Ave atque vale - 51st Congress adjourns sine die

 The Fifty First Congress passed into history on its final day in office, as the Speaker of the House brought down the gavel and declared the fourth session (4·LI 2021-22) adjourned sine die.

Bhagavad Gita at the ready for Inauguration Day oath of office.

On the last day of the lame-duck session, Congress ratified Patria's fiscal 2023 budget and passed a number of other motions including an affirmation that abortion will always be safe and legal in Patria.

Minutes prior to the final adjournment, the final message of the 51st Congress was delivered by the Acting House Leader of the now-defunct Amrita Party (one of only four Amrita Party members who didn't resign and abandon their seats when the Amrita Party was dissolved in December 2021). The following is the text of the final message:

Mr. Speaker Pro Tem, with your permission I rise to deliver the final message of the Fourth Session, Fifty First Congress. As I speak, I am surrounded by empty seats that belonged to members of the Amrita Party, who abandoned this House when the Party was dissolved in December 2021. Let all members of Congress, whether their terms are coming to an end as the Speaker’s gavel next hits the dais or are continuing to serve in the Fifty Second Congress-elect, acknowledge the legacy of the Amrita Party and the great things Amma’s children have accomplished in Patria over the course of the past two decades. Though there remains only a small rump of the Amrita Party’s remnants – only four members calling themselves IAM in the new Congress – Patria will continue to be held in Amma’s hands and bow at her feet. 

Before continuing further, on behalf of the Jungle Party caucus, I would like to congratulate Kaleb in Green Bay, winner of Smack Off XXVIII, who will serve as the Jungle Party’s de facto House Leader in the Fifty Second Congress-elect, as well as Iafrate, who finished a close second and will serve as Deputy Leader.

 The Fifty First Congress began so auspiciously with Patria’s 2018 bicentennial celebrations, but – along with the entire macro-world – was dragged into a dark place midway through the Second Session. But while much of the macro-world resorted to lockdowns and police state tyranny in March 2020, Patria would not play along. Patria did not give in to those who would take away freedom for the sake of a bad flu season. Proudly we can say that this Congress and the thirteen Precinct legislatures did not impose full-scale mask mandates, business and school closures, the colossal failure of online school, to say nothing of police state lockdowns. Patria stood alone against the world in March 2020 and still we stand, not giving in to fear, protecting those who need protection, while allowing COVID 19 to run its course among the healthy population. Patria has gone on record that if you want to wear a mask, that is fine, as they say “you do you” but as a means of curbing the spread of COVID 19 masks are nearly useless except in certain limited circumstances, such as those who are actually infected, at high risk, or whose work comes into contact with such cases. Let the powers that be hate us. Let the ruling class call us a fake country that enacts fake laws and follows fake science. Proudly we went alone in the 51^st Congress and proudly we will go alone in the 52^nd.

 Forty years ago on this day, Patria moved on from the failed Forty First Congress. Today Patria moves on once again. Not from a failed Congress, but from one that rose up against fear, panic and oppression to say “enough is enough”. No masks, no lockdowns, no shuttered schools. This was not the 14^th century. COVID was not bubonic plague. It was not even the 1918 flu. Did anyone see bodies dropping dead on the streets and corpses stacked like cordwood on tumbrel carts as the driver called out “bring out your dead”? The macro-world powers that be attempted to immiserate, embitter and enslave the free world with lockdowns and isolation, with mandates and overreach by petty tyrants disguised as public health officers and “top doctors”. They attempted to control and re-set. For who? For what? To ratchet up fear of a respiratory virus with a 99-point-something % survival rate. For a bad flu season. And then after two years, when COVID began to wane they ratcheted up a new Cold War against Russia that has turned far hotter than the one against the former Soviet Union. But Patria would not play along.

 Patria of course condemns Russia’s brutal and unprovoked attack on Ukraine, but Patria will not join the neo-Cold Warriors in demonizing Putin and ginning up hate for the long-gone Evil Empire. Ladies and gentlemen, the Soviet Union ceased to exist in 1991. Putin is not Stalin. Not Khrushchev. Not Brezhnev. Not even Yuri Andropov. Russia is not our enemy. Ukraine is not our ally, much as Patria offers the Ukrainian people its moral and spiritual support as folks everywhere are virtue-signaling by flying the Ukrainian flag or hash-tagging #standwithUkraine on social media. Patria must remain neutral in all macro-national conflicts that do not threaten Patria’s security. Patria’s defense budget – part of the fiscal 2023 budget ratified earlier today – serves for the defense of Patria, to repel an actual invasion or serious threat of same, but the Patrienish Army, Navy, Air Force and Coast Guard will not fall in line with the US-led military industrial complex of endless wars that benefit only the weapons manufacturers.

 The men and women who have served in the Fifty First Congress and will serve in the Fifty Second Congress-elect are not elites. Not plutocrats. Not multi-millionaires. Not the so-called one-percent. For the most part they are ordinary citizens of the 13 Precincts and the Federal District. Their desire to love and serve, support and defend the Inner Realm has inspired their decision to seek elective office and has brought them here. Consequently this House is, and must always be not liberal, not conservative, but populist, reflecting the views of the grassroots, of the Joe Sixpacks and Sally Soccermoms, of the ordinary working people struggling to make ends meet, be it putting food on the table, putting clothes on their children’s backs, or putting gas in the car.

