After a week that saw the expected entries of Republicans Frank Antenori, Dave Sitton and Jesse Kelly into the CD8 special election to fill Gabrielle Giffords' empty seat, there's buzz that a fourth Republican might get into the April 17 GOP primary: Martha McSally.

The name didn't ring a bell for us, but she's got an impressive bio on her Facebook page:

Colonel Martha McSally was a pilot in the United States Air Force. She was the first American woman to fly in combat since the 1991 lifting of the prohibition of women in combat. McSally is also the first woman to command a USAF fighter squadron, the 354th Fighter Squadron (354 FS) based at Davis-Monthan Air Force Base. McSally is an A-10 Thunderbolt II pilot.

Military career

McSally graduated from St. Mary Academy - Bay View and then the United States Air Force Academy in 1988. She earned a Master's degree from Harvard University's John F. Kennedy School of Government. She earned her wings at Laughlin AFB, Texas and was initially assigned as a First Assignment Instructor Pilot (FAIP) in the T-37. She was selected for Lead-in Fighter Training (LIFT) in 1993, completed the Replacement Training Unit for the A-10 Thunderbolt II, was assigned to an operational A-10 squadron and was deployed to Kuwait in January 1995. During that deployment, she flew combat patrol over Iraq under Operation Southern Watch, enforcing the no-fly zone. In 2000, she reported to Joint Task Force Southwest Asia (JTF-SWA) in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia for a temporary assignment in support of Operation Southern Watch. In July 2004, she took command of the A-10 equipped 354th Fighter Squadron, and was subsequently deployed to Afghanistan under Operation ENDURING FREEDOM, where she employed weapons in combat for the first time. In 2005, McSally and her squadron were awarded the David C. Shilling Award, given by the Air Force Association for the best aerospace contribution to national defense.

McSally is not a household name and time is short: Signatures for the race are due by Feb. 27. Money will be hard to raise. (We hear Dave Sitton is doing well in that department, while Antenori is struggling to pull in dollars.) On the other hand, getting into a race like this could do wonders for your name ID and maybe even put you in a position in the upcoming regular election later this year...

Here's part of a story about McSally challenging the requirement that she dress in Muslim garb while serving in Saudi Arabia from 60 Minutes:

Who knows what we'll actually do with Pinterest, other than share some photos from our website and maybe some that didn't make the paper, but we're on there and we'll be adding stuff as we get around to it. So, if you want to follow us, we'd be happy to follow you and we'll let the Pinterest magic wash over us together.

Deep vocals, fast guitar strumming and a top hat describe Fred Eaglesmith, the singer/songwriter who publishes his own albums. He makes his way to Tucson on Saturday with the Fabulous Ginn Sisters for a show at Plaza Palomino. Though Eaglesmith's music is often classified as alternative country, his songs also seem to have a mix of blues, rock, folk and salsa styles.

And he's not just a talented musician, he's also a painter!

Here's what Tucson Weekly's Stephen Seigel said about Eaglesmith in 2010:

In many ways, Fred Eaglesmith is like a Canadian James McMurtry: Eaglesmith writes story-songs focusing on the travails of the common man living in the heartland. His early work is, in fact, reminiscent of the Texas songwriter tradition from which McMurtry springs, even in its instrumentation. But somewhere along the way, Eaglesmith got a bit more sonically interesting than that.

For more information, visit the Rhythm and Roots website.

Slate's Dahlia Lithwick thinks Stephen Colbert has done an admirable job of focusing attention on the spending machines known as Super PACS:

When President Obama criticized Citizens United two years ago in his State of the Union address, at least three justices came back at him with pitchforks and shovels. In the end, most court watchers scored it a draw. But when a comedian with a huge national platform started ridiculing the court last summer, the stakes changed completely. This is no pointy-headed deconstruction unspooling on the legal blogs. Colbert has spent the past few months making every part of Justice Anthony Kennedy’s majority opinion in Citizen United look utterly ridiculous. And the court, which has no access to cameras (by its own choosing), no press arm, and no discernible comedic powers, has had to stand by and take it on the chin.

• Arizona Opera
• Flower Duet

The opera comes to Tucson this weekend. Arizona Opera describes in a press release:

Arizona Opera’s production of “Madama Butterfly” features sopranos Shu-Ying Li and Jill Gardner sharing the title role of the trusting geisha abandoned by her American naval officer husband. One of the most challenging parts in the opera repertoire, Butterfly or Cio-Cio San is on stage for nearly the entire opera’s duration and sings some of Puccini’s greatest and most emotive music, including the popular aria “Un bel dì.”

