Oops! This one's gonna be a favorite of MSNBC for a while...

Iowa congressional candidate Pat Betroche kinda stepped in it while discussing immigration issues earlier this week. Tougher border security can certainly play well at a Republican forum, but when you compare illegal immigrants to dogs and suggest putting microchips in them, you may not come across all that well.

Update: Betroche told the Ticket that he does not support embedding microchips in humans and, due to time constraints, was unable to explain that he was merely offering a "critical social commentary on how inane and radical the discussion has become regarding the immigration issue." His full statement is at the bottom of the post. 

While speaking at the GOP gathering on Monday, Betroche, a doctor, said his prescription for fixing the illegal immigrant problem in the U.S. is simple:  “I think we should catch ’em, we should document ’em, make sure we know where they are and where they are going. I actually support microchipping them. I can microchip my dog so I can find it. Why can’t I microchip an illegal?"

Give it to Betroche, however. His astute political radar was going off even while saying it. “That’s not a popular thing to say, but it’s a lot cheaper than building a fence they can tunnel under,” he said.

Dadgummit! Turns out he was right. His comments are unpopular -- and viral. And just like the cartoonist who backed away from her Everybody Draw Muhammad Day idea once it became controversial, he's doing the same thing.

Turns out he didn't mean to say he "actually supports microchipping them."  In fact, what he meant to say, apparently, was actually just the opposite, and he doesn't know how that dog comparison happened.

"I don't support microchipping anybody, and it also didn't occur to me I was comparing dogs to illegal immigrants," he said in an interview Tuesday.

So why'd he say it?  He was trying to "illustrate a social commentary on how radical" the issue has become.

And good news for amnesty supporters: He's softened up a bit. In the same interview, he acknowledged that "shooting them at the border is radical" too.

Full statement by Betroche:  First, I want to say that I was quoted accurately in The Gazette Online.  However, due to time and not withing to be rude, I was not able to complete my statement, which would have made it clear it was a critical social commentary on how inane and radical the discussion has become regarding the immigration issue.  Ideas ranging from fences to shooting everyone as they cross the border have been proposed.  The Soviets, Chinese, and Nazis all built walls to try to control the flow of the population.  They all failed.  Right now, the Mexicans simply dig underneath our walls and fences.  In fact, one rancher in Arizona put a gate into the fence with signs pointing the way so he wouldn't have to repair it so often.

 In India and Africa, they brand and mark the undesirables.  That approach does not work either.  Amnesty has already been tried by Pres. Reagan, and that has failed.

In India, they have a caste of people called the Untouchables.  We are creating the same kind of caste here with illegal immigrants.  At what point do we stop with the political ideologies, and start discussing common sense solutions?  How many more boxcars full of dead immigrants do we need before we start addressing, in realistic terms, this tsunami of human slavery?  How many more torn and broken families do we need before we agree to address, in practical terms, the magnitude of human misery created by illegal immigration?

I do not support micro-chipping humans.  And I did not mean to compare illegal immigrants to dogs.  I am listening to people's ideas on this issue.  I have a internet radio show every Friday from 2-4pm, “The Reasonable Republican”, on www.desmoinesamplified.com, where we discuss timely issues.

-- Jimmy Orr

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Photo: A microchip. Credit: Reuters

Sue Lowden has a problem: Chickens are really funny.

Lowden, the GOP front-runner to take on vulnerable Democratic Sen. Harry Reid, has all the makings of a majority leader-toppler.

A casino executive, she can tout herself as a job creator during a devastating recession. She’s also got the looks and smooth delivery of a former beauty queen – Miss New Jersey 1973! – and Las Vegas TV anchorwoman.

Picture her next to the soft-spoken and charisma-deprived Reid and the Sarah Palin comparisons are inevitable. (For more evidence, check out this exhaustive Las Vegas Sun profile.)

But Lowden can’t go anywhere these days without someone squawking about chickens. After....

The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee is doing everything it can to defeat certain targeted Republicans around the country. All part of the perpetual PR combat between parties.

One of those targeted Republicans is Dana Rohrabacher, a former speechwriter for President Reagan and an 11-term Republican who represents California's 46th Congressional District, basically built around Long Beach-Huntington Beach and nearby areas.

