Say what you will about Rep. Dana Rohrabacher. Love him or hate him, he’s always interesting.

I think it’s because of his passion. I’ll never forget his House floor speech last year blasting President Bush in a sprawling stem-winder drawing an odd thread from the World Trade Center Tower bombings of 1993 with the Oklahoma City blast and the until-then ignored pleas to free border patrol agents Ignacio Ramos and José Compean. I spent most of it slack-jawed as he unloaded on his fellow Republican. It’s not something that happens every day, and certainly not since Tom DeLay’s or Newt Gingrich’s reign over the GOP, political machines that prided themselves on keeping the representatives in line to the extent that they sounded mostly like robots to me. Rohrabacher’s no shrinking violet, that’s for sure.

But he’s also the kind of representative to introduce sort of eccentric legislation, and he loves to sound off on international affairs. Don’t even get him started on China. He never misses a chance to criticize the government there. On Friday, he commented on the Port of Los Angeles’ cancellation of its contract for port security scanning units that were made by the Beijing-based Nuctech Company.

“America should not be dependent on a potential enemy to provide national security equipment,” Rohrabacher said in his press statement. “When the Chinese government quits jailing political opponents and persecuting religious believers, maybe then we can start talking about buying their scanners.”

He’s got a point, folks. I’ve long been a fierce critic of the Chinese government as well, especially since the Tiananmen Square protests and subsequent government crackdown in 1989.

But what caught my attention today was Rohrabacher’s bill to give DC residents a chance to vote for their federal lawmakers as residents of Maryland. This is all caught up in the DC Statehood movement.  There have been numerous failed attempts to win statehood for DC over the past few decades. While I was out in DC last week I saw posters advocating it, including one that appropriated an Obama catch-phrase: “DC Statehood: Yes, we can.”

The latest attempt — HR 157 — would give DC voters a chance to elect a member of the House of Representatives, but no senators. Right now, they can vote for president and vice-president, but that’s it.

Rohrabacher’s chief of staff Rick Dykema thinks the Supreme Court will toss that legislation if it happens to pass. So Rohrabacher’s legislation is a “Plan B.”

I’m sure plenty of statehood advocates would object to Rohrabacher’s proposal, but it does make some sense.

A little background here: The District of Columbia was formed out of land that was originally in Maryland and Virginia. It was 100 square miles in a diamond shape, Dykema said. In 1800 Congress exercised its authority to govern DC, making it a federal city. In 1846, though, the part that had been in Virginia was given back to Virginia. So Rohrabacher’s suggesting that DC voters go back to voting for the congressional members representing Maryland.

“We think ours makes the most sense,” Dykema said. “It restores the same voting rights residents of DC had taken away in 1800.”

Rohrabacher testified on his proposal before the subcomittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights and Civil Liberties Tuesday.

He said his proposal “provides not just voting representation in the House, but in the Senate as well, and gives DC residents the ability to swing 11 Maryland electoral votes, rather than the three they now have to themselves.”

It would limit the DC voters to voting in federal elections still.

“Although getting to vote for federal representatives without voting for state officials seems unusual, it is not unprecedented, and precedent shows it is within congressional authority,” Rohrabacher testified, citing how those living abroad are able to vote in federal elections.

If, as Rohrabacher predicts, HR 157 is signed into law by President Obama and then is struck down by the High Court, Rohrabacher’s bill will be on the table ready to go.

So what’s Rohrabacher’s interest in all this anyway? He used to serve on the DC committee in Congress until it was disbanded after Gingrich ascended to House Speaker.

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