We can’t even start writing this without telegraphing the punchline, so please, withhold your outbursts for the benefit of the children and slower members of the audience.

First the setup, as broadcast last week across the wingnutsphere:

Federal Reserve examiners came to the Perkins [Oklahoma] bank last week to make sure banks are complying with a long list of regulations. The team from Kansas City deemed a Bible verse of the day, crosses on the teller’s counter and buttons that say “Merry Christmas, God With Us,” were inappropriate. The Bible verse of the day on the Internet also had to be taken down.

Seems the bank had violated a federal regulation that forbids “the use of words, symbols, models and other forms of communication [that] express, imply or suggest a discriminatory preference or policy of exclusion.” At least, that’s how the Feds saw it.

But all’s well that ends well: After the bank alerted James Inhofe and others to its plight, the Feds backed down, and the crucifixes went back up.

We actually don’t have a problem with Mammon Community Bank getting all pious on our heathen arse. We would just hope that, in the interest of comprehensive exegesis, their daily verse includes the line about overthrowing the tables of the money changers.

After Outcry, Feds Back Down; Banks Can Display Crosses [KOCO]

Captain Beefheart, a.k.a. Don Van Vliet, dies at 69 [Entertainment Weekly]

While D.C.’s Adams Morgan neighborhood has its Festivus Pole and annual Airing of Grievances, suburban Loudoun County may be winning in the “Most Inclusive at Winter Solstice Time” contest.

The ABA Journal reports that the county courthouse in Leesburg is hosting not one, not two, but ten seasonal displays, because of a county policy that the first ten people or groups to apply for a permit get a holiday display. Read more »

“President Obama and his wife Michelle will not be invited to Prince William’s wedding next year. Because Prince William is not yet heir to the throne, his wedding to Kate Middleton is not classed as a ‘state occasion’ — and the couple feel under no pressure to fill the 2,000-strong guest list with heads of state, the Mail understands.” [Daily Mail]

“PolitiFact editors and reporters have chosen ‘government takeover of health care’ as the 2010 Lie of the Year. Uttered by dozens of politicians and pundits, it played an important role in shaping public opinion about the health care plan and was a significant factor in the Democrats’ shellacking in the November elections.”

Remember when the BP oil spill was being touted as “Barack Obama’s Katrina“? Despite the fact that Coast Guard vessels were on site working the spill from day one, and the Federal government mobilized heavily to contain the disaster, partisan critics of the Obama Administration insisted that not enough was being done to prevent oil from reaching Lousiana shores. And because it is an article of faith among the news media that every instance of Republican incompetence, corruption or greed must be counterbalanced by a corresponding incidence of Democratic incompetence, corruption or greed much of the new media and the chattering classes seemed perfectly happy to go along with the idea that the BP oil spill was, indeed, “Barack Obama’s Katrina.” Of course, to sucessfully argue this point it was necessary to show that there were effective countermeasures available that the administration, either through sloth or incompetence, was failing to implement. Enter Lousiana Governor Bobby Jindal. Always ready to savage the government for doing too much useless volcano monitoring, Jindall took to the airwaves to denounce the administration for not doing enough useful berm building. Berms, we were told over and over again, were the immediate, desperately needed, effective solution to the oil spill problem that the Administration was, for inexplicable reasons, failing to implement. There was only one little problem with this urgent claim: the experts disagreed. The building of berms, they told us, was an expensive way to accomplish very little. But never mind. All we heard from Jindall, the right-wing talks shows and much of the media was berms, berms, berms… and so under pressure from local legislators and the relentless, right-wing message machine, the Obama administration relented and pressured the Army Corps of Engineers to approve Jindal’s dubious project.  Read more »

So, about last night… Here’s all you need to know:

Reid and McConnell are now negotiating the terms of a short-term spending bill that can pass unanimously, punting the issue of federal funding into next year when the Republican House will likely demand significant spending cuts.

In other words, if you’re looking forward to a replay of the 1995 Clinton-Gingrich Rumble in the Jungle, time to start stocking up your Netflix queue instead: The 112th Congress hasn’t even begun, and already Democrats are scrambling in fear of a threatened government shutdown.

What failed last night because of shocking! Republican intransigence was the bog-standard annual spending bill, a $1.1 trillion cornucopia festooned with earmarks from both parties, but still meeting Mitch the Turtle’s budget target. (Democrats are adorable for taking Republicans at their word!)

The bill failed — with a majority, of course, because that’s what the Founders wanted.

Read more »