How to painlessly balance the budget

We could auction off 10 million U.S passports. Suppose we could sell each for $200,000 --- that would yield a one time payment of 2 trillion dollars. Now that I think of it, that's a pretty good idea! 

As these "international superstars" sort across our cities, many of them will buy homes. This will help to slow down home price declines and thus slow down mortgage defaults. This will prop up the balance sheets of banks and make them more likely to make loans and this will help the economy to rev up again.

--Matthew Kahn on an untapped revenue opportunity (via James Choi)