Doctors Without Borders said that since August, its medical teams have treated 115 people in Misrata who bore torture-related wounds, including cigarette burns, heavy bruising, bone fractures, tissue burns from electric shocks and kidney failure from beatings. Two detainees died after being interrogated, the group’s general director said.

The White House announced its lawyers view the President’s power to make recess appointments to be unfettered by GOP pro forma efforts to keep the Senate in session merely to obstruct the power to make appointments. This means the President may soon make other recess appointments, including to the National Labor Relations Board, which currently cannot operate because it lacks of quorum.

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, who negotiated the two-month stopgap bill on the payroll tax, unemployment insurance and the doctor’s fix that passed the Senate with 89 votes, ended his silence on the House GOP actions on the bill, by saying that they should go ahead and pass the stopgap. This further isolates John Boehner and House Republicans.

Regarding the payroll tax cut deal, apparently the plan is for a straight up-or-down vote tonight on the measure. House Speaker John Boehner promised that the vote would fail. That creates another stalemate, and Boehner misled his Senate GOP colleagues who already voted for the Senate bill.

Today was supposed to be the final day of the Congressional session, as the House would return to finish off the payroll tax deal negotiated and passed through the Senate. But that blew up over the weekend. We now have a regular business day in the House, with votes in the afternoon. But it’s not clear exactly what they’ll do with the Senate’s payroll tax deal.

As is typical at the end of the year, Harry Reid attempted to clear out a backlog of uncontroversial Presidential appointments before the holiday break. But Mitch McConnell would not allow it. He wanted assurances, instead, that the President would not seek out any recess appointments during the break, and he objected to moving the outstanding nominees until that time.

This may come as a surprise, since throughout this year Republicans have been able to use pro forma sessions to never take Congress into recess, thereby blocking recess appointments. Indeed, that was the plan for this holiday break as well.

OK, they’re not outwardly advocating this. But that’s the practical effect of demanding that the provision on Keystone XL get included in any end of the year deal to extend the payroll tax cut and unemployment insurance.

Republicans have insisted that Congress will eventually come to an agreement on the pressing year-end issues, namely the payroll tax cut, unemployment insurance, a “doc fix” to avoid a Medicare reimbursement cuts, and possibly some expiring tax breaks. But their version of “agreement” is predicated on the idea that the House will pass a bill with several objectionable features and everyone else will accept it. They essentially want to call the bluff of both Senate Democrats and the White House.

It looks like a blink. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell told reporters yesterday that “I think at the end of the day there’s a lot of sentiment in our conference, clearly a majority sentiment, for continuing the payroll tax relief that we enacted a year ago in these tough times.” But there are many hurdles to overcome before this comes to pass

Remember jobless persons, Louisville playing Kansas State, it’s what makes Mitch McConnell’s unique vision of America great.