"You Agree with Us? Well, We Don't!"

"It is sort of a unique position to be in, to be willing to accept 64 amendments and having the authors of the amendments reluctant to have their amendments accepted."

No, that's not a line from some lost Joseph Heller novel about the machinations on a fictional, absurdist Capitol Hill. That's a line from the real Capitol, on Monday, uttered in obvious bemusement by Senator Chris Dodd in response to Senator Mike Enzi on the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) Committee. You really have to watch the video--at the least Enzi himself seems embarrassed. (Too bad he couldn't teach that response to his fellow senators asking Judge Sotomayor stupid questions that start with the assumption default human is white male.) It seems the Republicans have 64 amendments to the health care bill. Fair enough. But it also seems they themselves don't like their own amendments, and perhaps not just one's like Tom Coburn's intended poison pill (his amendment: that every member of Congress and their staffs would be required to enroll in the public insurance option).

Or, perhaps, they just don't want anything to get done.

I'm beginning to think they should dump the elephant as their symbol and instead go with a baby. Not one too young--one old enough to just say No. And only no. One old enough to want everything, like, say, both a wife and Buenos Aries babe. Yet one with the attention span and focus of old what's-her-name from Up North.