The now infamous Rep. Joe Wilson of South Carolina who shouted “You lie!” at the President while he was giving an address to a joint session of Congress yesterday, was forced to call the White House and apologize.

Left to his own devices, its unclear how long it would have taken for this southern, Confederate flag loving, former aid to late Senator Strom Thurmond, to make the call. But probably sooner than later, considering the $200K Wilson’s 2010 opponent Rob Miller has raised since the outburst last night. A failure to apologize might have been political suicide.

President Obama of course has since graciously accepted the apology.

By the way… it was nice to see the man I voted for last November finally show up in Washington. I hope he sticks around for a while.

Even after the National Organization for Marriage (NOM) poured nearly $90,000 into his campaign, Republican candidate Stephen Burgmeier still managed to lose in a close race to Democrat Curt Hanson in a special election for an Iowa house seat yesterday.

Democratic candidate Curt Hanson, a retired schoolteacher, won against GOP candidate and Jefferson County Supervisor Stephen Burgmeier by 3,932 to 3,825 votes, according to unofficial tallies.

“We predicted it would be a close race and it was,” Hanson said of his 107-vote victory. “I think what surprised me was the total state attention and, perhaps, even national.”

Republicans acknowledge the loss was unsettling, but said the closeness of the race means that their future is bright and that they will gain ground in next year’s House, Senate and gubernatorial races.

Too bad for NOM. Now they have less money to launder up in Maine… The hits just keep on coming.

A new ad called “Together” began airing in Maine today advocating for marriage equality. The ad comes on the eve of a decision that may force marriage equality to a November vote provided enough signatures are gathered in opposition to the law, despite the governor having signed the measure on May 6. The 60 second spot is produced by Equality Maine, GLAD and MCLU.

Marriage equality in Maine is opposed by StandForMarriageMaine, as well as the usual suspects, the National Organization for Marriage and the Catholic Church.

In hardly shocking news, a Daily Kos/Research 2000 poll revealed that Southerners and Republicans buy into the birther nonsense more than anybody else. The poll asked a simple question “Do you believe Barack Obama was born in the United States or not?”

First by region. Note how Southerners are half as likely to believe Barack Obama is a citizen, while at least three times as likely to believe he is a foreigner, or they simply don’t have a clue.

Next by party affiliation. No real surprises here.

It seems that while perceived as a fringe movement from the outside, among Southerners, and by-and-large most Republicans, the birther movement is practically mainstream.

The poll did ask one other interesting question barely covered in the media reports. The question was “Do you believe that Africa and America were once a part of the same continent?” The results are shall we say, interesting…