Alan Greenspan acknowledged recently that George W. Bush's almost fetishistic tax cuts could, indeed, make it impossible to fund Social Security, but said that it should not be a problem as long as senior citizens were given expiration dates upon which they were required to expire.

Expiration dates could be easily tattooed on the back of Americans' necks, Greenspan said. He also proposed that the expiration requirement contain a grandfather clause permitting the continued existence of extremely wealthy grandfathers.

Asked if rolling back the tax cuts was a more reasonable option than such drastic measures, Greenspan replied, "The tax cuts were absolutely necessary to allow Americans to live in a robust economy."

"For at least a little while," he added.