To close a loop (something we don't often get to do) on a story we picked up on a few weeks ago, the Assistant U.S. Attorney from northern Florida, John David R. Atchison, who was arrested in a sting in September for attempting to have sex with a 5-year old girl, has committed suicide in federal prison.

Atchison had previously tried to kill himself just days after being arrested at the Detroit airport where he had flown to a federal agent he had believed to be the little girl's mother.

"Just gotta go slow and very easy. I've done it plenty," Atchison reportedly told the "mother" before he left Florida, after the agent in the string operation had expressed concerns to Atchison about injury to the little girl.

In AP's report on the AUSA's death, they described him as a family man, whose attorney hopes he'll be remembered for "a lot of good in his life"...

ED NOTE about the sub-headline, from our initial quick coverage of the arrest last month, intimating that Atchison was a Republican...

Paul Kiel at TPM has an interesting late update on the Senate hold, by Obama and Feingold, on Hans von Spakovsky's nomination to the FEC, which we reported yesterday. New details/analysis on the "game of chicken" now in play in the Senate, along with the ramifications for the FEC in 2008 if a stalemate continues...and what Bush could do about it.

This is interesting. In a "blind bio poll" of Republican voters, conducted by Zogby, Ward Casscells polled as well as both Rudy Giuliani and Fred Thompson.

Who the hell is Ward Casscells? Some guy who's not even running for anything. But apparently Republican respondents liked his bio as much as they like Rudy, Fred, and all the rest, according to a new Zogby poll out today...

We've suggested that our friends at Why Tuesday? change their tagline ("Fixing our voting system, one question at a time") for what seems to us an obvious reason. They're doing good work so far on their new video blog site, but given the topics they're dealing with, we'd suggest our system is already "fixed" enough thanks.

That said, they recently issued a candidate challenge to all of the presidential candidates, asking them to respond to three specific questions concerning their plans for Election Reform.

We're hoping in the near future, they will add the following question to their challenge: "Do you support a paper ballot --- not a 'paper trail' or a 'paper record,' but a paper ballot, and one that is actually counted --- for every vote cast in America?"

In the meantime, we'd encourage those of you out there going to candidate events (both Republican and Democrat) to ask such a question of the candidates if you can, and capture it on video. Do that, and send us the clip (or a link to it on YouTube, etc.) and we'll get it up on The BRAD BLOG, and perhaps even on Why Tuesday? as well.
So far, the first response they've been able to get to their challenge is from Joe Biden when WT?'s Exec. Director Jacob Soboroff ran into him recently at a D.C. coffee shop. Biden's comments are at the right.

We'll note that, while not asked about it specifically, he first refers to a "paper trail," but later refers to a "paper ballot" and wants a standardized system used across the country. He also mentions that full public financing of presidential and congressional elections will do more than anything to reform the system as he sees it. Let us know what you think.

Guest Blogged by BRAD BLOG's D.C. Correspondent, Margie Burns

It was a big day on Thursday in the national capital, with several flaming surges hitting the news at once – the Washington Post hooking up with the MSM campaign to put “Hillary” over the top before the magic deadline of October 15 (more on that later, elsewhere); Rep. Henry Waxman and the House Government Reform and Oversight Committee holding a powerful hearing on Iraqi corruption; the blocking of Hans von Spakovsky's nomination to the FEC; and discussion of a proposed federal shield law for journalists (full text of bill here), which was reported out of the Senate Judiciary Committee today to the full Senate.

While I was able to sit in for hearings on two of the items above, space and time regrettably being constraints, I'll cover only the proposed shield law for the moment. Right up top, I have to say that I have qualms about it. A real leak, by a whistleblower exposing a crime or some danger to the public, is one thing. But protecting journalists from exposing a politically motivated ‘source’ trying to plant misinformation is another. This bill, as it was debated in committee and written about in papers yesterday, might equally protect both, if it protects either...

Does this mean he is gay after all? It's all so confusing.

(P.S. We still love our wife!)

UPDATE: Two very short related sound clips for your bemusement...

Nasty Boy...

Mr. Closeted Conservative Congressman...

LATER UPDATE: The inimitable Josh Marshall weighs in on The Genius of Larry Craig, Senator, master of crisis management.

At last Thursday's Republican Debate --- the one which the four Republican front-runners refused to attend --- sponsored by PBS and hosted by (egad!) African-American broadcaster Tavis Smiley, the question of Photo ID restrictions on voters was raised by the Atlanta Journal-Constitution's Cynthia Tucker.

California Rep. Duncan Hunter's answer was interesting. And it's no small matter given that trying to disenfranchise Democratic-leaning voters seems to be Strategy #1 (once again, but moreso than ever) for the desperate GOP in 2008.