Need any proof of Washington's basic cluelessness these days? The D.C.-based Democratic committee apparently needs help figuring out exactly who or what it is really after.

Today it put out a news release headlined:

Not an April Fools’ Day Joke: Representative Dana Rohrabacher Caught Trying to Take Credit for Jobs She Voted Against

Too bad the release wasn't an April Fool's Day joke. It would have made sense then. Because Dana Rohrabacher is a guy.

Maybe you think it was just a simple typo? Here's a quote from the release:

Representative Dana Rohrabacher is still trying to have it both ways by trying to take credit for President Obama’s economic recovery policies that she voted against but even on April Fools’ Day, voters will see what a joke her hypocrisy is.

Or what shoot-at-anything-that-moves is anyway.

-- Andrew Malcolm

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Now that the Obama administration's Justice Department appears ready to deny the publicity-seeking self-proclaimed 9/11 mastermind, his alleged cohorts and their defense attorneys the brightly-lit global stage of Broadway and the Big Apple for the trials, the debate begins over where best to hold them.

Chicago's South Side Hyde Park doesn't seem to be on the list of possibles. Nor Eric Holder's neighborhood.

Gee, if only the United States had a secure military-type prison 90 miles offshore where it could not only safely house these accused possessed evildoers but try them as well.

Now comes a new Rasmussen Reports poll that could make President Obama hit his forehead with the palm of his hand: Why didn't we think of this?

Rasmussen found 44% of U.S. voters suggesting the trials of Guantanamo Bay prisoners be held in a place called Guantanamo Bay, which is 90 miles offshore on the island called Cuba.

Thirty-three percent don't like that idea, but weren't volunteering their town. And 23% couldn't decide.

Nineteen months ago, 54% of Americans thought these foreign guys should be tried by military tribunals on account of their allegedly being involved in a military conflict against the United States and its people.

As a result, the Obama administration decided to try them instead in civil courts as if the accused were American citizens full of rights. This decision can't be changed because Holder's Justice Department already dropped the military charges before placing the civil ones.

So now today, more than two-thirds of Americans (67%) think military tribunals are or would have been the route to go.

There's another homemade Obama catch. During the 2008 presidential campaign, as part of his change platform, the ex-community organizer promised to close the Guantanamo Bay detention facility because it had a bad reputation. As opposed to, say, any other prison on the planet, which typically are so well-thought-of that the facilities must have barbed wire all around to keep people from breaking in.

Guantanamo was especially ill-thought of among millions of people overseas who can't vote in the U.S.

In fact, despite warnings that it was more difficult than it seemed from Springfield, on his second day in office before he'd even found all the White House bathrooms, Obama signed a real Executive Order ordering the Guantanamo prison closed by the end of 2009.

He couldn't follow his own Executive Order. Missed the deadline. Completely blew it.

In fact, it was more difficult than it seemed from Springfield, or anywhere else for that matter. Turns out, few of the other countries that were so eager to have Guantanamo closed were so eager to imprison its inhabitants on their soil. And it also turns out that, if released, about 1 in 5 of these guys went right back into combat against American and allied troops, which is a dangerous thing.

So despite the promises and the Executive Order, in fact, there's still no new or maybe firm date for closing the Guantanamo Bay detention facility. Although, by golly, it will be closed. Believe in it.

In the meantime, however, the secure facility is still there. Still secure. So are the prisoners. And the best part is, Guantanamo has no member of Congress to get his/her behind shot off by angry voters in this fall's midterm elections. As The Ticket pointed out here could happen in Illinois Tuesday.

-- Andrew Malcolm

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Photo: Joe Skipper / Reuters (Guantanamo); White House (file).

Even before the polls close, political insiders are debating the outcome.

If Democratic Atty. Gen. Martha Coakley loses the Senate seat held by the liberal icon Ted Kennedy for 48 years, look for the blame game to get even louder. Many are blaming Coakley.

In a state where Democrats outnumber Republicans by a wide margin, Coakley assumed her victory in the Democratic primary was a coronation. So she took a little break during the holidays, dismissing Republican state legislator Scott Brown as an irrelevant irritant.

“Going dark was not a great idea,” said Massachusetts Democrat Richard Neal.

