Our guest columnist is the increasingly desperate Rufus Gifford of the Obama campaign.

I’m the national finance director here at OFA.

I know we’ve been sending you a lot of email lately. That’s because we’re staring down a critical fundraising deadline tomorrow at midnight.

You know what that means for your inbox, but let me give you a sense of what that looks like around here.

The staff and I are working around the clock, powered by too much coffee. It’s been way too long since we called our moms. And we’ve all had more pizza and bad takeout in the past few weeks than anyone should have in a year…

If you’re able to, will you chip in $3 today?

[via email/Nabisco]

The Onion:

Congress Takes Group Of Schoolchildren Hostage

Brandishing shotguns and semiautomatic pistols, members of the 112th U.S. Congress took a class of visiting schoolchildren hostage this morning, barricading themselves inside the Capitol rotunda, where they remain at press time.

House Speaker John Boehner (R-OH), who has emerged as spokesman for the bipartisan group, informed FBI negotiators that the legislative body’s demands would be issued within the next hour, and that if any attempt is made to stage a rescue “all the kids will die.”

The Reaction:

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Glenn Greenwald is pissed that we’re not paying more attention to the World’s Lamest Flash Mob:

It’s unsurprising that establishment media outlets have been condescending, dismissive and scornful of the ongoing protests on Wall Street. Any entity that declares itself an adversary of prevailing institutional power is going to be viewed with hostility by establishment-serving institutions and their loyalists…

Nor is it surprising that much of the most vocal criticisms of the Wall Street protests has come from some self-identified progressives, who one might think would be instinctively sympathetic to the substantive message of the protesters.

Er… substantive message?

Read more »

As described: “The Ice Break Add A Motor To It couch breaks the world record for fastest sofa at Camden Airport, Sydney on 26th September 2011. Check it out as the couch reaches a top speed of 163km/h.”

Since America abandoned the metric system decades ago, that’s 101mph. But you really wanted to see it crash in flames, didn’t you?

[via @pourmecoffee]

For some reason, Sarah Palin approves the legendary San Francisco columnist: “Take Herb Cain. Look at why he’s doing so well right now. He’s, I guess you could say, with all due respect, the flavor of the week because Herb Cain is the one up there who doesn’t look like he’s part of that permanent political class. Herb Cain — he came from a working class family. He’s had to make it on his own all these years. We respect that.” [Weigel]

At 6 pm PT, Rachel kindly informed us that Chris Christie was embarking upon a Big Speech that would — well, might — blow the lid off the 2012 race for the most mind-blowing GOP collapse since Goldwater. (Yes, we’re sticking with that line. Yoda Pez is out of town, and unable to restrain us.) By 6:55 pm, our hopes were cruelly dashed.

But not before we had everything ready to launch. And since the rest of the news sucks — have the democratic Wall Street protesters democratically decided on a democratic response to democratically being maced? — we’re going to dwell in an alternate universe where Christie did jump in, and the next week would be filled with as many Jabba the Hutt images as we could muster.

When Andy Rooney began his Old Fart shtick in 1978, we couldn’t legally buy alcohol. Now he’s finally retiring, and AARP keeps nagging us for membership.

Andy Rooney to step down from his “60 Minutes” role [CBS]