Gage Skidmore/Flickr

Arizona Republican Party Chair Tom Morrissey

I'd really hoped we were past this.

You might think that President Obama's comfortable reelection last month would put an end to the Republican birther conspiracy. But if you do, you don't know Arizona Republicans.

The latest battle for the movement that believes Barack Obama is ineligible to be President was fought Monday at the state's Electoral College vote, where a trio of Republican electors -- including state GOP chair Tom Morrissey -- once again raised concerns that Obama's birth certificate is a fake during the electoral college vote.

They were rebuffed by other Republicans in the room, including Gov. Jan Brewer. National Republicans have also distanced themselves from the birther movement. But in Arizona, the birthers aren't going quietly, even if they do recognize that they are going.

Arizona Secretary of State Ken Bennett (R) flirted with the birther conspiracy theory in May before backing off, but it appears some of his GOP colleagues in the state just can't let go.

But it's the larger context that's worth keeping in mind: a few too many conservatives are just as uncomfortable with reality now as they were before the election, and the election was supposed to be their wake-up call.

Polls tell you what you don't want to hear? Assume there's a polling conspiracy! Economic data runs counter to your expectations? Assume there's a conspiracy there, too! Election results leave you feeling discouraged? Guess what: more conspiracies!

In Arizona, there are conservative activists still running around complaining about the president's long-form birth certificate, for crying out loud.

As I argued a month ago, if 2012 taught the right anything, there should have been one overarching lesson: if you perceive reality as the enemy, you're doing it wrong.

(Image: Gage Skidmore/Flickr)

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Can Arizona Governor Jan Brewer (R) for re-election? It's a straightforward question with a seemingly obvious answer, but a controversy is unfolding nevertheless.

The 68-year-old Republican is weighing a bid for four more years in office even though a voter-approved 1992 constitutional amendment limits the state's top officials to two consecutive terms, including "any part" of one served. Brewer was elected in 2010 after completing the remaining two years of Democrat Janet Napolitano's term.

"I haven't ruled anything out," Brewer said yesterday after a ceremonial bill-signing in Peoria, Arizona, a suburb of Phoenix.

At least in theory, the decision isn't entirely hers to make -- the law limits governors to two terms, including "any part" of one term. Brewer became governor in early 2009, succeeding Janet Napolitano, and serving the final two years of Napolitano's term. Then Brewer won a full term of her own. One and one is two, and the law doesn't seem to leave a lot of wiggle room.

"The constitution is quite clear," Paul Bender, Arizona State University law professor told Bloomberg Businessweek. "She cannot run again, and I don't think there is any real significant doubt about it."

And yet, Brewer hasn't "ruled anything out," and her lawyer, Joe Kanefield, insists there are subtle ambiguities in the law that offers her the opportunity to run for a third term.

"It comes down to, what does a term mean?" Kanefield said.

If Brewer decides to test the law, the matter will almost certainly end up before the Arizona Supreme Court. The governor will not enjoy the support of Arizona Secretary of State Ken Bennett, the state's second-highest ranking Republican, who wants Brewer's job, and insists the governor is no longer eligible to run for re-election.

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Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer hosted a meeting of the Western Governors Association over the weekend, where she was scheduled to deliver a speech on energy policy. Beforehand, the governor chatted with local TV station KTVK, which asked whether Brewer believes in climate change.

"Everybody has an opinion on it, you know, and I, you know, I probably don't believe that it's man made," she said. "I believe that, you know, that weather elements are controlled maybe by different things."

Once the interview was over, Brewer asked the local reporter, "Where in the hell did that come from?"

Of course. Because nothing's more outlandish than asking a governor about climate change before a speech on energy policy.

And how did the speech go? Not well.

Although she was introduced as a political rock star Saturday, Gov. Jan Brewer wasn't a very big draw.

The Western Governors' Association held its annual winter meeting in Paradise Valley. But of the 19 governors in the group, only two showed up to see Brewer deliver a brief keynote speech. [...]

Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper (D) and Utah Gov. Gary Herbert (R) were the two governors who attended the meeting. They are the current vice chairman and chairman of the organization.

Brewer spoke for a grand total of three minutes before leaving the stage.

Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio is the law in Phoenix, Arizona. "America's Sheriff," as some call him, built his reputation on immigration sweeps and on housing inmates under the desert sun in tents, making them wear pink underwear and serving them green bologna. Over at the hometown Arizona Republic, Laurie Roberts tracks his declining margins of victory, starting with his second term in 2000 (66 percent), then in 2004 (57 percent), followed by 2008 (55 percent). Facing an energized, outraged and growing Latino electorate, Arpaio just won a seventh term, with a margin of 50.7 percent.

 Roberts' interview with Arpaio is amazing in its own right. "I can get along great with the Hispanics," he tells her. "In fact, I sure would like to meet them, even the politicians, maybe in the back room or whatever, have a couple of beers and try to explain. But they need to understand that I enforce the laws. I want to listen to them and hear their problems. I want them to tell me what their problems are. Maybe we can come up with a solution."

So there's that. Earlier this month the Tea Party News Network posted an interview with Arpaio, in which the guy with a winning margin of 50.7 percent suggested the national Republicans take their cues from him.

TPNN Reporter: After this last election, all we’re hearing right now is from the Republican Party that, you know, maybe we need to actually cater to the immigrant population, maybe we need to find a pathway to citizenship, that we don’t have an immigration problem in this country. Is that true?

Sheriff Arpaio: Well, you know it’s not true, and I’m sure they know it isn't, but you know, if they’re worried about the Hispanic vote, why don’t they use me? The president has used me as a poster boy. But let me put it this way, we have 33, 35 percent Latinos in this county. I took 'em on. I got elected again. So don’t tell me that you can't get elected without the Latino vote.

You can make your own joke about Karl Rove calling Arpaio now for advice, or maybe fiddling while Rome burns, or whatever works.

The good people of Arizona have finally finished counting the votes from that big election a couple weeks ago. Republican Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio still won, and so did Republican Jeff Flake in his bid for Senate.

Meanwhile, Arizona Secretary of State Ken Bennett, also a Republican, has pitched an idea for making voting easier in his state. As the Arizona Star reports, Bennett would like to see "voting centers" where anyone could cast a ballot, regardless of their home precinct.

In essence, each polling place would have electronic access to a list of every registered voter in the county, complete with an image of that person's signature.

Someone who shows up would be identified by voting precinct. And the poll workers, using printers linked to computers, could then print out a ballot specific to that person, including the right legislative districts, county supervisors and school board members and bond votes.

What that means, Bennett said, is the ballot can be not only verified on site but also put into the machine that, properly programmed, will tabulate the vote. That would apply both to regular and early ballots.

The system is already working in a couple of Arizona counties. The big challenge seems to be with printing the ballots -- if the printers break down, for instance, the voting center needs to have a ready supply of each precinct's ballot. Also, Florida learned the hard way about the perils of printing ballots voter-by-voter. That doesn't mean Arizona couldn't do it, or that Florida couldn't improve on its performance.

It's mostly just a gleam in the Arizona Secretary of State's database, but a new group called Arizona Advocates for Marriage Equality has formed to pursue same-sex marriage in that red state. The founder, Tanner Pritts, 22, tells us the idea is to get a referendum on the ballot in 2014:

We cherish and value every facet of love and are discouraged by the fact that Arizona government is turning their backs on not just same-sex couples, but love itself. My team and I are working around the clock to spread the message about equality. We have contacted local newspapers and news stations, colleges and universities such as Arizona State and University of Arizona, and even LGBT organizations such as Sedona Pride and Phoenix Pride. I have recently conducted interviews with reporters from the Associated Press and Capitol Media Services. We understand that we face an uphill battle in the fight for equality here in Arizona, but you will not find any other individuals who are more dedicated and passionate about this issue than me and my team. 

Pritts might have the numbers on his side. In May, Public Policy Polling found that 77 percent of Arizonans support either marriage or civil unions, including 63 percent of Republicans and 79 percent of Hispanics.

After Maine, Maryland and Washington passed ballot measures for marriage equality this month, activists have said they're looking at Delaware, New Jersey, Rhode Island, Illinois, Minnesota, Oregon and Hawaii. Those are all blue states. So far as I know, Arizona Advocates for Marriage Equality would be the first new effort in a red state. They'll need a quarter-million signatures.

You could say Tanner Pritts is a blue dot in a red sea, but not the reddest. Arizona is sending five Democrats to Congress, out of a nine-member delegation, and in 2006, the state narrowly defeated an anti-gay amendment. The state later banned same-sex marriage with an amendment in 2010. 

