What in Hell is going on? Seriously, even for Congress this past week reads like a bad fantasy novella with Ted Cruz slated to play Conan the Confused and Incomprehensible.

To recap: Ted Cruz urged the ‘not ready for pre-school’ caucus in the Republican Party in the House to shut down the government, which they did. Then, having shut down the government, the NRPS members staged photo ops where they complain that someone had shut down the government. This was followed by their agreement to pay all of the laid off Federal workers for the time they were laid off?!

Charlie Pierce, among many others, featured this explanatory quote by Marlin Stutzman (R-IN): “We aren’t going to be disrespected…We have to get something out of this. And I don’t know what that even is.”

If you don’t know what it is, how will you know if you get it or if you actually want it? Look at the polls, Marlin, if you want respect, you don’t run for Congress.

Badtux highlighted another NRPS member, Representative Renee Ellmers (R-NC), who thinks she needs her Congressional paycheck, but the Capitol Police don’t deserve theirs. She apparently believes that people who don’t do their job and pass a budget are more worthy of pay then those who put their lives on the line to protect Congresscritters.

As CNN notes, an unpaid employee at a National Weather Service office in Alaska sent people a message. For those who don’t know, that was a ‘discussion’ message, not a forecast. Discussion messages are usually only looked at by professionals, and not broadcast like forecasts.

Neil Macdonald of the CBC has another spot on piece: U.S. government shutdown stokes Republican party civil war.

For those who think I’m getting carried away by referring the House caucus as ‘not ready for pre-school’, note that I’m not the one who used Green Eggs and Ham to explain their position…

Position: 28.1N 91.9W [10PM CDT 0300 UTC].
Movement: Stationary.
Maximum sustained winds: 35 mph [ 55 kph].
Wind Gusts: 45 mph [ 70 kph].
Minimum central pressure: 1008 mb ↑.

Currently about 185 miles [ 295 km] West-Southwest of the mouth of the Mississippi River.

A jog to the West and then it stalled this afternoon. The tracking is dependent on the interaction between the storm and the cold front that is moving through.

At 10PM CDT the storm was downgraded to a depression and all watches and warnings were cancelled. Dry air infiltration and wind shear are preventing any development.

Here’s the link for NOAA’s latest satellite images.

[For the latest information click on the storm symbol, or go to the CATEGORIES drop-down box below the CALENDAR and select “Hurricanes” for all of the posts related to storms on this site.]