As his campaign against ObamaCare gained traction with independents and Tea Party activists -- Boston, after all, was the site of the original tea party 235 years ago -- Coakley was forced to debate Brown. By all accounts, he won. Take a look on this video.

Others blame the White House for not spotting Brown's surge in time to stop it. And White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel reportedly blames the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee and Democratic pollster Celinda Lake for failing to raise red flags about Brown's Big Mo.

“With the legislative and political stakes so high, it’s unbelievable that the Senate committee and White House let this race get so out of hand,” one senior Washington Democrat told Politico. “There’s a lot of blame to go around. Martha Coakley is only one of the problems here.”

Others sharing the blame include Gov. Deval Patrick, whose approval rating with state voters has slipped to 41%, and President Obama and a Democratic-controlled Congress for running up big deficits while job losses continue.

Coakley made a lot of mistakes. She said the Taliban were gone from Afghanistan. She said Curt Schilling, a hero to the Red Sox Nation, was a Yankee fan.

But the defining moment of the campaign may have come when Coakley was asked why she was not spending more time with voters. Noting that Brown stood outside Fenway Park greeting hockey fans who attended a special outdoor game between the Boston Bruins and the Philadelphia Flyers, Coakley said, “ As opposed to standing outside Fenway Park? In the cold? Shaking hands?”

In politics they call that tone deaf.

-- Johanna Neuman

Photo Credit: Associated Press

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The last time Massachusetts elected a Republican to a major statewide office was 2002, when an investment banker named Mitt Romney captured the statehouse. But now, on the eve of a potential upset by another Republican of the Senate seat held by the iconic liberal Ted Kennedy for 48 years, Romney is nowhere to be found.

There's a lot fueling the stunning prospect that Democratic Atty. Gen. Martha Coakley could lose to a little-known state senator from Wrentham named Scott Brown.

Tea Party activists, angry at ObamaCare and federal spending run amok -- are flooding the Bay State with money and ground troops. Check out RedInvadesBlue.com for details.

And Coakley has proved herself a tone-deaf candidate. She offended the entire Red Sox Nation by calling Curt Schilling a Yankees fan and scoffed at Brown for wanting to bring back the Bush-Cheney tax cuts. As a result, despite a last-minute personal appearance by President Obama, some are now calling Brown "The Great Right Hope."

But for all the attention focused on Massachusetts in the run-up to Tuesday's election, Romney is conspicuously absent. And as Politico pointed out, his MIA status could say a lot about his presidential aspirations.

“Mitt Romney is an unpopular former governor," said Jeffrey Berry, a Tufts University political scientist. "He hasn’t really been a part of Massachusetts political culture since he left office. I think people thought he ran for office merely to run for president.”

Early on, Romney hosted several fundraisers for Brown and sent an e-mail appeal for supporters to make calls. But lately, as Republican boldface names like former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani and former Gov. William Weld have stumped for Brown, Romney has been on the sidelines.

Still, he has a prediction.  "Massachusetts is not as monolithic as people think," he said recently, noting the state voted for Ronald Reagan -- twice.

-- Johanna Neuman

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It only sounds like a “Saturday Night Live” skit.

The group “African Americans for Senator Harry Reid” had already scheduled its kickoff luncheon for Thursday when news broke of Reid's racially insensitive comments regarding President Obama.

Now the luncheon, hosted by veteran Democratic strategist Donna Brazile, is in the spotlight as the Nevada senator tries to repair his relationship with a Democratic base he needs for a tough reelection fight.

Look for more tomorrow on the Ticket. In the meantime, here’s some intentional comedy on the Reid contretemps.

-- Ashley Powers

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Photo: Getty Images.

We take a break from our regularly scheduled U.S. politics to bring you this (not) very important bulletin:

A Canadian lawmaker insulted a rival member of the Parliament on Twitter -- while the fellow was sitting at the same table.

"Del Mastro should grow up (not out)," wrote Michelle Simson, a Liberal legislator, on her Twitter profile, which has 484 followers.

Mastro, a Conservative who Reuters describes as "not slim," apparently saw the message during the meeting.

Because, well, you know, anyone in the world can see Twitter (except maybe China and North Korea), including colleagues sitting at the very same table.

