Fossils found on Capitol Hill

Fossils found on Capitol Hill

By Robert Haught
Potomac Junction

WASHINGTON - Everybody's talking about a startling new scientific discovery. An amateur paleontologist reports that he has found signs of dinosaurs inside the Capital Beltway.
Ray Stanford, 66, spent 10 years digging in streambeds near Interstate 95 before turning up footprints of a 6-foot-long dinosaur that roamed what is now Maryland 100 million years ago.

Stanford and federal geologists identified the tracks as belonging to a member of the hypsilophodon family, so they named it hypsiloichnus marylandicus.

These determined diggers were so happy about their find that they wrote it up in an international journal called Ichnos. They informed us that the "Hyp" family members walked on their hind legs most of the time but dropped to all fours to rest, eat or drink. One geologist described them as "the Mesozoic equivalent of rabbits."

Well, I hate to burst their bubble, but dinosaurs inside the Beltway are not a new discovery. Tourists visiting the U.S. Capitol will discover a number of them roaming the halls of the U.S. Senate. In many respects they're comparable to the "Hyp" species, even to rabbit-like behavior on some occasions.

Some of them are approaching extinction. Last year saw the return of mushmouthic carolinus, also known as Sen. Ernest F. Hollings, to the swamps of South Carolina. Exleaderus pterodaschle (former Democrat leader Tom Daschle) was banished to the hills of South Dakota.

The Senate has become an increasingly older preserve. In the 109th Congress, the average age of senators is 60.4 years, the oldest in history. Of course, one doesn't necessarily have to be old to have the characteristics of a dinosaur.

Here are some of the species remaining:

Senataurus rex -- Literal translation "king of the Senate." At 52, Senate majority leader Bill Frist, R-Tenn., has some time to go before becoming fossilized.

Pompousic orataurus -- There does not exist a more pompous orator than Sen. Robert Byrd, D-W.Va., at 87 the oldest member. This creature has a voracious appetite for partisanship and devours Republicans who get in his way.

Liberalis massachusettus -- Senate liberals have no fiercer fighter than Edward Kennedy, D-Mass. Now 72, he is showing signs of forgetfulness, such as this sputtering response to a question about how Barack Obama was elected senator by such a large margin in Illinois: "Why don't we just ask Osama bin -- Osama Obama -- Obama what --"

Ravenous porkbarrelaur -- Ted Stevens, the 81-year-old senior senator from Alaska, has sharp talons that grab large chunks of federal funds for his home state. He rivals Byrd as the pork barrel king of the jungle.

Ambitious hillaraptor -- While not a dinosaur in terms of age, Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y., commands attention with her reptilian tactics to fulfill her ambition of returning to the White House as president.

And if there aren't enough dinosaurs in the Senate to satisfy the fossil hunters, there's always the Supreme Court.

Robert Haught: potomacj@hotmail.com

Just thought this was cute, regardless of the side of the aisle you are on!