Shamed by The Ukraine?

Congressional Magazine "The Hill" reports that the Government Accountability Office is about to begin investigating voting irregularities in the 2004 election:

"The Government Accountability Office (GAO) announced yesterday that it plans to investigate alleged voter irregularities during the 2004 election, a response to two separate letters written by a group of Democratic lawmakers, including Reps. John Conyers (Mich.), Jerrold Nadler (N.Y.), Robert Wexler (Fla.), Robert Scott (Va.) and Rush Holt (N.J.).
The lawmakers released a statement yesterday: “On its own authority, the GAO will examine the security and accuracy of voting technologies, distribution and allocation of voting machines, and counting of provisional ballots.”

But control yourself. This isn't a seditious attempt to upset the apple cart:

"A spokesperson for Conyers said the intent of requesting the investigation was not to overturn election results but to improve the overall mechanics of the voting process. "

Better than nothing, though.

Elsewhere in the same mag, I found this nugget, thanks to Josh Marshall:

"Deep in the transportation section of this year’s omnibus spending bill, Rep. Ernest Istook (R-Okla.) dispensed a little appropriator’s justice, punishing 21 Republicans who wrote him a letter in support of $1.8 billion for Amtrak.

Istook, chairman of the Subcommittee on Transportation, Treasury and Independent Agencies, drastically reduced, or entirely excised, the transportation earmarks that those lawmakers were expecting to receive, making good on a little-noticed threat he issued in a letter last February."

The four PA lawmakers identified as being on the receiving end of this snotty little vendetta, whic promises only to hurt the people and businesses who need Amtrak, are Mainliner Curt Weldon, Jim Gerlach, Melissa Hart, and Phil English.

A nest of squirming, gutless wonders. all of them.