ARIZONA: Teabagger Flag Granted Same Legal Protections As U.S. Flag

Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer has signed a bill granting the Tea Party flag the same legal protection as the American flag. Properly known as the Gadsden flag, homeowners associations are now barred by state law from banning its display.

Current law overrides any rules when it comes to the U.S. flag, the flags of any branch of the military, the state flag, the POW-MIA flag and the flag of any Indian nation. The new law will add the Gadsden flag to that protected list, that yellow flag with the drawing of a coiled rattlesnake and the phrase “Don’t Tread on Me.”

RELATED: My pal Dr. Jeff and I recently spotted the Tea Party flag flying from the upper windows of an Upper East Side megamillion dollar townhouse. Fight the power!

ARIZONA: Jan Brewer Vetoes Birther Bill, Approves Bill Restricting Gay Adoption

Today Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer drew the ire of fellow teabaggers when she vetoed a bill requiring presidential candidates to submit a birth certificate in order to be placed on the state ballot.

Brewer said in her veto letter that she was troubled that the bill empowered Arizona's secretary of state to judge the qualifications of all candidates when they file to run for office. "I do not support designating one person as the gatekeeper to the ballot for a candidate, which could lead to arbitrary or politically motivated decisions," said Brewer, who was secretary of state until she became governor in 2009. "In addition, I never imagined being presented with a bill that could require candidates for president of the greatest and most powerful nation on Earth to submit their 'early baptismal circumcision certificates' among other records to the Arizona secretary of state," she said. "This is a bridge too far."

Also today Brewer approved a bill requiring that married opposite-sex couples be given first preference in all adoption decisions. According to the bill's opponents, this may effectively mean the end of gay adoption in Arizona.

Senate Bill 1188, which was sponsored by Sen. Linda Gray, R-Glendale, would require an adoption agency to "give primary consideration to adoptive placement with a married man and woman." It permits the agency to consider a single person if, among other things, the child's best interests require the adoption by a single person or if a married couple is not available and the alternative is extended foster care. The bill applies to both state and private adoption agencies. Previously, only Utah has a law requiring priority for married couples, though several other states have bans on adoptions by same-sex couples or by unmarried couples.

ARIZONA: Federal Appeals Court Blocks Gov. Jan Brewer's Anti-Immigrant Law

Today the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals upheld a lower court's ruling that Arizona does not have the right to create its own laws on immigration.

The original law was enacted in April 2010 after Arizona officials argued that they needed their own immigration law to deal with the growing problem of unauthorized immigration from across the Mexican border. In general, the law establishes a variety of immigration-related actions as state offenses and defines what local and state officials can do to enforce the new law. The law immediately sparked boycotts and protests across the nation as immigration activists argued that Arizona was trying to usurp a federal prerogative to define immigration rules and had proposed unconstitutional actions, including profiling. The law also required police to check immigration status when enforcing other laws. The Obama administration's Justice Department sued to block the law from going into effect. It argued that the federal government had the responsibility for immigration law.

Among the now-banned policies put forth by Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer was an instruction to the police that they were to stop and demand the papers of anybody they "reasonably suspected" of being in the country illegally.