That's just one of the reasons why Barack Obama's block of the Dem "deal" to slide through the nomination of Bush's evil GOP anti-voter zealot, Hans von Spakovsky, to the FEC today is so important.

Tucker's question from last Thursday: "Many voting rights advocates are worried about rigid voter ID laws which require photo ID like a driver's license. Are you concerned that some eligible voters will be denied the right to vote simply because they don't have a driver's license?"

Hunter's imaginative answer: "We have right now a real danger of people that are illegally in the country being rounded up, herded into the polls, we've seen that in California, voting illegally. That disenfranchises everybody in that community."

Really? We've "seen that in California," have we? Undocumented (illegal) aliens being "rounded up [and] herded into the polls" and "voting illegally"?

Living out here in the Golden State, we hadn't heard of that one. And we do follow these issues fairly closely. So we checked with Hunter's campaign to find out if they could offer any examples of such illegal votes from herded aliens in our state...

[2/25/08: Welcome to Hugh Hewitt's Townhall blog readers! You should know that you are being misled by Patrick Ruffini's disinformational blog item today. Please see our response to it here so that you get the full story on what is actually going on with the FEC nominations in the Senate, which are currently being blocked by the Republican leadership in that body.]

A Democrat does the right thing for a change! What are the odds these days? And will it hold?

Senator and Presidential Candidate Barack Obama (D-IL), had recently (and correctly) called on Bush to send up an "acceptable" nominee to the Federal Election Commission (FEC), instead of the anti-Democracy, anti-voter villain Hans von Spakovsky.

"His record of poor management, divisiveness, and inappropriate partisanship makes him an unacceptable nominee to the FEC," Obama had previously said. "I am particularly concerned with his efforts to undermine voting rights at the Civil Rights Division during his tenure at the Department of Justice."

And for a change, we have a Democrat who has decided to put his money where his mouth is! For now.

Roll Call (subscription req'd) is reporting that Harry Reid (D-NV) and the Democratic Leadership had shamefully "struck a deal" with Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KS) to slide four FEC nominations, including the GOP "voter fraud" zealot, von Spakovsky, through the Senate on a voice vote, unless any Senators objected.

Obama did object today and succeeded in blocking the vote. Bravo! Don't back down, Senator!

TPM has more details from the Roll Call report. Loyola law professor Rick Hasen offers speculation on what comes next.

For more on the evil von Spakovsky, our extensive coverage of the Bush crony/operative began in late 2005 as he was nominated and then recess appointed by Bush to the FEC. While at the Civil Rights division at the DoJ, he was, among other embarrassing affairs, at the heart of the successful national GOP strategy to gut the beloved Voting Rights Act of 1965. Who better to sit on the FEC?! And in a Presidential Election year no less!

We've requested a comment/explanation from Reid's office on what he must have been thinking. Will update this item if we get one.

UPDATE: Russ Feingold (D-WI) joined Obama in blocking the vote on vS. They've just issued this joint statement:

Still no word on what Reid must have been thinking.

UPDATE 10/5/07: Paul Kiel updates the story with the "game of chicken" now in play in the Senate, and the ramifications for 2008 if a stalemate continues.

The first hard evidence is now coming in from the crackdown/massacre in Myanmar (formerly Burma), as tape, including a dead monk floating in the river and blood on the streets, is aired on CNN.

RAW STORY has the report and video. Kudos to CNN for airing it.

And what will the "pro-Democracy" George W. Bush do about it? Likely, the same thing his father did in response to the 1989 Tiananmen Square Massacre in China. Namely:

WaPo blogger Chris Cillizza is reporting:

You'll remember Domenici, of course, as the senator (along with NM Rep. Heather Wilson) who was haranguing US Attorney David Iglesias to bring phony "voter fraud" indictments in the state via several inappropriate phone calls prior to the 2006 election. Iglesias was later fired for not having done so.

Like most Repubs, when called out, he'd rather run (or not run, as the case may be) than fight.

Though Cillizza speculates that NM Gov. Bill Richardson would be the "dream candidate" to run for the seat, it seems he's currently too busy for the moment running for vice president. We'd be delighted to see him change his mind and do something actually useful for the country in 2008.

UPDATE: AP confirms, and notes that "Domenici would be the fifth Republican senator to decline to seek a new term." They've also got more details on the "health issues" that Domenici, who had previously planned on running again, will use as his excuse. We guess "need to spend more time with the family" is getting a bit worn out by now.

Looks like somebody needs attention. So we'll oblige and give it to her. RAW STORY covers Coulter's latest desperate "look at me" moment in which she speaks of her "personal fantasy" about taking away "women's right to vote."

