Let's privatize the Fire Department

This could be a great incentive for the economy. Not only would it go a long way to solving Dallas city government's budget woes, it would create a giant new private industry in fire care insurance. See, if your house caught fire, the private fire department would first determine if you had insurance before sending units to battle the blaze. Then once the fire was extinguished with hopefully little loss of life and/or property, the fire department would send you a bill for its services, determined by how long it took to fight the fire, how many and what kind of equipment was needed, whether follow up procedures like arson investigators were required, etc. Then you would file a claim with your fire insurance company in hopes it would pay at least part of the bill left after the $100,000 deductible was applied. Of course your claim could be denied completely based on pre-existing conditions (i.e., a wood-frame house) or acts of G-d (lightning strikes). And the millions of Americans who could not afford the insurance or whose employers refused to provide it would be left without any protection for their homes. But that would be a small price to pay for our freedom from the socialized fire fighting system we have today. (Does Dallas Fire-Rescue have Death Panels? I'm betting it does.)