 Those who disdain Patria’s role in the micronational world, as a politically incorrect maverick state that goes it alone, as a democratic socialist nation that is not woke, as a land that proudly affirms Sanatan Dharma along with the Judeo-Christian western traditions as well as the “spiritual but not religious” folks in the Chakra Party, as a realm of free speech and free choice, as the only country on this planet that thumbed its nose at the COVID police – know this: Patria is doubling down on all of the above in the new Congress. Let the haters hate Patria’s lack of woke-ism. Let the elites despise Patria’s grassroots populism. Let the ruling class in America call Patria a land of conspiracy theorists. Let the ignorant ignore Patria’s legacy since 1818. Let the skeptics be skeptical that such a micronation can thrive and prosper. Patria will live on as it has endured for the past 204 years, fortis et liber, strong and free. They can call us a fake country. They can shout their words of hate. But as the song goes, the cost of keeping this land free can never be too great.

 As we bring down the gavel on the Fifty First Congress, as the Speaker Pro Tem leads the closing prayers, let us pause to remember the real victims of COVID as a result of the vast over-reaction since March 2020: those who committed suicide or seriously thought about it during the lockdown as they suffered intensely from economic devastation, isolation and depression, who were considered by the unelected, unaccountable public health authorities little more than collateral damage, as well as those who died amid these actions befitting a police state because their cancers went undetected, their surgeries were canceled or their treatments for non-COVID diseases were postponed indefinitely.

 The Amrita Party may be no more, but Patria has been blessed by Amma’s grace, by her presence. May it continue to be so in the Fifty Second Congress-elect. Om amriteshwaryai namah. Antarbhumi ramrajya ki jai ho!

 

SRM slams NU and Jungle as lame duck session begins

 The SRM Congress members are pointing fingers at National Unionists and Jim Rome’s Jungle Party for failing to deliver a right-wing coalition in the 52^nd Congress election. “If the National Union and Jungle had doubled their seat count, to 40 and 20 seats respectively, along with most of the minor parties the Patria First movement could have held off the Social Democrats, Greens and Chakras… but no, they failed to deliver and Patria is stuck with four more years of so-called progress with a purpose, four more years of discredited leftist rabble”. Of course, the SRM could have done better itself, as its own pollsters projected at least 108 seats. They won 90 seats, but in Patria’s everyone-into-the-pool proliferation of parties, that translated into only about 27% of the popular vote.

All bark, no bite. NU won only one more seat than in 2018.

 Holding a mediocre 22 seats (about 6.6% of popular vote), the National Union won only a single seat more than in 2018, while the Jungle Party lost one seat, down to 10 members from 11 in the 51^st Congress. The biggest winner in the 52^nd Congress-elect is the Chakra Party. They won 76 seats – 43 more than in 2018 – and succeeded in scooping up a large number of Amrita Party supporters. Given Patria’s multi-party mish-mash, getting about 23% of popular vote is a big win for the Chakras.

 The old 51^st Congress (4·LI 2021-22) reconvened for the traditional post-election Lame Duck Session that will continue until a day or two before Inauguration Day and will include Smack-Off XXVIII on June 24, in which the Jungle Party will select the ten members of its caucus (broadcast live on PMBC-1152). The first item on the order paper is to certify the returns of the recent election, as provided by the returning officers of the 13 Precincts and the Federal District. The last item is to hammer out and ratify Patria’s fiscal 2023 budget. In between there are many items of business and other loose ends to tie up, including a proclamation of Patria’s neutrality in the Russo-Ukrainian war.

SRM thought they won, until they didn't.

Six more weeks on campaign trail as Congress takes pre-election recess

Patria’s tenrec (the animal symbol of Patria, as proclaimed by Act of Congress in 2018) saw its shadow – or perhaps didn’t see its shadow – today, meaning there are six more weeks of campaigning until 52^nd Congress Election Day, April 16.

After a rare Saturday session that capped off days of marathon debates on tax reform and tax cuts for 2023, the Fourth Session of the 51^st Congress (4·LI 2021-22) adjourned for the traditional, though unwritten, pre-election recess in order to allow Congress members to hit the campaign trail in their home Precincts and districts. Congress will return a few days after the Election Day/Patriots’ Day weekend for the also traditional Lame Duck session, which will conclude a day or two before Inauguration Day.

Although supporters of the defunct Amrita Party tend to be parking their vote with the Social Democrats or Chakra Party, the SRM is fighting hard for their votes. The newest SRM campaign posters feature the goddess Kali and a new slogan “WHOSE PATRIA? OUR PATRIA!” along with the SRM's usual "Patria first".

Tenrecs get some love as 50th Congress adjourns "sine die"

On the last sitting day of the 50th Congress, the tenrec has become Patria's official animal symbol. Efforts to designate the tenrec as such go back well over a century, following Patria's failed attempt to claim Madagascar as part of its colonial empire in the 1880s. The Act of Congress noted that the tenrec is to Patria what the beaver is to Canada, the bald eagle is to the US, the kangaroo is to Australia and the kiwi is to New Zealand. Patria's national soccer/football team - if there were a micronational World Cup - could now be nicknamed the Tenrecs.

