(2005-02-01) -- Due to the "somber mood of the nation," Democrats in Congress have called on their Republican colleagues to refrain from all celebratory applause during President George Bush's state of the union speech Wednesday night.

The annual presidential address before a joint session of Congress is traditionally interrupted dozens of times by applause from both parties and frequent cheers and standing ovations from the party in power.

"How can anyone applaud in a time like this?" said Rep. Nancy Pelosi, D-CA, before launching into a list of reasons why Americans are in mourning.

-- "Iraq is a quagmire of Sunni disenfranchisement, and our own citizens in Ohio still lack full voting rights.
-- All of America's beloved manufacturing jobs have been outsourced to China and all the garment-sewing and tech-support jobs to India.
-- The only union labor left on our shores is done in the public schools, where teachers suffer the assaults of wild-eyed heretics trying to undermine Darwinian orthodoxy.
-- Across our land illegal aliens still lack proper health insurance and suffer daily indignities in the name of so-called homeland security.
-- The elderly face a terrifying future when the federal government no longer controls all of their retirement money.
-- Our 14-year-old girls live in fear that they may need parental permission to abort their unwanted fetuses.
-- Our homosexuals still can't marry, forcing them into deadly liaisons with multiple partners.
-- The wealthiest Americans continue to waste money on investments and consumer goods while Congress struggles to make ends meet.
-- And the Supreme Court itself faces the threat of perhaps several new justices who will be too lazy to rewrite our out-dated Constitution."

The House Minority Leader recalled "the halcyon days of the Clinton administration, when clapping and whooping were entirely appropriate."

"Now," she added, "is the winter of our discontent. Please, hold your applause."

In related news, the Democrat National Committee announced that its televised response to the president's speech will be sponsored by Eli Lilly, the makers of Prozac.