Matthew Erikson, the public relations manager with Arizona Opera, describes the storyline as follows:

The basic storyline is that ugly American military officer abandons trusting geisha. Even after a 3-year absence, Butterfly (Cio-Cio-San) faithfully awaits the return of her beloved Pinkerton, holding onto her dreams of passionate love and their child, whom she has named Sorrow. When at last he arrives, Butterfly discovers he has married someone else. Her heart shattered, she must find a way to soar above disgrace and restore her honor. With sets that evoke a Nagasaki village, the Arizona Opera production includes one of the most sought-after interpreters of “Madama Butterfly,” Chinese soprano Shu-Ying Li.

When:
February 4, 7:30 p.m. and
February 5, 2 p.m.
Where:
Tucson Music Hall

For tickets, call the Arizona Opera Box Office at 520-293-4336 or visit Ticketmaster.
For more information, visit the Arizona Opera website.

Below the cut, a video preview of the show from Arizona Opera:

Tonight on Arizona Illustrated's Political Roundtable: Jeff Rogers, chairman of the Pima County Democratic Party, and Sam Stone, the former spokesman for the Pima County Republican Party, discuss the special election to fill the seat recently vacated by Gabrielle Giffords, as well the union-busting bills at the Arizona Legislature and the Arizona presidential primary. Plus, pollster Margaret Kenski stops by to talk about the voters in CD8 with Andrea Kelly and me.

Tune in at 6:30 p.m. tonight on Channel 6 or stop by here later when we post it online.

Andrew Collberg has lived in Sweden, New Zealand and Arizona, so it's safe to say his music has been influenced by different cultures and musical styles. With a blend of acoustic guitar, raw vocals and slower tempos, Collberg offers songs and performances that create a "feel-good" effect on his listeners.

The release of his 7-inch record kicks off Friday with a show at Borderlands Brewing Co. with fellow Fort Lowell acts Tracy Shedd and Young Mother and an after party at Plush. For more event and album information, check out the Fort Lowell Records website.

I had no idea that they did these 30 Rock animated webisodes, but anytime you can get Donald Glover, Ryan Adams and Michael McDonald together, I'm in.

While I'm sure their 56 Facebook friends will be devastated, 97.5 "Bob FM" will be no more in a few minutes, as Cumulus Media flips the station to "i97.5", which I guess is supposed to make you think of iPhones or something. Cumulus has other stations with the "lower case letter I" theme, including Indianapolis' WRWM, so if you're looking for a station that plays The Fray, Adele, Katy Perry, Gavin DeGraw and Selena Gomez (WRWM's top five artists over the last five days) another place to hear the KRQ playlist, you're probably in luck. If you're looking for some sort of local presence or personality, you're still going to need to look elsewhere. But, hey, they're playing N*SYNC's "Bye Bye Bye" now, so there's that.

UPDATE, although probably no one cares: They're going to play 10,000 songs in a row without a commercial break, kicking off with LMFAO's "Party Rock Anthem", a song you certainly CAN'T HEAR ANYWHERE ELSE. Sigh.

• Zachary Vito

Republican Jesse Kelly has jumped into the CD8 special election to fill the open seat left by Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords’ resignation.

“We need lower taxes, a strong economy and more jobs,” Kelly said in a meeting with reporters this morning.

Kelly, who narrowly lost to Giffords in 2010, had been planning to announce his plan to challenge her again in 2012, but after the Jan. 8 shooting rampage, he dropped out of the political spotlight. In recent months, he has been spending much of his time in San Antonio, Texas, where his family’s construction business, Don Kelly Construction, has won a contract for part of a major public-works project.

The Kelly campaign did not have details on the San Antonio project available this morning, but said they would provide them later.

Kelly, a political rookie in 2010 who adopted a Tea Party approach to government that included a mish-mash of tax policy that ranged from a 10 percent income tax for all Americans to a new federal sales tax of 25 percent on all goods and services, caught lightning in a bottle for his first congressional run. But it remains to be seen if he can replicate his campaign team—at least two key players, campaign manager Adam Kwasman and deputy campaign manager Stuart McDaniel—are busy with their own campaigns, although other key players, including spokesman John Ellinwood, are back with Kelly for the special-election run.

In addition, some of his previous supporters are now gravitating toward state Sen. Frank Antenori, another Tea Party-backed Republican.

Kelly, who said today he wanted to replace all income and payroll taxes with a single 10 percent flat tax on all Americans, said he would not be attacking any of his fellow Republican candidates.

“The campaign is going to be a positive campaign,” Kelly said. “The campaign is going to be about each candidate representing themselves. … I don’t anticipate any kind of negative campaign.”

But Antenori has already been taking shots at Kelly for dropping out of Southern Arizona politics in the wake of the Jan. 8 shooting.

“What's really astonishing is that (Kelly) had no intentions of running in the normal election, and he had already started cutting staff away, and all of a sudden, Mr. Opportunity is back in town,” Antenori complained last week.