Washington, August 08: Suddenly you know they’ve been around too long. When the temperature edges into the 90s, and the political debate becomes as stifling, enervating and unpleasant as the weather. When a poster depicting the 44th President as a red lipstick-daubed Batman-style Joker alongside the word “Socialism” becomes a major political talking point.
When cable TV shows resurrect, for the umpteenth time, the canard that Barack Obama was not born in the US, even though his Hawaii birth certificate is available on the internet. And, it should also be said, when the President gratuitously and injudiciously wades into the arrest of a Harvard professor, elevating a minor incident in a Boston suburb into a national drama.
In short, even politicians need a break. So what more perfect moment for that mightiest of commanders – “Generale Agosto” (General August) as he is called by the Italians, who know a thing or two about legislative logjams – to take matters in hand and march those weary, quarrelsome legislators off to the beaches for some overdue R&R. And, in a sense, precisely that has happened. The “triple-H” days (hazy, hot and humid) are arriving in Washington, and, on Thursday evening, the Senate, like the House of Representatives a week earlier, wrapped up its last scheduled business and, with a deep sigh of relief, disappeared until September.
–Agencies