Reuters writes:

[Mastro] stood up in the House of Commons in front of hundreds of legislators to demand Simson say she was sorry.

"I apologize that I'm not perfect and perhaps my stature doesn't meet the criteria that some members of the House might set but I have actually battled that problem since birth," he said.

Simson then apologized publicly, saying she had been wrong.

Maybe Simson will get a boost in Twitter followers from this Canadian kerfuffle. She's actually pretty funny and makes occasional references to "The Simpsons" (not kidding).

We wish the senators and representatives in our Congress would take a page from Simson's book and drop more off-the-cuff nuggets onto their Twitter feeds. U.S. politicians -- active ones, not Sarah Palin, who prefers Facebook -- are just so boring.

-- Mark Milian

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Photo credits: House of Commons

 

Every election cycle in the Silver State, some public figure makes the same blunder. They – or one of their surrogates – mispronounce the state’s name.

Here, it’s Nuh-VAD-uh.

Not Nuh-VAHD-uh.

Nuh-VAD-uhns are sensitive to this. We’re not sure why. More than two-thirds of residents were born outside the state and a number of them swear they’re only staying for a year (and then never leave). But President Bush and Sen. John Kerry both caught flack for not realizing that the second syllable rhymes with “dad.” Same with TV newsmen George Stephanopoulos and Brian Williams.

State Democrats, in the run-up to the 2008 presidential caucus, apparently sent all their candidates a welcome guide that included the correct pronunciation: Nuh-VAD-uh. And yet, this cycle’s campaign ads are already mangling the state’s name, which is Spanish for "snow-capped." (In Spanish, it would be pronounced Neh-VAH-dah.)

This summer, the National Education Assn. ran radio ads cheering Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, whose poll numbers could use a little pep as he seeks reelection in 2010. But the spot’s narrator repeatedly butchered Nuh-VAD-uh.

This week, Danny Tarkanian, one of the gaggle of Republicans who hope to unseat Reid, released a Web ad mocking how federal stimulus dollars were reported as going to congressional districts that didn't exist.  But the narration pronounced the state as Nuh-VAHD-uh.

One wonders how this might play out in Mi-ZOOR-ee, a.k.a. Mi-ZOOR-ah. Incidentally, in the western part of the Show Me State, there's a town called Nevada. But there it’s pronounced Nuh-VADE-uh.

-- Ashley Powers

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Top photo: Bloomberg. Bottom photo: Associated Press.

We salute Slate and the New Republic, whose quick-thinking staffers decided to produce an index for Sarah Palin’s bestselling book, “Going Rogue: An American Life.”  Some had speculated that Palin decided not to put an index in the back of her book to thwart the traditional "Washington read," which involves standing in a bookstore searching the index of a newly published tome for your name or the names of friends, enemies and/or frenemies.
   After reading the independent indices, we conclude that authors and publishers must be careful what they stint on. An independent index, it turns out, is more than a simple alphabetical listing of content. It’s a powerful analytical tool, as you will see from our excerpts of both versions:

Baby shower at shooting range 76
Bridge to Nowhere 237
“Captive” of McCain campaign 261
Caribou lasagna 218
“Change,” on originating campaign slogan before Obama 114, 225
Clinton, Hillary, Palin’s non-accusations about whining of 287
Couric, Katie Lack of knowledge about energy issues 207, 273; Low self-esteem of 256; As “lowest rated news anchor in network television 270; Unfair editing of interview with 272-275, 279; Lack of national pride 279

Meg Whitman is still fending off questions about her spotty voting record.

Whitman, you may recall, is the former eBay CEO who spent most of her adult life not registered to vote. She also is hoping to become the GOP candidate for governor in California. Presumably, this would be accomplished through a decidedly un-high-tech fashion — people (or to be precise, registered voters) going to the polls or filling out absentee ballots and popping them in the mail.

As our friends over at the political blog The Swamp report, Whitman had to answer more questions about voting this morning on the Fox Business Network. "I’ve been very straight-up that my voting record isn’t perfect,” Whitman told Neil Cavuto. "I did not consistently vote. Like many Americans, I’ve missed too many elections ... ” Here's the full report.

