Burt Prelutsky

In the same way that whoever is elected president in 2016 will be fortunate because he or she will be compared to Barack Obama, the worst person who has ever disgraced the office, 2013 will only need to be better than 2012. And considering that we suffered through 10 months of non-stop electioneering only to re-elect Obama, 2013 should have a pretty easy time of it.

The other tragic events of 2012 involved the massacre of Ambassador Stevens and three other exemplary Americans in Benghazi, and the murder of 27 people in Newtown, CT. Predictably, the administration, with the help of the media, lied about the first, and then used the second in order to promote their endless assault on the 2nd Amendment.

At the risk of sounding like Michael Bloomberg, I don't see the need for citizens to own automatic or semi-automatic weaponry. But, then, I also don't see the need for anyone to own a Hummer or for Will Ferrell to continue making movies. But I don't think my opinion counts for anything in these matters. I also don't believe that it's the government's business what law-abiding citizens own, use or smoke. These puffed-up bureaucrats are constantly yammering about people with guns, while we're supposed to overlook the fact that all of them are protected by people with guns. Obama, himself, is protected by enough guns to arm Syria's insurgents.

The other fact is that for all the talk about gun control laws, the places with the strictest -- namely Chicago and Washington, D.C. -- are the nation's murder capitals, whereas those places where citizens are allowed, even encouraged, to carry their own firearms are among the safest places to live. None of which comes as any surprise to people who are sane and logical, which naturally rules out politicians and liberals.

Some people insist that nobody should be committed to an asylum until they finally explode violently, but I contend there is a big and easily identifiable difference between youngsters who try to appear slightly eccentric in an attempt to appear at least mildly interesting to members of the opposite sex, and those, like Jared Loughner and Adam Lanza, who are so obviously non compos mentis that they might as well have "Dangerous Lunatic" tattooed across their foreheads.

Until society starts taking insanity seriously and proactively begins hatching its boobies, no gun law is going to make the slightest bit of difference.

All you have to do is look around the world to recognize that it's not guns that create violence. It's inevitably young, single males, be they in Gaza, Paris, Athens, Chihuahua or Los Angeles, who are constantly throwing rocks and Molotov cocktails, tipping over cars and setting tires ablaze. So if anyone is really interested in doing away with violence, I suggest keeping the guns and getting rid of the 20-year-olds.

Another issue that calls for my sort of solution is abortion. Ridicule is the answer, not government funding. I mean, just how stupid does someone have to be in 2013 to still be getting unintentionally pregnant? When every eight-year-old has been told how to prevent it, there is simply no excuse for Planned Parenthood to exist or for Sandra Fluke, either, for that matter.

When it comes to rape, it should be a capital crime, as should child molestation. Both crimes destroy lives as surely as murder does, and there is no possible excuse for allowing the perpetrator to continue living.

What's more, no politician, even one who has received the Good Housekeeping Seal of Approval from some misguided Tea Party, should ever try to break rape down as "legitimate" or "illegitimate," and nobody should ever suggest that rape is ever a part of God's plan. If it were, what would there be left for Satan to do besides lie around and work on his tan?

As of this writing, it remains unclear whether criminal charges will be brought against the two Australian DJs who made the crank call to the English hospital to check up on Kate Middleton's condition. There's no way that Mel Greig and Michael Christian could have ever imagined that the nurse who fell for the crank call would hang herself a day or two later. But I would still toss them in the clink for a month or so, if only as a warning to all the other half-witted radio teams who muck up the airwaves with the juvenile hijinks they try to pass off as humor.

Finally, a word to the wise for firemen and cops: Stop letting school teachers ride your coattails when it comes to negotiating new contracts. We actually need you folks to fight crime and put out fires, whereas members of the teachers union can't even describe themselves as "educators" with a straight face. Although there may be a few exceptions to the rule, the mere fact that they choose to belong to such a loathsome group, comprised in the main of under-achieving, over-paid and over-pensioned, louts, destroys your own hard-earned credibility.

As George Bernard Shaw once nearly said: "Those who can, do; those who can't, trash state capitals in pursuit of higher wages for less work, and then have the gall to insist they're only doing it for the kids."