Two years ago — back when we still had a show on the TV — we boldly confronted U.S. Rep. Jon Porter about his mysterious connection to actress Scarlett Johansson. That connection? She graced the cover of Esquire magazine, in the very issue it endorsed a bunch of candidates for office. You guessed it: Porter got the New York elite media nod for re-election. Voters agreed, but just barely. Esquire’s influence is apparently not what it used to be.

Well, once again, Esquire has an endorsements issue, and once again, there’s a hot chick on the cover, and once again, the magazine is recommending a vote for Porter. This time, the congressman’s newsstand running mate is Halle Berry, who Esquire proclaims is the sexiest woman alive. And, we must say, the magazine make a fine argument.

For Berry, that is. The Porter endorsement is a little light on details: “This is a race between two very able candidates, Porter, a moderate conservative, and [Dina] Titus, a rising star state senator from Vegas. Representing a politically balanced district in a bad year for Republicans, Porter may well be running his last race. That would be too bad.”

That’s it? That’s all we have to go on? Well, the magazine does have to squeeze in endorsements for hundreds of districts around the country, including Nevada’s 1st (Shelley Berkley) and 2nd (Dean Heller). Of the latter, Esquire says “In the House, he’s broken sharply with his party on stem-cell research. Word is he wants to run for governor.”

Heller has broken sharply all right: He’s broken sharply off the main road of decency up a winding path to a remote cabin where he’s made sweet love to the conservative wing of his party down by the fire! But hey, whatever, Esquire gets Halle Berry to pose for its cover, and all we’ve got is a Tommy Bahama fedora, so who are you going to listen to?

Anyway, Titus shouldn’t be totally sad: We noticed that in Michael Moore’s new book — Mike’s Election Guide — she’s prominently featured as an endorsed candidate. And he didn’t even endorse in every race, the way Esquire did. So, there’s that. Just don’t mention that out in Logandale, senator.

The Clark County Democratic Party led quickly down the same path as the state party and the Barack Obama campaign, in the guise of a news release praising Democratic law-enforcers who raided the offices of the activist group Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN) this week. Here’s the statement:

Democratic Party Applauds Leadership of Democrats Attorney General Catherine Cortez Masto and Secretary of State Ross Miller in Voter Registration Investigation

Las Vegas, Nevada—The Clark County Democratic Party applauds the leadership of Secretary of State Ross Miller and Attorney General Catherine Cortez Masto.  It is clear to all residents of Clark County and the State of Nevada that Miller and Cortez Masto are committed to fair and honest voting practices.  It is under their leadership that the State of Nevada is conducting a thorough investigation of possible fraudulent voter registration.

“As a veteran, and the father of a son who has had three tours of duty in Iraq, I know that there is nothing more fundamental to democracy than our right to vote, and each vote must be counted fairly and accurately,” said Clark County Democratic Chair John A. Hunt.  “Ross Miller and Catherine Cortez Masto are shining examples of why we must elect Democrats to public office in Nevada.”

The Clark County Democratic Party looks forward to the continued leadership of both Ross Miller and Catherine Cortez Masto.  “The Clark County Democratic Party is working hard to ensure that all registered voters have their vote counted and any coordinated effort to suppress the vote is aggressively prosecuted.  We are lucky, as Nevadans to have two such honest, ethical and competent people making sure the process is fair.” said Chairman Hunt.

The Clark County Democratic Party supports every measure to ensure each vote is valid, accurate, and counted.  Nevada Democrats clearly have shown they do not condone any behavior that undermines the legitimacy of the voting process.

It is vital that Nevada continues to elect Democrats and restore America’s faith in our elections.

Republicans from sea to shining sea have been ACORN bashing since the raid, which was conducted to get more information about field organizers who allegedly submitted fradulent voter registration affidavits to the group in order to make daily quotas and get paid.

A couple things:

First, Miller and Cortez Masto should be praised, since they were doing their jobs enforcing the law. And nobody condones voter registration fraud.

But, second, a raid of the organization was not really necessary, given the fact that ACORN brought suspicious registrations to the attention of county and state officials, and complied with requests for information and a subpoena for employee records. We’re pretty sure the group would have given up whatever information the state wanted without protest, and without the need for search warrants. But whatever, we’re not going to judge.

Third, Republicans — and now the Clark County Democratic Party chairman — seem to be under the impression that fake voters were being signed up to vote and could possibly have gone to the polls and swung the election. This is false. There was no way that any of these fake people could have voted, inasmuch as the state has safeguards to prevent that from happening. This is, was and will continue to be an effort by some people to gain money from ACORN but failing to do the honest work required to do it, not an attempt at vote fraud. So the chairman and his family can rest easy.

Now, does ACORN bear responsibility, given the organization hired people including ex-felons to gather voter registration information? Yes. It does. But should ACORN be made a pariah after doing great work in much-neglected parts of the community for years, including registering thousands of legitimate voters? No, it shouldn’t.

You’d think Democrats of all people would recognize that…

Military sources tell CityBlog that the retired pilot who crashed Oct. 5 near Sandy Valley, Nev., was also a former commander at Area 51.

According to military sources, retired Air Force Col. Greg Jaspers, whose kit plane crashed after reportedly experiencing mechanical failures, was an ace test pilot whose most recent military gig was as the so-called wing commander at the Air Force Flight Test Center at Groom Lake, where the military tests secret aircraft and their propulsion and weapons systems.

According to military sources who spoke to CityBlog, Jaspers was the unit’s commander from early 2004 until mid-2006, when he retired from the Air Force. Before that, Jaspers was the Groom Lake operations group commander from early 2002 to mid-2004, where he and his staff personally oversaw all of Area 51’s test flights, a position often reserved for the best pilots. Jaspers was certainly that, according to government records. He held the highest Federal Aviation Administration certification possible and was allowed to pilot and land a variety of aircraft on both land and sea.

In fact, Jaspers was so adept in the air, he had previously commanded the 410th Flight Test Squadron at Edwards Air Force Base, Calif. — another hotbed of test-flight secrets. Military sources tell CityBlog that Jaspers was part of the team that helped usher in the F-117 Nighthawk stealth jet.

A Nellis spokesman would not comment on Jasper’s former duties at Groom Lake, despite their being a matter of public record.