SEIU Plants 500 Protesters on Bank of America Employee's Lawn

Now some fresh pickings from the Political Grapevine:

Scare Tactics?

Fortune columnist and Fox News contributor Nina Easton is calling a recent protest outside her neighbor's home a form of "personal intimidation." Easton writes, "Last Sunday... 500 screaming, placard-waving strangers [were] on a mission to intimidate my neighbor." That neighbor is Greg Baer, a deputy general counsel at Bank of America.

Easton says 14 school buses brought demonstrators from the Service Employees International Union and the National Political Action Group, carrying signs and bullhorns up Baer's front steps to denounce bank foreclosures. She writes Baer's teenage son was alone in the house and locked himself in the bathroom until his dad was able to get home.

The SEIU maintains the protesters did nothing illegal and remained peaceful.

Newfangled Gadgets

While many lawmakers embrace new media — including Facebook and Twitter — some senators appear to have little or no contact with the decades-old technology of ATMs.

The Washington Post reports 69-year-old Nebraska Democrat Ben Nelson told a local paper, "I've never used an ATM. It's true — I don't know how to use one."

Nelson's Nebraska colleague, Republican Mike Johanns, says he has used his ATM card fewer than five times. Iowa's Chuck Grassley, the ranking Republican on the Finance Committee, says he has a bank card, but doesn't use it for cash.

ATMs have been around since 1969.

Cut It Out

House Democrats are dismissing as a gimmick the Republicans' YouCut initiative that encourages people to go online or text their vote for spending programs that should be cut.

Florida Democrat Alcee Hastings voiced his own concern over who exactly might be voting:

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. ALCEE HASTINGS, D-FLA.: This is not "American Idol" or "Dancing With the Stars." This is America's legislature. For all we know, on YouCut, Usama bin Laden could be voting.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

No word on whether UBL would vote online or by texting.

— Fox News Channel's Lanna Britt contributed to this report.