Not ironic at all. During today's $1.1 million, GOP-led reading of the U.S. Constitution on the floor of the U.S. House today, Article 2, Section 1, as read by Rep. Frank Pallone (D-NJ, the parties were taking turns reading) the "natural born citizen" clause was interrupted by a protester shouting from the gallery.

As Pallone read "No person except a natural born Citizen, or a Citizen of the United States, at the time of the Adoption of this Constitution, shall be eligible to the Office of President," the "birther activist" Theresa Cao shouted out: "Except Obama! Except Obama! Help us Jesus!"

Cao's First Amendment rights were abruptly revoked as she was ordered escorted out of the chamber and arrested by Capitol Police.

Here's the video, courtesy of TPM who has more...

That wasn't the only early embarrassment for the new GOP majority in their first full day on the job. There was also this amusing little problem. May be an amusing couple of years ahead...

Via Google News last night...

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...in 18 seconds. We are a country of jackasses. Here's proof...

[Hat-tip Barbara Morrill at dKos]

This afternoon, during my weekly "Muckraking Wednesdays" appearance with Harrison on KPFK/Pacifica out here in Los Angeles, we discussed the first day of the 112th Congress, Kindergarten Kapitol Kop Rep. Darrell Issa, the continuing intentions of the GOP to keep legal (Democratic) voters from being able to cast their vote, the seating of disgraced RNC vote cager Tim Griffin in the U.S. House of Representatives and the proposed new rules for filibuster reform [PDF] in the U.S. Senate.

Joining us on that last point was the great David "d-day" Dayen, news blogger from FireDogLake.

The lively hour follows in full below, if you'd like to give it a listen.

Download MP3 or listen online here...

Scottish singer-songwriter Gerry Rafferty, who, with his partner in the band Stealers Wheel, Joe Egan, wrote and recorded "Stuck in the Middle With You" in 1972 has died today. He later wrote and recorded enduring hits such as "Baker Street" and "Right Down the Line." But as "Stuck in the Middle..." has been The BRAD BLOG's unofficial official theme song since we began here nearly seven years ago, it seems appropriate to take a minute today --- ironically enough, on the first day the new Congress convenes --- to pause and tip our hats in his memory.

Once again proving the well-worn axiom IOKIYAR ("It's okay if you're a Republican"), disgraced former U.S. Attorney, Karl Rove protege and the Republican Party's 2004 vote cager, Tim Griffin has not only been elected as a Representative to the U.S. House from Arkansas' 2nd district, he's also been assigned to a leadership position as deputy whip and has been given a seat on the U.S. House Judiciary Committee, of all places. Guess they had to replace the previously disgraced anti-democracy champion Rep. Tom Feeney (FL-24) with someone, eh?

As Talking Points Memo notes...

TPM has more on that aspect of Griffin's "rap sheet", but as The BRAD BLOG has detailed over the years, Griffin was also at the center of a dirty scheme to peel thousands of legitimate voters off the roles in Ohio in 2004, as revealed by his own "vote caging" emails sent to fellow George W. Bush/RNC campaign officials at the time...

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Scary black man with weapon outside a polling place somewhere!!! It's a scandal!!! A "voter suppression" outrage!!! And Obama's scary black men are coming to get you next!!!

I don't care much about this silly story and, apparently, neither did any voters. Not a single one of them filed a complaint of "voter intimidation" during the 2008 "incident" captured on video for a minute or so outside a polling place in a largely minority area of Philadelphia and then played endlessly on Fox "News" ever since. Naturally, the footage is always accompanied by some sort of pretend "outrage" from the Fox host in each instance.

As the incident has even less relevance to the lives of Americans as the death of Natalie Holloway, we haven't covered it more than once or twice here, most recently last July when Washington Post Ombudsman Andrew Alexander took the bait in support of his paper's regard of the non-story as some sort of "political bombshell".

But, with the death-by-fake-scandal of ACORN, the Republicans need something on which to hang their fake, vaguely "voter fraud"-related, very much black people-related investigations in Congress as they take over the majority in the House. So, get used to it. We're all gonna be forced to hear about this silly story --- over and over again --- whether we like it or not, in the coming months (and, probably even years!) as the GOP hold hearings and "investigations" on this story, rather than on ones which actually matter.

So to that end, if you're not already familiar with the ridiculous "scandal" concerning the "intimidation" by two jackasses from the so-called "New Black Panther Party" at a polling place in 2008, Adam Serwer's summary at WaPo today (of all places) has you covered. He's even honest enough to take his paper on directly for the ink they continue to give to the non-story courtesy of their Rightwing columnist (one of many) Jennifer Rubin.

Gosh, I wonder if, when the GOP hold their hearings on "voter intimidation" at the polling place, they'll also be demanding that Eric Holder prosecute this guy as well. Somehow, I'm doubting it.

