Breaking, official: disgraced Hewlett-Packard CEO/McCain '08 ladypuppet Carly Fiorina is gunning for Barbara Boxer's Senate seat in California.

All she has to do now is secure the Republican nomination, and here's where the story gets symbolic…

Fiorina, considered to be a moderate Republican with little history on social issues, will face off against conservative California Assemblyman Chuck DeVore for the GOP nomination.

The Fiorina-DeVore matchup has all the makings of another Republican battle between the conservative wing of the party and national leaders seeking for the most electable candidate. [...] A string of conservative bloggers have already lined up behind DeVore, and South Carolina Sen. Jim DeMint said Tuesday he was backing the assemblyman.

So which will it be, California Republicans? The ineffective lady whose printers never work or the DeMint-ed DeVore? Only time will tell, but either way, it'll have nothing to do with the shallowness of the GOP's leadership pool and everything to do with Barack Obama's first year in office.

So, it's now looking like Harry Reid and his gang of do-nothing Democrats in the Senate have lost New York City to popular New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg…

With 97 percent of precincts reporting, Mr. Bloomberg was narrowly leading Comptroller William C. Thompson Jr., his Democratic rival, 50.5 percent to 46.1 percent. The mayor was projected to win by a much thinner margin than in 2005 — when he thoroughly trounced Fernando Ferrer — and than many had anticipated.

Whoa! So, not only did Harry Reid lose New York City to the already sitting mayor, but he did it by a much smaller margin than people expected he'd lose it by, which clearly shows Americans' frustration with Democratic legislators insistence on trying to insidiously provide them with moderately more affordable health care.

Look at me! I'm punditing!

David Rees — author of the dearly departed Get Your War On comic — is, I guess, blogging on True/Slant these days. (That's one of those websites that I should go to more, but that I don't, because I so rarely get to read the entire Internet these days.)

Anyway, yesterday he posted 10 Jokes About Joe Lieberman and His Threat to Filibuster Any Health Care Bill Which Includes a Public Option, and — I'm gonna level with you here — you need to read them…

1. Joe Lieberman walks into a bar with a parrot on his shoulder. The bartender turns to him and says, "Sorry, we don’t serve bitter old egomaniacs here. And fuck your stupid parrot."

2. Joe Lieberman walks into a second bar. The second bartender says, "Get out." Joe Lieberman says, "Why? Can't I buy a drink?" The second bartender says, "Don’t you get it? Everybody hates you."

3. Knock, knock!
Who's there?
Joe.
Joe who?
Joe Lieberman.
Get off my doorstep, you asshole.

I heard that second one back in grade school. But the others were new!

Seven more over here.

Hey, far be it from me to come between Joe Lieberman and a guy who wants to call Joe Lieberman a douche nozzle, but this line of argument from HuffPo's Sam Stein seems a tad stupid…

Senator Joseph Lieberman's (I-Conn) threat to filibuster health care legislation that includes a public option for insurance coverage has sent minor shock-waves throughout Washington…

Fifteen years ago, as a freshman Democrat, Lieberman actually worked to have the filibuster killed. He deemed the parliamentary maneuver "a dinosaur" that had become "a symbol of a lot that ails Washington today."

Fifteen years ago, I thought U2 was one of the best bands in music history. Fifteen years ago, I thought modeling my hair off of Robert Smith from The Cure was a really good idea. Fifteen years ago, I thought the cheeseburgers at McDonald's were not all that bad.

People change their minds about things sometimes over the course of a decade and a half. It happens. Calm down.

That said, Joe Lieberman should fall off a cliff and land in the mouth of an exploding shark and then they should both get sucked into a black hole. I'm just sayin'.

As you may or may not know, there's been this federal law on the books for the past two decades which banned HIV victims from international travel for some reason or another. It was written by homophobes back when human adults actually thought the disease was brought about by an ancient desert god who wanted to smite sinners because of who they chose to have sex with; it was passed due to the politics of fear and hate; and it had absolutely no basis in either science or reason.

Oddly enough, it just got repealed…

President Obama called the 22-year ban on travel and immigration by HIV-positive individuals a decision "rooted in fear rather than fact" and announced the end of the rule-making process lifting the ban.

The president signed the Ryan White HIV/AIDS Treatment Extension Act of 2009 at the White House Friday and also spoke of the new rules, which have been under development more more than a year. "We are finishing the job," the president said…

The Senate finally voted to overturn the ban as part of approving legislation reauthorizing funding for the President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief, or PEPFAR, in 2008, and President Bush signed it into law on July 30 of that year. Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.) and then-Sen. Gordon H. Smith (R-Ore.) led the process in the Senate.

Way to go, America! You got one right. I know that even a stopped clock is non-bigoted twice a day, but I don't want to dismiss this thing. This is a really good thing, and we probably all deserve milkshakes today.

But let's be clear here. The repealing of this nonsensical law was a bipartisan effort. But it's Obama's signature at the bottom of the document, and he'll probably get an undue amount of the credit/blame for this. Credit/blame that he doesn't really deserve. Right alongside the undue credit/blame he's gonna get for the gay-friendly hate crime legislation that just passed.

But, you know what Barack Obama can do for real for supporters of no-brainer civil rights, like, this afternoon? He can suspend Don't Ask, Don't Tell in the military with, essentially, a phone call. He can leverage some of his popularity in Maine and Washington to tip the scales in favor of the gay marriage referendums by issuing a simple statement. He can mention that he stands behind Arlen Specter in support of repealing the Orwellianly-titled Defense of Marriage Act.

Or not. He could also not do any of that.

I wonder which option he'll choose. I can't wait to find out!

Here's Sen. Chuck Schumer — who, a couple years ago, opposed gay marriage — last week, speaking reasonably and eloquently* about expanding marriage rights to every American (and he even uses the word "transgender" — scandal!), before the the Empire State Pride Agenda, which, to be fair, is probably not the toughest crowd to deliver that message to.

Even so, I'm happy, in this moment, to have him as my senator…

Here's the money shot…

"If Dick Cheney can support marriage, so can every Senator. So can every Democrat, Republican, Liberal Conservative. Equality should know no bounds, and we must not rest until we have marriage in all fifty of these United States."

Hahaha. Shame sandwich! What kind of bread do you think the President and practically every Democratic congressperson prefers theirs on? I'll bet Obama likes his shame sandwiches made with seven-grain rolls, lightly toasted with dijon mustard and chèvre.

.

^{* He must have gotten some writing help from Roland Burris.}