Yawn.

Via New York Daily News:

When I was a kid in Brooklyn there was a mock nursery rhyme: “In 1492/Columbus had nuthin’ to do/ So he sat on the grass/ And scratched his ass/ In 1492 . . .”

And 521 years after Columbus “discovered” America, on the holiday celebrating the noted explorer, America was still closed for business. And in 2013 Congress had nothing to do, so it sat on a hill of grass scratching its collective ass.

Even on Columbus Day.

Columbus and his band of European Christian white guys had sloshed ashore to civilize the “savage” red man. And half a millennium later words like “deadlocked,” “debt ceiling,” “fiscal cliff,” “sequester,” “continuing resolution” and “default” clogged the headlines and airwaves like a logjam of political inertia that has made us the laughingstock of the world.

Five centuries after Columbus and his nervous white crew arrived, there is still a small crew of frightened white people in Congress who refuse to accept an America with a black man in charge.

These extremists have not yet been able to accept, even after two decisive national elections, that a black man occupies the White House.

This crew of right-wing loonies does not want Obama to succeed, so they hold the entire country hostage. It doesn’t matter that the latest Wall Street Journal/NBC Poll shows that their own Republican Party has sunk to historic lows in public opinion. That even sane, conservative Republicans like Sen. John McCain and Rep. Pete King warn of political blowback. […]

The worst part is that the Republican Party allows this extortion to continue because its cowardly leadership fears primary challenges financed by the odious Koch brothers, who have bottomless pockets.

HT: JWF