The LA Times reports that Scooter Libby was epically obsessed with Joseph Wilson. Monitored his every media appearance. Encouraged the White House to “mount an aggressive public campaign against him.” And, in a particularly chilling instance of malicious fixation, “dictated the format for internal memos [regarding Wilson], including that paragraphs be indented.” MORE »

President Bush may have skipped U2’s DC concerts this week, but his work wife (one of them, anyway) didn’t, at least according to an operative who writes:

There I stood, squished up against the rail on the floor of the U2 concert on the 20th (also was there on the 19th - both shows rocked) when in swirled the Condi and her posse of Secret Service on my left. She conveniently missed Damien Marley’s opening act. Anti-Jamaica but pro-Ireland? I would have loved to see her reaction when Bono went on one of his many not so subtle politically charged rants and 23,000 people seemed to be agreeing with him.

Well, maybe, oh, 22,398 or so. Remember, along with Hillary Clinton, John Thune, Mary Bono, Darrell Issa, Eric Cantor, and a few more Republican politicians were using the shows for fund-raising purposes too. — GREG BEATO MORE »

With only a bunch of boring nobodies who might as well be straight spilling their same-sex longings on National Coming Out Day last week, Washington Blade editor Kevin Naff is pointing his finger at a few celebrity candidates, including:

Shepard Smith, who hosts a popular program on Fox News and received widespread praise for his work covering Hurricane Katrina

Wonkette sponsors
Bring us such cheer
To be one too
Please click here. MORE »

A seven-figure book deal for telling “exuberant, in-your-face” tales about how he convinced state chairmen to share their voter lists? Yes, former DNC Chairman Terry McAuliffe truly is a “fundraiser extraordinaire.” But according to an operative who was exuberantly draining bottles of Argentinian red with McAuliffe at Olive’s the other night, his anecdotes are pretty entertaining. Herewith, a rough transcription of a typical McAuliffe monologue:

Wednesday night at the convention, sitting in my box, all of a sudden I hear a scuffle behind me, yelling and screaming. My security guys were getting into a scuffle with P. Diddy, who was in the box. One of the political operatives had said he should put a coat on over his “VOTE OR DIE” T-shirt, and he wasn’t happy about it. MORE »

Special Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald has launched a new website, devoted to his investigation of Plamegate. But as Fitzgerald spokesman Randall Samborn told WaPo’s Dan Froomkin, it’s “still a work in progress.” Meaning? No Cheney mug-shot T-shirts for sale yet, just a bunch of press releases and stuff. Also, they’re having problems with “some document formatting issues that [they're] still resolving.” So, indictments as soon as they learn HTML? Or maybe just Fitzgerald’s favorite ’80s bands as soon as he learns to podcast? Either way, we can hardly wait. — GREG BEATO MORE »

Rep. Henry Waxman (D - CA) wants to know why FEMA is paying Carnival Cruise Lines so much to rent three cruise ships to house Hurricane Katrina evacuees. In 2002, Waxman discovered, Carnival had gross revenues of $150 million over six months. In 2005, it’s charging the federal government $238 million for the same time-period, even though for this particular journey, it doesn’t have to burn any fuel (the ships are docked) or pay as many employees as usual (the bars and casinos are closed). MORE »

So the NYT has reported that most, if not all, of the president’s men “have been advised that they may be in serious legal jeopardy.” But are we talking Judith Miller serious here, or just Barney Miller serious? Below, we explain the differences between “serious legal jeopardy” and “frivolous legal jeopardy.” — GREG BEATO MORE »

Bill O’Reilly, faintly croaking on The Today Show: “To fight every single day of my life, which is literally what I do in this culture war, this intense battle, it just sucks the energy out of you. So, I’m like an athlete. My body’s going to break down sooner or later under the stress of this.” MORE »

It looks like Larry Wilkerson finally learned something from the neo-cons: Appeasement doesn’t work. Eschewing diplomacy of any kind, the former chief of staff of the State Department fired away during a speech he gave at the New America Foundation yesterday, charging Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld with hijacking American foreign policy and basically ruining everything. Some of his assessments of other administration staff? Douglas Feith: “Seldom in my life have I met a dumber man.” Condoleezza Rice: “Extremely weak.” President Bush: a practitioner of “cowboyism.” And Wilkerson himself? Apparently he’s the guy who got outmaneuvered by a bunch of dumb, extremely weak cowboyists. Pretty entertaining speaker though. — GREG BEATO MORE »

How low are Air America’s ratings in DC? So low “Arbitron couldn’t detect a measurable listenership for the station this time around.” But is there any truth to the rumor that Chris Matthews in a crowded restaurant actually gets more listeners than the typical Air America broadcast? As far as we know, no. But still: what the hell happened to the liberal media elite’s insularity and self-absorption? — GREG BEATO MORE »

You say you want a Big Mac with a nice, juicy lawsuit on the side? Not if James Sensenbrenner (R - WI) has anything to say about it. He and his colleagues in the House of Representatives voted 307-119 in favor of a bill that prohibits fatties from suing burger chains for making crappy food too cheap and delicious. In a refreshingly blunt style, the probable fitness freak Sensenbrenner expounds: “As one judge put it, if a person knows or should know that eating copious orders of super-sized McDonald’s products is unhealthy and could result in weight gain, it is not the place of the law to protect them from their own excesses.” Idle thought: Does Opensecrets.org track french fry contributions? — GREG BEATO MORE »