March Madness

No, I don't mean the NCAA kind. We went home for Kate's spring break and headed up to Tahoe for a few day's skiing. What we found was more snow than I can remember seeing in the 30+ years we've been going up there. We had a couple of days of great powder skiing, light and fluffy, no Sierra cement--and then had to wait a day to go home until I-80 reopened.

We got back to a cold and rainy DC, but the cherry blossoms are an unmistakeable sign that Spring has arrived. Glorious symbols of the beauty and fragility of life, especially poignant this year after the earthquake and tsunami.

The madness that has been going on here shows no signs of letting up now that April is here. They're playing "chicken" over shutting down the government again--I never stop being amazed by how freely people claim to speak for "the American People" when what they really mean is "that portion of the American people who agree with me." I think it pays to remember that there are lots of folks out there who don't agree with one's own views on every issue--and they are Americans, too.

Meanwhile, the best example of March Madness that I came across is the member of Congress who, during an oversight hearing, compared the Affordable Care Act to Das Kapital.