Only in a city that values the past as much as New Orleans does, could, what is known as, the “modern” Mardi Gras been invented in the 19th Century. Prior to that time, Carnival in la belle Orleans had been your relatively straight-forward Euro-Christian-pre-Lenten-festival-cum-pagan-bacchanal.

The arrival of the Grand Duke changed all that.

As the tale is told, a nobleman of the snobbishly inbred Francophonic Russian Imperial Court was visiting the Colonies to assist the rustics in the ongoing extermination of the Plains Buffalo and decided to take a detour and visit our fair city, smack dab, as it happened, during the Carnival Season.

The hormonal surge that struck the "putting-on-airs glands" of the local powers-that-be-that-were upon hearing this news was particularly potent, and in a frenzy of kowtowing and toadying created almost overnight a miniature system of courts to be called “krewes,” a faux aristocracy complete with Kings, Queens, Dukes, Knights, Princes, Princesses, Pages, Squires, Ladies-in-waiting, crowns, orbs, scepters, thrones, ermined regalia, court intrigues, modes of speech, arcane rituals, initiations and customs.

A particularly nice touch of ersatz aristocracy worthy of a Hugo or Dumas novel were the Mounted Masked Knights which would accompany the courtly procession through the streets, tossing the occasional fake coins and cheap trinkets to the hordes of the unwashed, less as an emulation of some ancient tradition of Noblesse Oblige, than, I believe for their own amusement at watching the peasants scramble and claw for possession.

Obviously little has changed.

Except of course that carnival is now primarily a bunch of bourgeoisie emulating the pretensions of a bunch of upper-class people emulating the pretensions of a group of dead aristocrats.

I am well aware of the central position Mardi Gras plays in the culture, psyche and economy of New Orleans, and how many artists, artisans, costumers, mask-makers and the like, benefit from the festival.

I am also as fond of a good party as the next man.

But, may I be so bold as to suggest that in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, with the all-too-real life and death differences between rich and poor cast in such high relief, that this might just be a good time to consider reinventing Mardi Gras again.

I am not suggesting anything as radical as a wholesale guillotining of the Boston Club, nor anything as PC as affirmative-action-gender-neutral krewe royalty, nor anything as party-pooping as questioning the wisdom of the shear amount of human energy and financial resources devoted to what is, after all, essentially a frivolity.

Instead, I’d like to suggest a couple of minor changes, which I believe might be more symbolically appropriate for the devastated population of a city, in a country at war ostensibly to spread the notions of democracy and equality.

It's that mounted aristocrat on horseback throwing fake money to the masses business that really bugs me.

It just hits too close to home.

So first I’d like to suggest that the courts and retinues get down off their horses and walk like the rest of us.

It could be a nice opportunity personally meet and greet those friends and neighbors who are fortunate to be alive and home.

Secondly I’d like to suggest something which might not be feasible until next year, and that is that the krewes and members agree that the money which would be spent on doubloons and trinkets should, for a period of say five or ten years, be instead placed in a trust or endowment to be used to benefit all the citizens of New Orleans.

In recognition of this, for each dollar thus directed, the krewes wouldy instead design, print and distribute an equivalent dollar amount in “krewe kashe,” beautifully designed scrip in the tradition of those eminently collectible old ball invitations.

They could be inscribed as follows:

“By Proclamation of the Courts and Krewes of Carnival, Know Ye All that the Face Value of this Currency Represents an Equivalent Amount that has been Given in Specie to Benefit all the Citizens of the Realm and May They and our Fair City enjoy a Long and Benevolent Prosperity.”