Following the ratification of the "Tenrec Act", the final act of the lame-duck Congress: debate on Patria's financial health, leading up to the ratification of Patria's fiscal 2019 budget. Traditionally, the budget is the final item to be debated and ratified by Congress before summer adjournment.

At 11:28 PM Patrienish Local Time (PLT) immediately following ratification of the budget (declared by the Clerk of the House to be ratified unanimously) and a call for any further business or member's bills to be brought forward (there were none), the Speaker of the House slammed the gavel on the dais, the Sergeant-at-Arms blew the ceremonial vuvuzela, and the words everyone had been waiting to hear rang through the House chamber: "Under the power vested in me by the Constitution of Patria, I declare the Fiftieth Congress of the Inner Realm of Patria adjourned sine die".

Hi, I'm a tenrec. It took over 100 years for Congress to ratify, but I am Patria's official animal!

Tomorrow, June 30, 2018 is Inauguration Day. Ave atque vale, L Con. Pat.

End of the line for 49th Congress

The 49th Congress passed into history after an all-day Saturday session that continued past midnight until the ratification of Patria's fiscal 2015 budget was completed. The budget is traditionally the final item to be ratified by Congress before adjourning for the summer recess.

With no further items on the order paper, the Speaker of the House killed off the lame duck session by delivering the message that Patria had been waiting to hear since election day two and one half months ago: with the Divine Mother’s blessings, the Forty-Ninth Congress has completed the Fourth Session and has thereby come to the end of its term of office...Under the power vested in me by the Constitution of Patria, I declare the Forty-Ninth Congressus Patriaë adjourned sine die.

The Speaker's gavel hit the desk and the vuvuzela blew at 12:52 AM PLT (Patrienish Local Time) on Sunday, June 29.

Post-Bhakti Fest: be in the lame duck Bhav!

Bhakti Fest - the official pre-inaugural kirtan ball of the 50th Congress-elect - concluded on Sunday (June 22). To use a Jim Rome analogy, Bhakti Fest is the Smack-Off for yoga teachers and kirtan singers: the best of the best, who are there by invite only.

To state the obvious, the yoga classes were totally awesome and the kirtan - headlined by the "chant master of American yoga" Krishna Das - rocked the house. Or the House, as in Patria's 50th Congress-elect, which was given a major infusion of shakti going forward to Inauguration day.

Disclaimer: the views expressed in the following two paragraphs are this blogger's own and do not represent the opinions of the Inner Realm of Patria or the 50th Congress-elect.

Making the trek to Madison, WI were the usual left-over hippies, most of whom were not yet born in the 1960s, sporting dreadlocks and dreadful tattoos. Do these people ever stop to think how lame that ink will look when they're, say, 60 or 70 years old? Or how do they expect to find a job? Unless, of course, they're self-employed, perhaps as the owner of a tattoo shop, in which case they don't have to worry about personal appearance at job interviews. There was no shortage of stereotypical new-agey bliss-blobs, vegan zealots and far-leftists (e.g. women who flaunt unshaven legs and/or underarms to make a political statement), but such demographics are usually expected at events like Bhakti Fest.

What was not expected, at least by Patria, was that the event seemed to be as lily-white as a Tea Party convention. Bhakti Fest might as well have been Caucasian Fest! As far as this blogger could tell, of the thousands in attendance during that weekend in the Wisconsin capital, there couldn't have been more than a handful of Indians (South Asians, not First Nations), and very few African Americans and Latinos as well. This is in stark contrast to the diversity seen at Amma's North American tour programs, where there is always a mix of Indians and Westerners - in some cases a 50-50 mix or a plurality of non-First Worlder White ethnicities.

One of the few non-white faces at Bhakti Fest belonged to Nina Rao, who led the daily chanting of the Hanuman Chalisa.

Having returned from Bhakti Fest and having received Amma's blessings for the new administration, Patria is locked and loaded, infused with the bhav for Inauguration Day on June 30. In the meantime, it's back to work for the lame-duck 49th Congress. There are still at least two more sitting days, and possibly the June 28-29 weekend, in which to ratify Patria's fiscal 2015 budget and get a whack of legislation passed before the Speaker of the House swings the gavel and blows the vuvuzela.

What time is it in Patria? It's lame-duck session time!

Meanwhile in midtown Castoropolis, as the transition to the 50th Congress-elect begins, the old 49th Congress has returned to the Capitol for the traditional post-election lame duck session. Until a day or two before the June 30 Inauguration Day, there will be legislation to pass, a 2015 budget to ratify, and a number of other loose ends to tie up before the Speaker (or Speaker Pro Tem) can pound the gavel, blow the vuvuzela and declare the 49th Congress adjourned sine die. The first act of the lame duck session is to officially certify the results of last Saturday's election.

Precinct-by-precinct election returns.

The Voice of Labor in Patria. The Social Democrats came away with 49 seats.