So how will California voters react? Two letters to the editor in the Opinion section of today’s Times offer instructive examples.

Audrey Wicks of Irvine says Whitman has the abilities to be a great governor and doesn’t mind that Whitman had not registered until a few years back.

“She was very busy not only running a large company but furthering it, making it a big success,” Wicks writes. “She puts all of her energies into the job for which she’s responsible. This is to her credit. There are too many people who vote because they think it’s the American way. There are too many people who do not study the issues and merely vote without thought on the issues. This is one of the factors that has our state in such a detrimental status.”

Vincent J. Carollo of Upland takes a decidely different view and Whitman has to hope he's in the minority:

“I have two signs for the campaign trail: ‘Sorry Meg, I will be too busy to register and vote for you.’ And: ‘Meg, ever heard of the absentee ballot?’ ”

Meanwhile, the Whitman campaign announced today that she has won the endorsement of former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani. In a statement the campaign says she’s already been endorsed by former California Gov. Pete Wilson, former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney and Arizona Sen. John McCain. No word yet on whether Whitman will be tapped for any GOP get-out-the-vote efforts.

 -- Steve Padilla

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Photo: Meg Whitman speaks at the California Republican Convention in Indian Wells in September. Credit: Associated Press

(UPDATE: An update on Biden's schedule has been added to the end of this item.)

Vice President Joe Biden did not need Air Force Two Thursday night to travel across the Potomac River to McLean, Va., to the home of former Democratic Virginia Gov. and Sen. Chuck Robb.

It was, of course, a fundraiser, designed to help finance three freshman Democratic House candidates -- Glenn Nye, Gerry Connolly and Tom Perriello -- in their challenging reelection races 13 months from now in what once was a predictably GOP state.

Robb himself did not speak at the event. His wife, Lynda, daughter of President Lyndon B. Johnson, introduced the trio of representatives.

But it looks like Joltin' Joe stepped in something again, rhetorically speaking.

About 100 supporters had paid $1,000 each to gather in the open-air pool house where Biden spoke. 

"I don’t have to tell you that you’re in a very competitive state,” the vice president said, according to the press pool notes. “You got some tough votes coming up.”

Biden called the three men “independent minded” and “damn competent,” adding, however, that they were all united on core Democratic Party themes, including energy policy and healthcare. 

“These guys are smart, "Biden asserted. "Some of the guys Chuck [Robb] and I have campaigned for are turkeys. Not all Democrats are created equal, while most Republicans are.”

The voluble Biden has a reputation for sometimes getting carried away in remarks, as refreshingly candid though they may be to some non-administration ears. Last fall at one gathering, a shirt-sleeved Biden paced the stage with a microphone and said Hillary Clinton would have been a better running-mate choice for Barack Obama to make, a gaffe that prompted the campaign to end most of Biden's media interviews then and there.

GOP candidates may also have some fun in coming months speculating to partisan crowds which Democrats the vice president had in mind as small-minded birds.

Biden became a U.S. senator way back when the 48-year-old Obama was a sixth-grader. And ran for the presidency himself twice. So he's campaigned with and for many Democratic politicians over all these years.

Perhaps understandably, on Thursday night the vice president did not proceed to list which fellow Democrats that he's campaigned who are the turkeys and which are the smart ones. And presumably Biden did not intend to imply that most Republicans are smart.

But he might be asked about all that in coming days by the media -- or even White House folks. And many fans of politics may be trying to guess which Democrats Biden had in mind when he likened them to those tasty but dim birds.

Obama was in Pittsburgh overnight as host for the G-20 summit and protests. He'll return to the White House this evening.

Biden is off to Georgia (the American one) this morning to briefly watch floodwaters. He'll return to Washington in the afternoon for what has become one of his frequent duties, swearing someone in. Before heading for Delaware, Biden will administer the oath to Paul Kirk. He's the senate replacement for the late Ted Kennedy. Kirk was just named to that spot Thursday morning by Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick.

(UPDATE: 4:44 p.m. The vice president's weekend schedule has just been released. Here it is: "Vice President Biden will be in Wilmington, Delaware on Saturday and Sunday. There are no public events scheduled.")

-- Andrew Malcolm

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Photo: Getty Images