluntary on the part of the churches and synagogues.)

If the experiment works, we will note that priests will not be killed by mental cases, as happened last week; poor boxes will not be rifled, as happens all the time; and parishioners will go and sin no more, which hasn't happened yet.

At the end of the trial period there will either be a noticeable decrease in crime or there will not be.

If there is a decrease, keep the commandments nailed to the wall. If, however, there is no meaningful decrease, nail the fundamentalists to the wall.

Just another meaningful contribution to civilization; no charge, of course.