ST gave you the scoop earlier, and I touched on the matter at my own blog yesterday, but it’s now common knowledge (across the blogosphere, anyway) that the “constituent” who got “roughed up” by Allen staffers the other day is a Daily Kos member who basically was stalking the Senator and rightfully got what he deserved.

Now he’s been hired by…are you ready for this?…Air America:

University of Virginia Law school student Mike Stark is now a member of the press.

Stark, whose scuffle with Sen. George Allen’s supporters at a campaign stop Tuesday in Charlottesville made national news, has been hired as a reporter for a liberal talk show.

Arianne Schrodel, a spokeswoman for the show titled “The Young Turks,” said the 38-year-old Stark would be the show’s first “street reporter.”

The show bills itself as “the first nationwide liberal talk show and first live, daily Internet TV show.” It airs live Monday through Friday from 6 a.m. to 9 a.m. on Air America radio and via Webcast. The show, based in Los Angeles, began broadcasting in 2002.

Stark would not say how much he was being paid as a reporter for the show. He also said he was uncertain if he would cover the Virginia senate campaign because of study demands at U.Va.

“This job is totally secondary to law school,” said Stark. “But the main reason they’re hiring me is because of the void in the media of asking difficult questions of powerful people.”

“First nationwide liberal talk show”….yeah. How’d that work out, anyway?

It’s quite obvious what the scam is here. Hire him, give him a press pass, then unleash him to go out an stalk Allen. Only this time, he’ll be legit, because he can say “I’m a member of the media.” Except he isn’t, really.

And it’s behavior that Air America certainly can get behind, after all.

Brian runs the website Iowa Voice, and is filling in for ST for a few days.