Andanh.com

Sounds like Texarkana and Fort Smith may have been stages for a new Borat movie.

Beered-up locals who thought they were paying to see a bloody cage match became enraged when male wrestlers began stripping and kissing on each other. Film crews caught the action. Sound like a setup to you?

Sacha Bara Cohen isn't talking.

City Hall has decided that crime and other safety issues company the de facto conversion of motels to extended-stay facilities. City officials tomorrow plan a news conference to publicize an effort to do something about it.

The action is in the form of a pending ordinance, that would limit stays in the motels to 30 consecutive days and 60 days within six months; prohibit coooking in the rooms except where kitchen facilities are provided, and impose other limits. The mayor and others plan a news conference tomorrow morning next to the Plantation Inn, recently closed as a nuisance.

Today's the deadline (at close of business) for ballot petitions. The lottery petitions are already in. The anti-gay group hoping to limit all adoptions had previously said it would submit an amount nominally sufficient (it turned out to be about 65,000, with about 62,000 needed), though the number admittedly included many unacceptable signatures. Sounds like the anti-immigrant group may not make it, even with bogus signatures to give a fig leaf for the  signature-gathering extension allowed by law.

Opponents of the anti-immigration effort say the expected failure of the drive amounts to a showing of the lack of enthusiasm in Arkansas for punitive measures against immigrants. I think it's more likely a showing of the disorganization, and at times, nuttiness, of the leaders of the anti-immigration effort. Whatever. It's a happy day if Arkansas won't have to fight that ugly fight this year.

Speaking of ugly fights: Here's some advice for the good Christian canvassers in the anti-adoption effort. Careful when you sign a document swearing that you witnessed a voter's signature. Words have meaning. Somebody might be checking your work.

UPDATED: It's official, Stephens Media reports. The immigration petition drive has been abandoned. Mexico may now annex Kansas City at its leisure. A drive to gather signatures on a proposal to give sheriffs four-year terms also failed.