Harry Reid Offers Super Bowl Tickets to Republicans for Health Care Vote
WASHINGTON, DC – Whispers in the Capital building are echoing through the halls of congress today. After Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi told reporters that she doesn’t have the votes to pass a health care bill, Harry Reid’s phones began ringing off the hook. His iPhone buzzed with twitter messages and his computer moaned with excess email. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid has been missing in action for almost twenty-four hours. When The Daily Rash called his home, his wife nervously said that her husband was in a poor part of town helping the less fortunate. A phone call to his office prompted an intern to shout obscenities and hang up.
The problem?
According to Washington insiders, Senator Reid offered many prominent Republican Congressmen seats on the fifty yard line at February’s Super Bowl in Miami. Not just that, but less important congress persons and their staff were offered perks ranging from tickets to Disney World to free massages at Whole Foods. Two days later all gifts were revoked, many times they were physically taken back.
The Daily Rash spoke with Gayle Russell, an intern for Congressman Mike Pence from Indiana. She said that someone from Senator Reid’s office called and offered her a George Foreman Grill if she could convince Congressman Pence to “ease up a bit.”
“I told them I wanted that Foreman Grill, but there was no way in hell Congressman Pence was going to ease up his fight against the health care bill. Then they told me they would give me the grill and one of those Popeil knife sets if I would at least try. So, I tried! The next day Pelosi said she didn’t have the votes in congress for health care. Next thing I know, someone’s knocking on my door demanding my grill and knife set back!”
Ashley Dunbar interns for NY Congressman Peter King. Miss Dunbar said she received a call yesterday from representatives of Senator Reid. “They were very nice. They asked how attached the Congressman was to voting against health care. Before I could answer they offered to send me and my Mother to the Yankees 2010 home opener! I told them I could ask the congressman if he might reconsider….and they interrupted and said that if I could at least get him to consider reconsidering….that they would get me my own Reality TV show!” Ashley sighed. “The next day some undercover kind of guy pushed his way through the door and took our tickets!”
The Daily Rash attempted to contact Mr. Reid’s office. Once again an angry intern cursed us before hanging up.
So far the most heart wrenching tale to emerge from what some are already calling De-Gift-Gate comes from Darren Wilcox, an intern for West Virginia Congresswoman, Shelley Moore Capito. Mr. Wilcox said he spoke with a Reid representative early Wednesday morning. 
“I got a call from a man who was very cordial. He asked about my grandmother who is suffering in a nursing home in Ohio. The man was aware that our family can’t afford to move Grammy closer to home so that we can see her more often. He said he could get Grammy in one of those luxury “assisted-living” communities, nestled in a beautiful mountain valley in West Virginia! I was even more surprised when he told me she would be moved that day!”
But the excitement and gratitude that overwhelmed the Wilcox family disintegrated the very next day.
“The whole family packed in the station wagon to go see Grammy in her beautiful new home. When we arrived we were told that she’d spent the night, but this morning a UPS truck hauled her back to Ohio! We tried calling Senator Reid’s office, but each time some angry man curses at us and hangs up!”
A representative of the Golden Twilight nursing home told The Daily Rash that not only was the elderly woman returned to them, but she was returned C.O.D.
“We paid the charge, but we’re going to have to pass the cost on to the woman’s family.”
The Daily Rash obtained a handwritten list of gifts for Republican health care votes on Senator Harry Reid’s letterhead. A senior Reid staffer said that all gifts have been or will be de-gifted:
Super Bowl tickets on the fifty yard line (30) Lincoln Town cars (25)
All expense paid family trips to Disney World (20) Princess Cruise trips (20)
Nascar pit passes (15) Signed copies of Going Rogue by Sarah Palin (250)
No Spin-Zone doormats (500) Sleepover with Glen Beck (6)
Keith Olbermann dart boards (90) Whole Foods massages (30)
Twelve gauge shotguns (13) Popeil 150-piece knife sets (80)
George Foreman grills (57) Reality TV series (2)
Elderly relative relocation (1) American Flag decals (724)
Personal arm-tone workout with Michelle Obama (1) NY Yankee home opener tickets, behind home plate (2)
World Trade Center photograph signed by Rudy Giuliani (1) Scalp massage from Rush Limbaugh (1)
Fist bump with President Barack Obama (1) Gideon’s Bible (900)
Night-vision goggles (75) Oliver North’s Torture Techniques video series (300)
