WASHINGTON - Buoyed by the passage of Saturday's health care bill, the House of Representatives today voted to skootch up the end of the world to 2010, to give lawmakers a chance to address it before the mid-term elections.
They also included a provision allowing individual states to "opt out" of the apocalypse if they wish.
The bill was rushed through the House, even though some members said they didn't think government had a right to interfere with the Earth's magnetic field. But others were determined to put the End of Days farther up on the calendar.
"I know what the ancient Mayan schedule is," said Minority Leader John Boehner, "but the Republican party has its own timetable of self-destruction and quite frankly, we don't follow everything the universe tells us to do."
In a rare bipartisan effort, members of both parties have been working around-the-clock to ensure that all geomagnetic reversals and black hole alignments don't conflict with fundraising dinners.
"We expect some changes to the galactic plane," said Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, "and we welcome those changes. But even though the past, the present, and the future will be transmogrified beyond recognition, right now time is still money."
Even Senator Joe Lieberman, who had previously pledged not to block a filibuster against consciousness shifts, impending doom or the like, said he now would, probably, sort of. "I am strongly opposed to not blocking things I am unfamiliar with," he said, "although the opposite is also true."
The Senate warned that just because the House had hastened the end of the world, they were inclined to let it stay where it was, or even later. "We'll do whatever the hell we feel like doing," said a Senator, on the condition that he not be identified or pointed at.
"Those people have to get re-elected every five minutes," he continued. "We're all relaxing over here with cigars. We're going to watch the end of the world from our marble balconies like William Shatner and James Spader at the end of Boston Legal."