Elderly Tourists Say They Were Held at Yellowstone Hotel Under Armed Guard

Your petulant partial government shutdown

Pat Vaillancourt went on a trip last week that was intended to showcase some of America's greatest treasures.

Instead, the Salisbury resident said she and others on her tour bus witnessed an ugly spectacle that made her embarrassed, angry and heartbroken for her country.

Vaillancourt was one of thousands of people who found themselves in a national park as the federal government shutdown went into effect on Oct. 1. For many hours her tour group, which included senior citizen visitors from Japan, Australia, Canada and the United States, were locked in a Yellowstone National Park hotel under armed guard.

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[Calvin Coolidge]

Some of my own stories:

Nearby at Valley Forge, a jogger parked his car outside the park and went jogging. When he crossed into the park, three rangers quickly caught him and issued a $100 ticket for trespassing. Public Property means Government Property, apparently, not property that is open to the public.

At Mt. Rushmore, there isn't much of a park, just a big mountain with four people's faces carved into it. Not even a gift shop in Teddy's nose. People drive by, park, look, take pictures, and drive on. Except that now there are cones in every nearby turnaround (outside the park) to prevent people from stopping and looking. Because if there is no money, then we can't afford to have people stop and look.

I really hope that people are starting to notice the mendacity in the Obama adminstration's approach, and not just mindlessly blaming the Republicans, but I have no expecation that this will be the case.