Imagine a television stage upon which open-faced cubes are stacked. Each cube is large enough for a desk, a chair and a presidential candidate.

You may be reminded of "Hollywood Squares," a popular game show that featured such celebrities as Joan Rivers and Paul Lynde. Its original version ran from 1966 to 1981.

The cubes were stacked in an 18-by-18-foot steel frame, with a staircase off to one side so the stars could climb into their boxes.

"Hollywood Squares" stacked the celebrities three cubes wide and three cubes high, accommodating nine stars, but our structure will have to be higher and wider because at least 15 Republicans have already declared for president, with a few more waiting in the wings.

Because our structure is modular, this will present no problems. We can merely add more cubes as candidates announce and remove them as they drop out.

The GOP can sell the naming rights: "Presidential Squares," brought to you by Ikea.

The primary debates will take place with the candidates seated in their cubes. The staircase will be eliminated. The candidates and their cubes will be hoisted into place by a crane.

A 4-by-4-foot stacking pattern could accommodate 16 candidates; a 5-by-5 pattern could accommodate 25. Other stacking patterns can be easily created.

As candidates drop out, their cubes can be removed or occupied by a pleasing object, such as a cartoon character, a kitten or a Kardashian.

The candidates will be free to decorate their boxes in any way they see fit. Donald Trump can have red velvet wallpaper and plush purple carpeting.

Rand Paul can have a bed of nails.

I think the candidates will grow to love their cubes. After the debates, the cranes can move all the cubes to ground level, and the candidates can talk to the audience and the press (or not). Then the cubes will be moved to the individual campaign buses or planes.

Reporters will get their own cubes. No more scrambling around for hotel rooms or getting on and off the bus. The press cubes, with reporters in them, will be stacked on the back of flatbed trucks the way cargo containers are today. Nutritional and sanitary needs can be easily provided.

Cubist campaigning will take over politics.

It will be better than what we have now. As of today, TV networks, supported by the Republican National Committee, have decided to let only the top 10 candidates debate based on their poll numbers. After the top 10 debate, there will be a "children's table" debate, or a forum for the also-rans.

"I wish we could find a way to debate with 16 people onstage and have it be meaningful," Steve Duprey, chairman of the RNC's debate committee, said last August. "But I don't think that's going to happen."

The Washington Examiner dissected a 90-minute debate held in 2011 and found that when you subtract time for commercials, questions and so on, the actual time left over for the candidates to speak was 72 minutes, 49 seconds.

If that were divided equally among 16 candidates, it would leave about 4 1/2 minutes for each candidate to speak, which The Examiner decided would be far too little and would lead to "inevitable chaos."

Really? I think 4 1/2 minutes per candidate at this stage in the campaign would be just fine.

Debates are theater. They are all about candidates regurgitating answers written by their media gurus. Debating has nothing to do with how a candidate would actually behave as president.

And debates are judged not by candidates' knowledge or judgment but by how many gaffes they avoid and how many nifty one-liners or successful attacks they deliver.

There is no pretense that there is no pretense. Debates are all pretense.

So we might as well make them entertaining, too. Box up the candidates. Allow the audiences at the debate site and at home to electronically vote on each candidate as the debate goes on.

If a candidate does well, flashing lights will illuminate that candidate's cube and applause will play.

If a candidate does poorly, a chute will open up and the cube will slide into a pool of cow pies.

Tell me you wouldn't watch that.

Roger Simon is Politico's chief political columnist. His new e-book, "Reckoning: Campaign 2012 and the Fight for the Soul of America," can be found on Amazon.com, BN.com and iTunes. To find out more about Roger Simon and read features by other Creators writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Web page at www.creators.com.