"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.

Makes You Long for the Days of Fred Grandy

TPM reports:

GOP Rep. Steve King Is Only Vote Against Recognizing History Of Slave Labor In Capitol

Here's an interesting example of those famous lone "No" votes in Congress -- the contrarian who is willing to stand up alone against the overwhelming majority of his or her colleagues, and vote against something that was passing easily.

Yesterday, the House of Representatives voted 399-1 for the Capitol Visitors Center to have a plaque acknowledging the role of slave labor in the construction of the Capitol. The resolution has information in it that even this history fanatic didn't know about -- for example, slave labor was involved in constructing the "Statue of Freedom" atop the Capitol Dome.

At the time it was unclear why King would make such a stand, but INOTBB has learned the following from King spokesperson John B. Irchers, "Congressman King has grown worried over the past few weeks that he was losing his vaunted spot as the most ridiculous Republican. John Ensign, Mark Sanford, Sarah Palin--they've had too much news time of late, and then there's Michele Bachmann who is at least a St. Paul short of a Twin Cities. King is sure this vote will help cement his reputation that he prefers is not tarred."

What's more Irchers claims that Congressman King "thinks this whole thing about a few slaves is just part of what the media wants you to believe. Look, if history taught us one thing, if we only kept going with all those very much legal immigrants we wouldn't have the illegal immigration problem we have today. Heck, after they got done with the Capitol, they should have built that electric fence the Congressman's been asking for."