That silly comment, of course, is meant as little more than a Britney Spears-like attempt to lurch herself back into the headlines as she flogs her latest book. But it does give us the opportunity to remind folks that Coulter herself, without question, committed two third degree felonies, and one first degree misdemeanor by committing voter fraud (yes, actual voter fraud) in Florida in 2006.

The story is more important than it would appear at first, given that the GOP's 2008 strategy to pull their fat out of the fire consists of convincing folks that there is a massive epidemic of Democrats committing voter fraud in order to require driver's licenses at the polls. That, despite the fact that such fraud is exceedingly rare (at least by Dems) and millions of urban, elderly, and minority voters would not be able to cast their legal votes at all should the R's continue to get their way with draconian, Jim Crow-era Photo ID restrictions.

On the other hand, the few instances of actual voter fraud in America seem to be carried out by folks like Coulter, and other Republicans.

We've covered the whole Coulter Fraud saga, in great detail --- including hard, undeniable evidence --- for the past year or so right here: https://BradBlog.com/CoulterFraud.

But Ron Brynaert at RAW gives us a break today by doing the heavy lifting for us on her latest related nonsense.

And we can't say we didn't enjoy it. Probably a whole lot more than Matthews did...

LATE UPDATE: E&P's Greg Mitchell describes the interview as "worth waiting a decade for."

Tomorrow's NY Times features an article describing Rush Limbaugh as the "Latest Victim" in the "War of Condemnation" following his characterization of Iraq War vets calling for a pull-out as "phony soldiers." Limbaugh's comment was made to his 14 million or so listeners across America and on Armed Forces Radio.

In the last graf of the Times piece, discussing whether or not the U.S. House will vote on a resolution to condemn Limbaugh --- just as they voted to condemn MoveOn.org for asking whether Gen. Petraeus should better be described as "General Betray Us?" in a single Times ad (seen by millions, only due to the "Conservative" Media exploitation of it), Democratic House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer is quoted thusly:

Well gosh golly gee willickers, Mr. Hoyer. Shouldn't that have occurred to you before you allowed a vote on a resolution condemning MoveOn? A resolution, we should add, which you voted in favor of?!

P.S. Jane Hamsher is absolutely right. Limbaugh should be taken off of Armed Forces Radio immediately. What should be done with Hoyer is another question entirely.

As we near the one year mark since some 18,000 votes inexplicably disappeared in Sarasota County, Florida, on the Direct Recording Electronic (DRE) touch-screen voting machines used in the U.S. House Election for the state's 13th Congressional District, more study is still needed to determine whether or not the voting machines were at fault, according to the report released today by the Government Accountability Office (GAO).

Even with the additional testing, the GAO admits, it will be impossible to determine for certain whether the touch-screen machines caused the extraordinarily high undervote race in the election.

The GAO's report [PDF] was presented to a Congressional task force investigating the challenge brought by Democratic candidate Christine Jennings, under the Federal Contested Elections Act, after the certified tally between her and her Republican opponent, Vern Buchanan, was reported by the state to be a slim 369 vote margin.

No reasonable explanation for the massive undervote --- found only in that particular contest, only in the Sarasota portion of the race, and only on the touch-screen ballots there (as opposed to the paper-based absentee ballots) --- has yet been proven by anyone.

The GAO has asked the task force to allow them to conduct further testing of the ES&S iVotronic touch-screen machines, in three specific areas, though they admit while "the proposed tests could help provide increased assurance, they would not provide absolute assurance that the iVotronic DREs did not cause the large undervote in Sarasota County."

Determining for certain whether the machines caused the problem would be "impossible," according to the GAO analysis, because they are "unable to recreate the conditions of the election in which the undervote occurred." Ah, the trouble with touch-screens.

As well, the report determined that "some of the prior tests and reviews conducted by the State of Florida and Sarasota County provide assurance that certain components of the voting systems in Sarasota County functioned correctly, but they are not enough to provide reasonable assurance that the iVotronic DREs did not contribute to the undervote."

While the Congressional task force has given permission for the GAO to proceed with their additional testing of the DREs, Jennings has already announced her intentions to run again in 2008 and Buchanan has voted for almost a full year with the Republican House caucus. And Democrats in the House prepare to vote on legislation which would allow the same faulty technology to be used in further elections.

QUESTIONS ABOUT ES&S CONTINUE

Among the unanswered questions in any of the FL-13 reports so far, is whether or not the source code reviewed in previous studies was the same as the code actually in use in the machines on Election Day. Recent news out of California demonstrates that ES&S has a prior history of playing fast and loose with different versions of hardware and software used on their machines in elections.

As well, reading past the summary section of the GAO report reveals another troubling disclosure by the nation's largest voting machine vendor...