MISSOURI WATCH: YEAR OF THE ELEPHANT: NO HUNGRY, HOMELESS CRIMINALS ON WELFARE

I don't know about you, but I couldn't be happier now that Republicans are about to be in charge again. After 40 years of a Congress controlled by liberal, wild-eyed Democrats and two years of a wild-eyed, liberal president, it's time America put aside the foolish notion that we can just tax and tax and spend and spend.

That overwhelming GOP sweep at the polls the other day didn't really surprise any of us ace columnists, who have been marching in lock-step with Rush Limbaugh from the very first days of his ministry, and other assorted prophets such as Strom Thurmond, Newt Gingrich and Al D'Amato. We aces knew that enlightened leadership like this would surely prevail over the forces that have been whittling away at our constitutional liberties since the days of FDR, Harry Truman and Jack Kennedy. Enough is enough, if you ask us.

Now that voters have so overwhelmingly approved the Republican "Contract With America," it's only a matter of time until we stop wasting our tax dollars on such frivolous expenses as food for hungry children, housing for homeless and cable TV for wanton murderers, rapists and senior citizens who are living off the fat of the land with their exorbitant Social Security entitlements.

And, just as we enlightened columnists predicted before the election, the days of GOP fiscal responsibility will return the moment Bob Dole gets the keys to the United States Senate and Newt Gingrich's coronation is held in the House of Representatives. Oh, how we've been longing for the fiscal responsibility that we've been denied since that sad day the Grand Old Party was canceled and the Democratic white trash took over all the decent parking spaces at National Airport, not to mention the Abraham Lincoln bedroom at the White House and the Richard Nixon Memorial Annex at the Library of Congress.

We can all count on Republicans to give America what it has so badly needed since the first administration of that wild-eyed, liberal spending George Washington: a balanced budget. Those with long memories can well recall the days when our first president, seeking to coddle special interest groups such as veterans and the poor, spent lavishly on federal aid that Washington couldn't pay for. It's been downhill ever since, if you ask us ace political commentators.

Coming to our rescue just in time our new House leader, Professor Gingrich, is going to endow us with a Balanced Budget Amendment, just as he promised he would do even before the election. Skeptics claimed that once the GOP scrubbed down the Capitol and found all those Democratic skeletons that were laying around, Newt would go back on his word and forget all of us conservative taxpayers. Oh, ye, of little faith. Newt will not only push for balance, he will valiantly secure its passage and send it on its way to 50 state capitals, where after several years, a majority will approve its tenets. Voila! The budget is balanced, and the wicked deficit is dead!

The last time anyone promised us a balanced budget amendment, Ronald Reagan was president, and all of us ace columnists just knew he would live up to his word. But fate intervened and we had an invading Russian Army at our shores, forcing us to build new ultrasonic bombers, invent Star Wars and support the Contras. Well, you can't balance the budget when all of those threats are going on, so our government did the next best thing: we tripled the national debt. And, why not? After all, if our kids are going to live in a country that is not governed by some wild-eyed political nut, who threatens all of us with starvation, no housing and lowered Social Security checks, someone has to pay the bill. We decided to take the best alternative at hand; we sent the tab to our children's children. We spread the good times around.

That's why we should all rejoice that the fiscally conservative Republicans are back in power. Today we are faced with still greater threats, including Democrats who are even now asking for unemployment. But in addition to these enemies, we have welfare recipients asking for food, homeless families seeking shelter, retired millionaires drawing down their huge Social Security entitlements and even lazy poor folks who have the audacity to seek medical care when they're sick and dying. Clearly, we're facing another emergency that cries out for conservative remedies. Hey, kids, the bill is in the mail!

~Jack Stapleton is a Kennett columnist for the Southeast Missourian.