Key Lawmaker on Capitol Hill Loses His Driver's License

Now some fresh pickings from the Political Grapevine:

Drive Me Crazy

Michigan Congressman John Conyers, the chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, temporarily lost his driver's license this summer. The Associated Press reports that the check Conyers wrote to pay his renewal bounced.

The 81-year-old Democrat eventually paid the fee and his suspension, which began on June 30 was lifted July 26. His office says the account connected to the check had recently been closed.

The AP reports Conyers isn't the only Michigan congressional candidate with a blemished driving record. It found that 11 of them combined for a total of 18 speeding tickets, four citations and three suspensions.

Contents Under Pressure

A climate change group has apologized for a violent video that the group admits "missed the mark."

British clean energy group 10-10 released a video called "No Pressure." In it, a schoolteacher tells students about clean-energy alternatives. When two of the students decide not to participate, she whips out a detonator and blows them up.

This thread plays throughout a four-minute video with no explanation for three minutes, until a woman's voice asks "Care to join us? No pressure."

10-10 pulled the ad from its website, but says it won't try to remove copies that exist elsewhere online.

Hat in the Ring

And finally, the street performer in New York's Times Square known as "The Naked Cowboy" is throwing his 10-gallon hat into the ring for president. The cowboy, whose real name is Robert Burck, is the son of a career politician with a college degree in political science.

Burck's press release reveals his 2012 platform, which aims "to achieve a much smaller -- fiscally responsible -- decentralized federal government -- a robust economy run strictly on free market principles, and the strongest national defense on Earth."

We can only speculate about what he would wear to the inauguration if he won.