Congress Reaches Agreement ... On Helium

Despite the wrangling that's resulted in a government shut-down, Congress managed last week to agree on one thing: Helium. Reader gbrumfiel writes: "The U.S. holds vast helium reserves which it sells to scientists and private industry. According to NPR, a new law was needed to allow the helium to continue to flow. Congress passed it late last week, but only after a year-long lobbying effort and intense debate (and in the end, Senator Ted Cruz opposed the measure). Can a new bipartisanship rise out of this cooperation? Or will hot air prevail on Capitol Hill? (Insert your helium joke here.)" Apparently, helium is not yet so scarce that it's not available in balloons at the grocery store.

Comments

republicans should just shut up and play nice...

[crutchy]

...cos if they let the democrats get their way the phony overstimulated US economy will implode that much quicker, all the keynesian bullshit can be shown as the total fraud that it is, and then a real free market recovery can commence in ernest.

as long as the world remains addicted to cheap keynesian money printing, central banking, price-fixing of counterfeit fiat money, and ever increasing government spending, deficits and debt, the burden on taxpayers (aka the working middle class) will always increase till they are pushed into poverty and everyone ends up dependent on government welfare except for the wealthy buddies of politicians in washington dc... which is pretty much where the ussr was before 1985

jfk said "communism has never come to power in a country that was not disrupted by war or corruption, or both" and he was right

Re:Thank god we have Ted Cruz

[operagost]

So he voted against a bill that earmarked the funds in favor for a version that uses the funds for "deficit reduction" which is political speak for money into my pork project.

Thanks, Captain Democrat, but national parks and "environmental issues" ARE pork. Some states have more parks than others, and for those who do it has great pork potential. The same for "environmental issues", which today means subsidies for solar panels from failed corporations like A123 and Solyndra.