Via Eric Kleefeld at TPM this afternoon, candidates jockeying for chairmanship of the RNC, including current chair Michael Steele, held a debate today, and, naturally, spoke at some length to one of the most important imaginary threats facing our republic: Massive Democratic voter fraud!!! Coincidentally, almost always by black people and Hispanic people, who probably shouldn't be voting anyway, and stuff!!!

The goal of this years-long campaign against imagined "Massive Democratic voter fraud!!!" is, as long-time readers of The BRAD BLOG know too well, meant to encourage the adoption of photo ID restrictions at the polling place (and, short of that, intimidating challenges to voters when they show up to vote) under the purported guise of "ballot integrity".

Never mind that George W. Bush's own Dept. of Justice was unable to find more than a handful of actual voter fraud culprits despite their unprecedented efforts to root out this menace. And, definitely never mind that studies cited [PDF] by the League of Women Voters, and many others, have warned that more than 20 million legal American voters --- most of them, coincidentally, minorities, elderly and students (read: Democratic-leaning voters) --- stand to be completely disenfranchised by such draconian restrictions since many of them do not have the type of government issued photo ID the Republicans believe can protect us from "Massive Democratic voter fraud!!!"

It's not new, of course. The modern Republican War on Voting has been ongoing for years, begun as long ago (at least) as Rightwing icon Paul Weyrich's incredible 1980 speech to preachers in Dallas with Reagan and Falwell on hand (see :40 video clip at end of article below). But it's clear, despite the Republican/Fox "News"/Andy Breitbart "pimp" hoax that succeeding in killing the GOP's former #1 "voter fraud" bogey man, ACORN, the fake story of "Massive Democratic voter fraud!!!" will continue as a helpful voter suppression meme for the GOP for years to come --- at least if the new RNC chair, whoever that may be, has anything to say about it.

Here, in part, is what each RNC chair candidate had to say today in response to the question about how they planned to combat "Massive Democratic voter fraud!!!" as the new leader of the GOP...

In a press conference held this afternoon in Juneau, Alaska's GOP nominee for the U.S. Senate, Joe Miller, finally conceded the election to write-in candidate and incumbent Republican Senator Lisa Murkowski. He has decided not to appeal his federal case as dismissed by a U.S. circuit court judge on Tuesday. See AP's coverage for more on today's announcement.

Having followed the failures of Alaska's Diebold election system for years, The BRAD BLOG followed the race between Miller, Murkowski and Democratic nominee Scott McAdams closely over the last several months, as it served to offer, yet again, another reminder of the importance of full transparency and citizen oversight in (small "d") democratic elections and the need to reconsider the use of electronic tabulation systems which ultimately leave all of us wondering if election results are accurate and if this nation can consider itself as having anything approaching the self-governance envisioned in our Constitution...

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After requiring Alaska's GOP U.S. Senate candidate Joe Miller to file his federal lawsuit by Monday (yesterday), the federal judge in the case has now dismissed it without even waiting for the reply from the state, which was ordered due by Wednesday (tomorrow).

From Anchorage Daily News as posted within the last hour...

Last night we published our detailed analysis of Joe Miller's federal complaint, in which he pointed out Constitutional questions about the way in which the Diebold optical-scan system was used to tally votes. We also pointed out what might have been a fatal flaw in his complaint. Whether Miller will appeal Beistline's decision remains to be seen.

Beistline's 14-page dismissal is here [PDF].

UPDATE 8:22pm PT: A few thoughts after reading Beistline's dismissal...

The ignorance on display in this CNN interview segment concerning Wikileaks and Julian Assange yesterday is simply astonishing.

I'd expect the misinformed idiocy and/or out and out lying from one of the guests, former Bush Admin Homeland Security Advisor (now a paid CNN contributor) Fran Townsend. But the amount of ignorance about the profession of journalism, on display from CNN's very own journalist here, Jessica Yellin, almost defies words. Happily, Salon's Glenn Greenwald, a Constitutional attorney and actual journalist was the other guest on hand to help straighten both of these women out.

Watch the video, be amazed, and then I'll have a few more words on it below, as it mirrors another recent --- and embarrassing --- WikiLeaks-related segment on CNN, which we critically covered before later receiving a response from both CNN and host Don Lemon...

The week before last, we took CNN and host Don Lemon to task for a WikiLeaks segment in which, among other problems, they started off with a package that compared Assange to Bonnie & Clyde and other criminals who did things like, ya know, actually commit crimes, like killing people and stuff --- none of which either Assange or WikiLeaks has done. Not by a long shot. CNN's on-screen chyron for the segment was, shamefully, "ASSANGE: JOURNALIST OR TERRORIST" (no question mark even included)...