We don’t get involved in governor’s races. That’s the Democratic Governors Association’s responsibility, while we focus exclusively on electing Democratic state legislators.

But one Democratic gubernatorial candidate is making his state’s Republican-controlled legislature an issue in his campaign, and he’s taking them to task for having (shall we say) the wrong priorities during this recession. According to the narrator in a new TV ad:

A governor can create jobs by selling the advantages of Georgia to firms looking for a home. But it’s hard for industry to take us seriously when the Legislature attempts to outlaw stem cell research, passes bills about microchips in the brain, and talks about seceding from the Union.

The new ad reminded us about the legislative debate surrounding one of the GOP's misplaced priorities – the microchip bill, which makes it a misdemeanor to implant a microchip in someone without their consent. And when we found the full story, we wondered how on earth we’d missed it the first time.

From a committee hearing about the microchip bill:

“I’m also one of the people in Georgia who has a microchip,” the woman said. Slowly, she began to lead the assembled lawmakers down a path they didn’t want to take. (…)

She spoke of the “right to work without being tortured by co-workers who are activating these microchips by using their cell phones and other electronic devices.”

She continued. “Microchips are like little beepers. Just imagine, if you will, having a beeper in your rectum or genital area, the most sensitive area of your body. And your beeper numbers displayed on billboards throughout the city. All done without your permission,” she said.

It was not funny, and no one laughed.

“Ma’am, did you say you have a microchip?” asked state Rep. Tom Weldon (R-Ringgold).

“Yes, I do. This microchip was put in my vaginal-rectum area,” she replied. [Republican State Rep. Ed] Setzler, the sponsoring lawmaker, sat next to the witness – his head bowed.

One can only hope that the woman was playing some elaborate, Candid-Camera-style joke on the legislators. Nobody thought so at the time, and amazingly, the Republican-controlled State Senate then approved the bill without so much as a second thought.

But the best joke from this whole sorry episode probably comes from the Democratic candidate now making this an issue, who notes in his stump speech, “If somebody holds me down and drives a microchip into my head, it had better be more than just a damn misdemeanor!”