What I’m about to suggest might seem a little risky, particularly with how close I am to homelessness myself, but my own modest proposal in response to NYPD Commissioner Bill Bratton’s suggestion that the “quickest way to get rid” of , read: kill the homeless, would be to stop giving to them; why don’t we hold a Homeless Hunger Games?

The idea came to me yesterday after the train station was boarded by a young hustler whose spiel usually goes a bit like this, “Excuse me ladies and gentlemen, but I’ve just been released from Rikers Island and I currently find myself, at the present time, homeless. The reason I was at Rikers Island was because my mother’s boyfriend had a fight with my mom. Ain’t no man alive gonna put his hands on my mom and I bet some of you feel the same. I don’t feel that I should be homeless for that, but I am.”

This time, however, as soon as the young hustler got to his “excuse me” part, he stopped the spiel and became livid.

“This nigga!” He screamed. I hadn’t even noticed, but working the crowd from the other side of the train was a presumably blind man with a cane.

“I can’t believe mothafuckas fall for his shit! I mean, I seen him walk through a door!”

The young man couldn’t even continue in his hustle he was so angry. He got off at the next stop.

The fact that the young man was pale-skinned and used the term “nigga” is a subject for another blog. The fact that he might have considered himself “Spanish” therefore bringing to question whether he also considered himself of African descent, is for the blog after that.

“They should have just fought it out,” I thought with a smile, planting the seed for this particular post.

And wouldn’t it be fun?

I mean, I haven’t seen all the movies but I have read all the books and if we’re lucky, a Homeless Hunger Games might possible even produce our very own Katniss Everdeen!

We could stage it at the Javits Center, where I just worked the Marathon Expo, and load it with all the weapons and food and tricks and gadgets that made the real, well, fictional Hunger Games so exciting.

And let’s not front like it wouldn’t be the hottest show on television! Boxing got so boring that it had to be replaced with MMA and stuff like American football is a poor cocktease for America’s savage bloodlust.

We’ve always known ourselves to be the Roman Empire reborn, how bout a real gladiator sport? But instead of well oiled and practiced muscular men, we could have Ned the Wino battling it out with Scrilla the Junkie for that last hit of scag!

And let’s not forget the kids! All would be fair, or unfair, depending on how you look at it!

And most importantly, should this whole thing jump off and go right along the same lines as the old, fictional Hunger Games, it wouldn’t be long before we wouldn’t have to worry about homelessness ever again because you know what we’d get?

A new form of government!