Dramedy without end...problem solvers?...forced work without pay is the new norm in Trump's America!...Ice Age is coming, weatherguessers are giddy, Russians are to blame.

Happy Hump Day everybody! It’s Wednesday, you’ve made it this far, keep going (it’ll only get worse)!

Oh, did I mention that we’re all going to die…again? Yep, according to the near-giddy weatherguessers on TV last night, there is the daddy of all polar vortexes about to plunge North America into the next Ice Age! And, apparently, it’s all coming from Russia. Russia? Must be some collusion involved here. There should be an investigation.

Cousin Fred and Friend Lamont were here last night trying to make a case for me to let them stay in the main house over the next week or so. Normally, I couldn’t consider such a request, but since the Wife is on one of her fabulous two-week vacations right now, I’ll play along. I told the two of them that they have to buy groceries and beer. They agreed. In fact, Friend Lamont offered to do all the cooking.

So, we’ll hunker down here at The Compound, eat and drink like fiends while switching channels between binge watching “Longmire” and the ongoing absurd dramedy that is the Federal shutdown.

The New York Times, that last bastion of great liberal thought, published a report late last night that Fearless Leader is “summoning” some of the furloughed Federal workers back to work. Of course, there’s no provision to pay any of those people. “Summon this!”

Really? You expect people to come back to work and work for free? Hollywood couldn’t write a more idiotic plotline and those people live on a different planet. The IRS (why hasn’t anyone shut them down completely…they’ve been talking about it for years) announced it’s bringing back 46,000 – more than half of its furloughed staff – to handle tax season. Hmmm. Yeah, great idea. So, you have a bunch of disgruntled unpaid tax workers processing people’s returns and issuing refund checks. Who do you think they’re going to process first? Their own, of course!

And, let’s see…FAA has a plan to bring back “thousands” of aircraft inspectors and “others” - well, that’s f-ing reassuring (I guess).

Oh, and the Department of Interior, is bringing back 40 furloughed employees…not to clean the pigsty national parks that people have trashed since the shutdown began…no, these 40 employees will be tasked with selling oil and gas leases off the entire U.S. coastline. Huh? That has Trump written all over it. Bet he makes the 40 employees stay in one of his hotels while they’re working. Don’t worry he’ll feed them fast food (they’re big eaters).

What the hell is going on? We are truly descending into a fiery pit from which there may be no escape (one man’s opinion).

And, then what happens if one or all of the Federal employees being summoned to work (without pay) refuse? Huh? Then what, Genius Fearless Leader?

He’ll likely start a woeful lament in Twitter about how all Federal employees are Dems and they’re out to ruin the country. That’s before he declares a national emergency and deploys a phalanx of Federal marshals to round up hordes of disobedient civil servants and force them back to work without pay.

The NYT article also mentioned that Fearless Leader has invited Congressional members of the bipartisan group called the Problem Solvers Caucus to lunch at The White House on Wednesday. By the time the report was issued, no members had accepted the invitation. Fearless Leader will just have to eat all that fast food he ordered (and paid for).

Problem Solvers Caucus…bet that phrase appears next to the definition for oxymoron in the dictionary. Idiots.

But wait there’s more…

CNBC issued a report late last night pointing out that members of Congress are still being paid throughout the shutdown.

It raises an interesting question, me thinks. What’s the point of governance if there is no one or nothing left to govern? Maybe it’s time we just declare Fearless Leader king and be done with it. It seems that’s where we’re headed anyway.

But, the most interesting thing to me that came from that CNBC report was that the minimum wage if you’re a senator or representative is $174,000 per year. The House chaplain makes $172,500 for pete’s sake!

Guess we shouldn’t expect to see any senators or representatives standing in food lines any time soon. For a bunch of people who don’t seem to do very much, they sure get paid a lot of $$$$.
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That is all!