I want to be a bank

Don't get me wrong, I'm totally opposed to a government bailout. But if you're going to do it anyway, I want in on it.

I plan to do it the same way everybody else is: I am going to become a bank. The whole idea is sort of fun. I've always wanted to be a bank, or at least have one. Besides, I grew up on the cartoon "Tom Terrific," which is about a boy who could transform himself into anything he wanted by his magic, funnel-shaped "thinking cap." Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, GMAC, and American Express sure used their "thinking caps" and became banks, so if a credit card company can turn into a deposit holding company, why can't I, right? (Personally I think they all look a little silly, like foxes sneaking up on a henhouse thinking they can fool us with their rubber chicken beaks and fake webbed feet.)

Just show me where to apply. Or if you don't know, I'll just get to the back of the first queue I see downtown. It should be easy enough to find. Like Jesus said, "Where the corpse is, there the vultures will gather" (Matthew 24:28). If it doesn't turn out to be the right line for TARP applications, it will probably be a soup line, and that's OK, too.