With its half a million still-uncounted ballots, Arizona is the surprising new Florida of elections this year.

The story starts months ago, when a dedicated group of high school students ran a quite successful drive to register new voters. That group, Adios Arpaio, wants people to vote out the anti-immigrant sheriff of Maricopa County, Joe Arpaio. 

Adios Arpaio registered more than 30,000 new voters, and many of them experienced some kind of hitch at the polls. Now Adios Arpaio is in a desperate scramble to reach the 115,000 Maricopa voters who were forced into voting a provisional ballot. Those voters must go back to the county elections office by the Wednesday deadline to prove they voted properly, or else their votes will be thrown out. At least, as you can see above, the folks at Adios Arpaio have kept their sense of humor. More on their very serious story tonight.

Associated Press

For all the mockery Florida has received for its difficulties in counting votes, it's not the only state that has run into trouble in 2012. As of the weekend, by some counts, roughly 30% of the Arizona's 1.8 million were still outstanding, including over 300,000 votes in Maricopa County, which is home to Phoenix.

Given such a large number of uncounted votes, some of the closer statewide contests in Arizona could, in theory, still see significant shifts. One of those races, in turns out, is the U.S. Senate race.

The Arizona Senate race has already been called by networks for Republican Jeff Flake, but with many votes still to be counted, Democrat Richard Carmona isn't ready to give up yet.

"We're watching it very closely, and we're going to make sure every vote is counted," Carmona's spokesman Andy Barr told TPM on Monday.

He said the campaign has not ruled out taking action if the race tightens.

Based on the information currently available, Carmona trailed by about four percentage points, and after the race was called by news organizations, the former surgeon general conceded the race.

But the circumstances have changed. Carmona trails in the latest tally by about 79,000 votes, and with roughly a half-million votes uncounted, that margin no longer appears insurmountable.

Democrats shouldn't get their hopes up -- Maricopa County is not a heavily Democratic area -- but the vote tally going forward is well worth watching.

If you're not in Arizona, you could easily miss the story of what's happening there this week: More than 630,00 votes left to count after Tuesday's election, more than 172,000 of them provisional ballots, and many of those believed to have been cast by newly registered Latino voters who experienced some kind of hitch at the polls. Voters who used a provisional ballot face a deadline of Wednesday to return to their county elections offices and present ID that shows they voted rightfully.

Enough votes remain uncounted to swing several races in Arizona, including three for Congress and some where candidates have conceded or declared victory. At the far end of the spectrum, Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio's apparent re-election falls within the range of votes still not counted. Much closer is the race for Congresswoman Gabby Giffords old seat, now divided by a few hundred votes.

Instagrammed by @VotoLatino.

As of Friday afternoon, Arizona has gotten the pile of ballots down to 524,633, including the 172,196 provisional ballots. Activists in Greater Phoenix, in Maricopa County, have been protesting at the county elections bureau. They say they will stay there until the counting is done. While they wait for the world to find their story, they're telling it themselves. I've included a video, above, from a Youtube account known as PresentePac (associated with these folks?) and another, after the jump, from Chandra Narcia at the protests.

Posted by Presente.org.

@Presente and @VotoLatino are tweeting the story. Active hashtags for it seem to be #Maricopa, #Marico, #CountMyVote and #CountEveryVote. The Arizona Secretary of State's office has been posting updates on the counting in the late afternoons.

@KellenWilson tweeted this yesterday from a candlelight vigil at the Maricopa County clerk's office.

Tweeted yesterday by @KellenWilson at the Maricopa County clerk's office.

Last week in Tucson, sent by Susan Delaney. (Our sending machine.)

Christine Kaercher sends this pic of her friend's car in Phoenix. (Our sending machine.)

Arizonans who went to their local municipal offices in Maricopa County to pick up their voter ID cards may have been instructed to go to the polls on the wrong date -- but only if they were looking for the information in Spanish.

The wrong date was printed on a document that contains the new voter ID card. The document lists the general election date as November 6 in English but reads "8 de Noviembre" in the Spanish translation.

A spokesperson told local station ABC 15 that they estimated fewer than 50 people got documents with the wrong date, based on the number of people who picked up their cards in-person in "previous years," though they did not say whether those were election years.