Jim Lehrer: Next question. Mr. Vice President, a number of prominent economists, Alan Greenspan among them, have stated that neither your plan nor your opponent's plan will do much to keep Social Security solvent. With that in mind, how can you defend your plan?

Al Gore: You know, I've been doing some thinking about this very issue. And while I think my original plan was pretty solid, it needed some refinement. So I went back and took a fresh look at the numbers.

Did you know that back when FDR instituted Social Security there were more than 12 workers paying into the plan for every beneficiary? Now there are less than three workers for every beneficiary. No wonder Social Security taxes have gone up without a commensurate increase in benefits.

We have a baby gap. To put it plainly, the American people aren't procreating properly. Oh, mis hermanos y hermanas Latino are doing their jobs just fine, but the rest of us are not keeping up. We've got to get going if we even think we should keep Social Security alive.

I'm proposing a bold new initiative, a plan to plow the fertile fields of America's loins. If I am elected president, I will preside over the Great American Hump-a-thon. Any time, any where and any place will be my motto. We've got to get those babies coming if we want to save Social Security.

George Bush: Once again, my opponent has resorted to using fuzzy math. But he's right about one thing: There aren't enough babies being born. We don't need to sip from the poisonous waters of fortification, however. We just need to perambulate all of the fetuses that are currently being aborted. Why, every year we kill the equivalent of the population of a small midwestern city like Kansas City, home of the Joe and Mildred Pierce family, who will save $1,543 with my tax plan and $43 with my opponent's plan.

We need to get those babies born! If we stop the Barbary practice of abortion, we can save Social Security.

Lehrer: Governor Bush, most abortions are performed on unwed mothers, and more than half of the single-mother families in this country live in poverty. Will increasing the number of subsistence earners actually fill the coffers?

Bush: The vice-president says that we need more babies to save Social Security. Fine with me. We just have clear-cut, different ways of propositioning the problem. Now, take the Wendell Jobs family in Coeur d'Alene, Idaho. He's a deputy grand wizard of the local Ku Klux Klan, and he makes $31,034 a year. Now, with my tax cuts, he'll save $1,789, with a nice chunk of that coming from my targeted social activist credit. And I can guarantee you that he and his wife will never abort a pregnancy. That's just not done in his family.

Gore: I'm all for reducing abortions, but what we all need to pull together. And I think the best way for this country to join together in a good cause is the Hump-a-thon. Why, if every woman has four children, then by the year 2025 we'll have pulled the ratio of earners to beneficiaries up to four. If we keep humping away at the problem, we'll solve it faster than you might think.

Bush: I'd just like to say something else.

Lehrer: I'm afraid we have to go on to the next question.

Bush: I just want to say that it would be just fine for married folks to get it on. I mean, my wife and I enjoy a little piece now and again, though of course Laura has been through the change and all, so we can't contribute to the solution ourselves. Perhaps we might set up a marriage-a-thon to go along with the vice-president's plan.

Gore: That works for me. Want to shake on it?

Bush: Absolutely. This is what bi-partisanship is all about.

Lehrer: Next question. Governor Bush, when you referred to "snorting up enough coke to personally bankroll the Contras," what exactly did you mean?

Jon Worley is not contributing to the elimination of the baby gap.