Apr 1 2010 3:14pm

Congress Reinstates Pluto as a Planet

Last night, the Unites States Congress passed a new bill to declare Pluto is to be considered a planet again. This news was met with some confusion by the scientific community as Congress was not the body that initially downgraded Pluto to the status of “dwarf planet”.

“I don’t understand,” said astronomer David Levy. “How does Congress even have the power to do that?”

White House Spokesman Robert Gibbs, said in an early morning press conference that President Obama was very excited about the bill.

The President has always been upset over the removal of Pluto as a planet. It has a moon, for Christ’s sake. Once the bill is delivered, the President will waste no time signing this bill into law. To quote the vice-president, this is a small f****** deal.

Ron Laufenheimer of the Tea Party movement later made a statement in response to the news.

We are very pleased with the reinstatement of Pluto as a planet. This is a step in the right direction of someone standing up to the so-called experts and for what is right and good. Finally, Congress is doing something that is worthwhile, as opposed to economic or healthcare reform, which are completely outside of their Constitutional authorities.

“The scientists just need to quiet down,” said Reginal Torvalds, a Constitutional lawyer out of D.C. “This easily falls under the Interstate Commerce Clause. The Supreme Court will uphold this; Pluto is a back. I, for one, have already put the ninth Styrofoam ball back on my bed’s mobile.”

Richard Fife is a writer, blogger, and firm believer in a 9-planet universe.  More of his ramblings and some of his short stories can be found at

Joanne Center
1. thegloop
Uh oh! Somebody just made a sign with Neil DeGrasse Tyson with a Hitler mustache on top of his regular mustache.
Matt Schraeder
2. frozen-solid
Sorry to break it to you Tor, but this was actually done... in Illinois.

So much for April Fools!
Jennifer B
4. JennB
RFife, I like this one best so far.
Richard Fife
5. R.Fife
@2 Wow, that is awesome. I had no clue, and the funny thing is, I'm from IL (at least natively). Moved away back in '06 and lost track of things, but this only re-assures me that a 9-planet solar system will rise again!
Tricia Irish
6. Tektonica
I refused to remove my styrofoam ball in the first place!
Michael Morgan
7. morganml
424 out of over 10,000 astronomers got together and decided that Pluto was no longer a planet, I mean this is not even close to a quorum, I thought they were pretty ballesy when they decided they had the right to change the number of planets for the rest of us for no good reason I could see other that it offended the delicate sensibilities of some uptight smoooes that it was small. I had a very hard time trying to explain this to my daughters since they have a mobile with Pluto on it in their room.
8. kluelos
And they did it at the very end of the conference when nearly everyone else was already on the way out of town.

We should be campaigning for a repeal. Defenders of Pluto! That should be worth a T-shirt at least. Maybe even a logo. Tell all your plutonic friends.
Ethan Glasser-Camp
9. glasserc
I loved "Apparently they just do". Worth price of entry all by itself.

10. Laurel Kornfeld
I encourage everyone to please keep the Plutos on your mobiles. There actually are people campaigning for either a repeal of the controversial IAU decision or for ignoring it entirely. Even Tyson has criticized it as "flawed" and stated publicly that he never said our solar system has only eight planets. And the four percent of the IAU who voted on this were not experts, as most of them are not planetary scientists but other types of astronomers. Their decision was rejected by hundreds of professional astronomers in a formal petition led by Dr. Alan Stern, Principal Investigator of NASA's New Horizons mission to Pluto. Stern accurately described the IAU decision as "an embarrassment to astronomy." It was clearly a political decision, and if the IAU believes they can make political decisions, seriously, why not have Congress vote on a scientific matter? Also, David Levy is a strong supporter of Pluto's planet status. He was a friend of Pluto discoverer Clyde Tombaugh and on Tombaugh's deathbed promised he would always stand up for Pluto's planet status.
Ben Goodman
11. goodben
Ceres would like to protest the unfair preference given to Pluto. She would like to point out that she was considered a planet long before Pluto. She wants to be reinstated and given a ball in your mobile.

Eris, Makemake, and Haumea also want balls in your mobile--so do Orcus, Huya, Ixion, Varuna, Quaoar, Sedna, and 4 poor dwarves that haven't been given proper names yet.
12. Viadd
It was also done in New Mexico

It is obviously a State's Rights issue, and will inevitably lead to in a violent struggle between the 'Planetary Confederation' led by New Mexico and Illinois, and the 'Union States' who stand with the International Astronomical Union.
YouDont NeedToKnow
13. necrosage2005
I love it when people don't get April Fool's jokes!
Paul Andinach
14. anobium
necrosage2005, that's a non sequitur. Just because people have used the joke as a starting point to discuss a real-life issue, doesn't mean they didn't realise it was a joke.
Mikey Bennett
15. EvilMonkey
Sounds like something I would read about in The Onion

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