Santa Claus to Congress: "One Trillion Dollars or No Christmas."

(Washington, D.C.) In the CEO Gulfstream jet wake of General Motors, Ford and Chrysler returning to Congress in search of a 34 billion-dollar bailout, a sleigh with a vanity license plate that read simply "S. Claus" touched down in front of the Capitol yesterday. But out of it stepped far from a right jolly old elf. It was a clearly troubled Santa Claus who testified before Congress that Christmas might have to be canceled if North Pole Enterprises, LLC, the Santa Claus holding company, did not immediately receive one trillion dollars from Congress by December 12th.

Its Chairman, Democrat Christopher Dodd, best expressed the sentiment of the Senate Banking Committee. "My first emotion is shock. I thought you were a myth. But my emotion now quickly changes to disgust. I was five. I wrote you for a pony. I even left out some cocoa. And you know what I got? A freakin' erector set." Indeed bi-partisan childhood letdowns may stall any bailout package. "I don't know that I can trust a trillion dollars to a person who couldn't even deliver on a simple request, a Lionel HO gauge train set, I made when I was eight," said Republican Senator Mike Crapo.

Claus did not blanch from any criticism. "I know I've let many children down. When you've been doing this for 525 years, it's going to happen. And I will admit that I had a substance abuse problem for many of those years. I was drinking 400-500 cups of cocoa a day and then lapsing into a sugar coma. I've got that under control now. What I can't control is the economy."

Senator Bob Corker pointedly asked, "Mr. Claus, I've read over your proposed plan many times. And frankly I have to ask are you back on the cocoa?" Claus was equally as pointed. "I could just say, "Do you want a lump of coal this year", but that's too valuable an energy source to give away. What I will say is that I didn't come here on a Glufstream jet. I came here in a sleigh pulled by six reindeer. If you want to know what happened to the other two, the elves told me they were very tasty."

Claus then went on to say that if he did not receive a trillion dollars from Congress by December 12th, he would have to cancel Christmas. And even if the funding were okayed by Congress, Christmas would still have to be "curtailed by partnering with Chanukah." Claus also said that 30,000 elves would still have to be laid off "as more computer based gifts are outsourced to elves in Sri Lanka."

Merry Christmas to all and to all a good night!

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