The Census Comes to Town! Michele Bachmann Locks the Door

Republicans are having a rough month. Not only is Mark Sanford sighing to anyone with five minutes and a notepad over his lost soul mate -- that would be Maria Chapur, not one of the "handful of women" he's had dalliances with over the course of his marriage -- but Rep. Michele Bachmann (R -Minn.) can't stop railing against her arch nemesis, the U.S. Census Bureau.

Bachmann told The Washington Times that she will refuse to respond to the upcoming 2010 census with any information other than the number of people living in her house. Understandably, some of her colleagues in the GOP -- also members of the Subcommittee on Information Policy, Census and National Archives -- were less than pleased at this turn of events. "Boycotting the constitutionally mandated Census is illogical, illegal and not in the best interest of our country," said a statement from Republican Reps. Patrick McHenry of North Carolina, Lynn Westmoreland of Georgia and John Mica of Florida.

They may have also been puzzled by Bachmann's opposition since this year's census is a short-form census -- just the basics, including names, ages, ethnicity, length of time in house -- and does not collect the socio-economic data that's been part of the census in the past. Of course, refusing to complete the census is also, by the way, a crime, which Bachmann, as a member of the legislative branch, presumably knows.

Michele Bachmann may not like the census, but it would be beneficial to her to be included in the count. Not only does census data determine the allocation of state and federal funds that Bachmann would almost certainly like to continue receiving for her district, it also has a use that could hit even closer to home; census data is used to draw districts and distribute seats in the House of Representatives.