America in the Twilight Zone

A weekend session brings out the worst in the nation's supposedly best lawmakers as the Senate rejects two attempts to deal with expiring Bush tax cuts.

Democratic Sen. Claire McCaskill sums up the weirdness: “I feel like I am in the twilight zone. It’s depressing to me that we have gotten to this level of posturing, that they are saying if you do not give people a tax break on their second million, that nobody gets one.”

What's really horrifying is that it's going to get even worse. During today's debate, Lindsay Graham takes a detour to blame the Tea Party for making it hard to frustrate the White House next year.

"The House had a dramatic election. We picked up seats in the Senate," Graham complains. "Some of us thought, maybe we could pick up two or three more, but we made some pretty poor choices when it came to candidates."

Meanwhile, the President continues to take the high road to nowhere, declaring, "We need to redouble our efforts to resolve this impasse--in the next few days. It will require some compromise, but I'm confident that we can get it done."

Trouble is, the other side won't compromise, seeing today's votes as a stunt. "Americans," says GOP Leader Mitch McConnell with a straight face (or as straight a face as McConnell can manage), "don't want to see meaningless theatrics in Congress," overlooking the reality that his party has been doing nothing but that for two years.

For elitists with a shred of optimism for the future, a look at the best-selling political books may shrivel their hopes.

George W. Bush is atop the list followed by Glenn Beck (2), Sarah Palin (3) and Bill O'Reilly (5), with Laura Bush (11) and Condoleeza Rice (12) leading the second tier.

These are the choices of Americans who can presumably read voting with their money. What does it tell us about the rest?