Political Morsels and Other Droppings

Greetings from snow-covered Maryland! I believe we received around 20 inches of snow around my neck of the woods.  Not too shabby.  I spent my day, yesterday shoveling the snow at regular intervals so that I wouldn’t have to deal with it all at once.  It’s the light, dry, sledding type of snow so it could have been much worse.  Still, I have been bonding with my muscle relaxers, aspirin, and a heading pad. Everything was closed down yesterday and although the Postal Service claims that bad weather won’t keep them away, I can assure you, the mailman did not appear in my neighborhood.

However, do you know who did end up working through the storm? The U.S. Senate.  I nearly fell over in disbelief when I had heard that many senators showed up in the early hours of the morning to continue the debate on the Health Care bill.  I sure as hell know that even on a good day, I don’t even show up to my work on a weekend.  When I last checked CSPAN a couple hours ago, there was live coverage of Senators on the floor giving speeches in regards to the bill.  I know that modifications are still being made to the Senate version of the bill. Originally, there was supposed to be a 5% tax on cosmetic procedures, but that was removed in favor of taxing indoor tanning. (Hell, with the plastic surgery in California, Universal Health Care would be covered by that alone!)

The initial vote over the bill will take place at 1 a.m. tomorrow (Monday). If it passes, then the Senate version of the bill and the House version will have to be merged into one bill, which means that negotiations will start all over again.  We’ll see what happens.  In the meantime, I’m going to step out and make some snow angels.