Is he legislator or conspirator? During ten months in Washington, Ted Cruz has spent more time with House members than in his own chamber, culminating Monday night in being caught secretly huddling with a score of them at a DC night spot just before yesterday’s Tea Party refusal to reopen the government.

In the face of five more such years, there are fringe petitions circulating in Texas to recall Cruz, but shouldn’t owl-eyed old Washington hands be searching the arcane rules of Congress for some musty old statute that forbids such House-breaking?

If he is to survive as Speaker, John Boehner had better put a crew of toadies on the case full-time. Never in memory has there been such blatant inter-chamber subversion.

Meanwhile, the hours tick away and the nation is paralyzed. When I was writing a post on Bipolar Disorder yesterday, I went to the National Institute of Health for basic information on the condition and was greeted with this heading:

“Due to the lapse in government funding, the information on this web site may not be up to date, transactions submitted via the web site may not be processed, and the agency may not be able to respond to inquiries until appropriations are enacted. Updates regarding government operating status and resumption of normal operations can be found at USA.gov.”

That sums up where America is today perfectly. Even if you want to research madness, the Shutdown won’t let you.

If we are all to get out of this trap with our sanity intact, somebody had better find a way to get Cruz out of what used to be called the catbird seat.

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