7 p.m.

• I have been staying away from cable news shows, even the ones that make us LOL in 2007. However, last night I figured what the heck and turned on Hannity/Colmes because I wasn’t I the mood to watch basketball. The topic being batted around dealt with the whole “clean black” remark by Senator Joe Biden. Oh Christ. They had two chick pollsters/consultants/whatever: one for the Dems, one for the Reps. The Republican chick began bitching about how NOBODY’S talking about Biden and instead saying John McCain is too old to become president. The fuck? Then the other chick began talking about her Party has a black, a Mexican and a chick gunning for the Democrat nomination and how this WAS THE MOST DIVERSE PRESIDENTIAL FIELD EVER!!!!

I went back to watching basketball.

10:15 a.m.

• OMG THE CULTURE OF CORRUPTION ISN'T LOOKING OUT FOR OUR CHILDREN! found it interesting in which paragraph the Associated Press decided to reveal the accused's political party affiliation. Here's a hint on where to look: there's a reason I had to copy and paste the entire article.

A Statehouse scandal in which a lawmaker is accused of fondling a page has transfixed South Dakota, with many people following the case on TV and the Web as if it were a Hollywood reality show.

 

Sen. Dan Sutton, 36, is accused of groping the young man last year while the two shared a motel room at the start of the youth's weeklong stint in the Legislature. The young man was 18 at the time.

 

The South Dakota attorney general and other law enforcement agents investigated the allegations and made no arrests. But a Senate committee accused Sutton of sexual misconduct and planned to wrap up investigative hearings Thursday.

 

Austin Wiese, now 19, testified that Sutton, a longtime personal and family friend, touched his genitals through his shorts as the two slept in a king-size bed last February.

 

"He laid his hand on my stomach for 30 seconds and I was just shaking. He moved his hand down," said Wiese, now a college student. He said he jumped out of bed, pretended to have a cell phone call and fled the room.

 

While it is The Associated Press' policy not to identify people who say they are victims of sexual assault, Wiese's name was used in the public hearing, which was carried live on the Internet, and has been circulated by other media in the state.

 

Sutton has denied fondling the young man but acknowledged that he might have shifted in the bed and inadvertently touched him.

 

"I didn't do what Austin is claiming that I did," Sutton testified. "I loved Austin like a son, a son that I never had."

 

The nine members of the panel will make a recommendation next week to the full Senate, which will decide what, if any, action to take. Lawmakers could censure, discipline or expel Sutton.

 

Nearly every TV station in the state has covered the hearings, and South Dakota Public Broadcasting has offered live audio on its Web site. The state's largest newspaper, the Argus Leader of Sioux Falls, posted frequent online updates from the hearing room.

 

Sioux Falls TV station KELO has run live video from the hearings on its Web site. News Director Mark Millage said 750 viewers can log on at any one time, and people have complained because the link is maxed out.

 

"It's a soap opera. There's no question about that," Millage said.

 

David J. Law of radio station KWAT in Watertown said his call-in show Thursday drew many comments on the Sutton hearings. And callers seemed to know a lot of details, indicating they are listening live or reading news accounts, he said.

 

In a state with a population of only 750,000 people, the story is a tangled web involving people with political, business and family connections stretching back for decades. The Sutton and Wiese families have been friends for years.

 

Asked why the young man might have made up the allegations, the senator suggested that they might be tied to the page's father, Dennis Wiese, who unsuccessfully sought the Democratic nomination for governor last year.

 

Sutton, also a Democrat, said the elder Wiese might have wanted to get make sure he did not enter the race. Or, he said, the allegations might be connected to a troubled business venture in which a development corporation led by Sutton lent money to the business led by Wiese.

• First Democrats wanted to bring back the military draft. Now one from Ohio wants to draft poll workers for elections.

Fledgling Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner suggested last week that Ohio might try enlisting poll workers like courts enlist jurors. In other words, occasionally working the polls would be a mandatory part of a registered voter's life.

 

Though it may seem radical at first blush, the idea has been brewing since 2005. That's when the Commission of Federal Election Reform, co-chaired by Jimmy Carter and James Baker, issued its report on improving American elections in the wake of the closely divided 2004 presidential election.

 

The former Democratic president and former Republican secretary of state noted some harsh realities that are contributing to the country's poll worker shortage. The average age of poll workers is 72. They are paid minimum wage. They work 15-hour days with little, if any, appreciation ever directed their way.

So "occasionally working the polls would be a mandatory part of a registered voter's life." Yeah, that'll encourage people to register to vote. Then again, more Democrats would probably object to doing this -- this idea might not be so bad after all, but I digress. Here's the best part.

And the job they do, the report noted, requires understanding complex rules, operating increasingly sophisticated technology and doing it all with a sunny disposition "to interact with a diversity of people in a calm and friendly manner."

In addition to increasing the money flowing to poll-worker training and perhaps honoring these civic-minded citizens with a Poll Worker Appreciation Day once in a while, the commission recommended that states consider drafting poll workers as another alternative.

Honestly, I don't know what's dumber: drafting poll workers or having a Poll Worker Appreciation Day. We already have a Poll Worker Appreciation Day every month when Social Security checks get mailed out.

8:45 a.m.

• I just heard on an Atlanta-based RIGHT-WING RADIO station that the Atlanta Hawks just had their first winning month in nearly three years. Damn.