But... But... But... ACORN!!! Joe the Plumber!!! Aiiieeee!!!

While I was eating my lunch and browsing the paper (and after finding a cool story regarding some pre-war bassoons that fit in perfectly with MB's "Wolf" post), I came across these two delightful little tales.

1. McCain Campaign Paid GOP Operative Accused of Voter Fraud:

John McCain paid $175,000 of campaign money to a Republican operative accused of massive voter registration fraud in several states, it has emerged.

As the McCain camp attempts to tie Barack Obama to claims of registration irregularities by the activist group ACORN, campaign finance records detailing the payment to the firm of Nathan Sproul, investigated several times for fraud, threatens to derail that argument.

The documents show that a joint committee of the McCain-Palin campaign, the Republican National Committee and the California Republican Party, made the payment to Lincoln Strategy, of which Mr Sproul is the managing partner, for the purposes of "voter registration".

Mr Sproul has been investigated on numerous occasions for preventing Democrats from voting, destroying registration forms and leading efforts to get Ralph Nader on ballots to leach the Democratic vote.

The Shell Game continues. Pay no attention to that changed vote behind the curtain. Meanwhile, back at the ranch in Alaska:

2. Alaska Paid for Palin Daughters to Travel:

ANCHORAGE - Governor Sarah Palin charged the state for her children to travel with her, including to events where they were not invited, and she later amended expense reports to specify that they were on official business.

The charges included costs for hotel and commercial flights for three daughters to join Palin to watch their father in a snowmobile race, and a trip to New York, where the governor attended a five-hour conference and stayed with 17-year-old daughter Bristol for five days and four nights in a luxury hotel.

In all, Palin has charged the state $21,012 for her three daughters' 64 one-way and 12 round-trip commercial flights since she took office in December 2006. In some other cases, she has charged the state for hotel rooms for the girls.

And here's my favorite part:

Palin justified having the state pay for the travel of her daughters - Bristol, 14-year-old Willow, and 7-year-old Piper - by noting on travel forms that the girls had been invited to attend or participate in events on the governor's schedule. After she was picked by John McCain as his running mate and reporters asked for the records, Palin ordered changes to previously filed expense reports. In the amended reports, Palin added phrases such as "First Family attending" and "First Family invited" to explain the girls' attendance.

Awesome. Palin can do the Shell Game too! That's some G to the O to the P going on right there, my friends.