by FRANCIS GRECOROMACOLLUDEN, Alternate Reality News Service National Politics Writer
The 2018 Vesampuccerian Food Security (Which Has Nothing To Do With Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles, Unless That Misimpression Will Help Get It Passed, In Which Case, Maybe) Act was shivering in the dark and cold. It had tentatively reached out, but it had not encountered any other legislation, just an occasionally slimy surface. It had lost track of how long it had been there: it could have been a couple of days, it could have been a couple of legislative sessions. There was no way of knowing.
Ironically, the 2017 Vesampuccerian Violence Against Women (We're Against It - Surely, That Is As Bipartisan An Issue As There Can Possibly Be) Act rests nearby, also reaching out deaf and blind in the cold and dark. In fact, there are 275 bills just out of each others' reach.
Are they stuck in hell? Worse. They're stuck in the Senate.
"The Dumboprats in the House are so obsessed with impea - impish - capiscing - taking the peaches out of me," President Ronald McDruhitmumpf tweeped at 2:37 in the morning, "that they are getting nothing else done. Slackers! #getthingsdonelosers"
"That's ridiculous!" retorted House Speaker Nancy Pelligrinosi. "Dumboprats can walk and chew out goons at the same time. We have passed hundreds of pieces of legislation, most of which are sitting on Mitch Wichconnelliswich's desk!"
"Ain't I a stinkah?" Senate Majority leader Mitch Wichconnelliswich grinned. His desk was clear, but getting to it from the door of his office, one had to wade through a sea of papers (and, by opposing, end them?) that looked suspiciously like legislation.
According to presidential historian Michael Beschbefordatloess, this situation is unprecedented. "This is an unprecedented situation," he said.
Thanks for that, Michael.
The Reduhblicans are making a calculation that they can stall legislation in the Senate long enough to kill it when the legislative term ends in 2020, then accuse the Dumboprats of ignoring the nation's problems. You might think that reasonable people would see through the ruse, but -
"Die-hard Reduhblican supporters - unggh! - who live and die by what they see on Foxindehenhaus - errf! - News and hear on toxic talk radio are - aack! - not reasonable people!" presidential historian Beschbefordatloess wrestled the article away from me. He is the master of the rhetorical toehold, so I lifted my hands in submission and waved him through.
"Vesampucceri is at a strange time in its history," he continued. "We are approaching saturation idiotocracy - the term political scientists use to describe a situation where a majority of voters have abandoned the real world for the world of their nightmares. One hallmark of saturation idiotocracy is an inability to pass legislation. At that point, everybody in the country enters the majority's nightmare. And, much of the world, as well."
But, Reduhblicans in the Senate can't just ignore legislation after Dumboprats passed it.
"La la la, I can't hear you," Senate Majority Leader Wichconnelliswich la la laed. "Are you talking to me? I'm the only one in the room - except for the two dozen other journalists. Are you talking...to me?"
Okay. Umm, maybe they can. But, surely it would make more sense to have a rationale, however thin, to explain their inaction, wouldn't it?
"Of course we have a rationale," Senate Majority Leader Wichconnelliswich winked at me.
A couple of minutes later, I asked him what it was. "Wouldn't you like to know!" he laughed. Umm, yeah. That's kind of why I asked the question.
Senate Majority Leader Wichconnelliswich fluttered his hands, indicating that he was starting a round of the party game charades. He tugged his ear. "Sounds like..." Then, he fluttered his hands again. "Bike. Bicycle? Tricycle? Nitroglycerine? Velocipede? Velocipede! Umm...what the ferk rhymes with velocipede?"
Half an hour later, the answer became clear: the Reduhbicans were refusing to pass Dumbopratic legislation which would add to federal spending or lots impede (aha!) President McDruhitmumpf's agenda.
The press corps agreed that they would rather have had to figure out a movie title.
In the meantime, the Food Security Act quietly squeaked, "Is anybody out there? Can anybody hear me?" These questions were met by the murmuring of 274 other pieces of legislation desperate to know if there was anybody out there who understood their plight and could help them overcome it.
As of this writing, it seems unlikely.